In Defense of the Edmonton Police
I was originally planning on starting up with our Provincial Politics exploration this week, but my brain is stuck on the idea of city budgets and allocations because of recent Edmonton City Council news regarding the police budget…. soooo we are sticking with Municipal Politics for one more week! I’m discovering that scathing sarcasm is my tool of choice when I’m feeling really frustrated. So just in case you can’t tell: this post was written as a satirical piece, very much tongue-in-cheek, and I hope you find it as cathartic as I did.
Why the Edmonton Police Service deserves their budget, and more!
The police are the single biggest line item in the City of Edmonton’s yearly budget at 15-16% (as of this April 27, 2020 document). That might seem like a lot, but as Police Chief Dale McFee pointed out, in cities like Chicago and Minneapolis the police take up as much as 38% of city budget. We should be taking our lead from SAFE American cities like these!!! Sure, Minneapolis’ police budget is now 0% because their police service turned out to be full of city-funded criminals and murderers, but, um, la-la-la, nevermind! Ha-ha! Let’s move onto our next point!
The City’s operating budget is $2.89 billion and the Edmonton Police Service (EPS) spend around $46.6 million per year. But let me remind you that $92 million of that is money the EPS made through the sweat of their own hands writing tickets, from Provincial grants, and also via transfers from the EPS’ Reserve fund (speaking of which, it’s so easy to save, I don’t understand why all Edmontonians don’t demand a City budget that gives them $7 million to invest into a reserve fund every year, like – lazy!). So really, the EPS’ “net operating budget” is only $37.3 million and that sounds like hardly anything, wouldn’t you agree?
According to their 2020-2022 Business Plan, 81% of the EPS budget goes towards paying its staff, which totals around 2,724 people. And I would like you to know, the EPS is working on their diversity. 67% of EPS staff are police officers, and 20% of those police officers are female, which means we’ve got around 365 female police officers! Like, one for every day of the year, we’re just drowning in women over here! Also, almost 12% of the Edmonton police force identifies as either indigenous or as a visible minority, and I think EPS deserve a big ol’ checkmark for that (I hope some of those visible minorities are also women because – two birds with one stone! High fives all ’round, bro).
Why are these EPS diversity numbers so great, you ask? Well, even though roughly 50% of the population is female, women are so cute and small, and 20% is such a cute, adorable number! Yes this 2016 census shows that visible minorities and indigenous peoples in Edmonton together make up 41% of the population, but what’s most important is that you know EPS are thinking about diversity – and it’s the thought that counts. Gold stars for all! ***confetti gets thrown, people shake white man’s hand***
Capital Budget police expenditures disappointing and small
Do you know the difference between an operating budget and a capital budget? Don’t feel bad, I didn’t before this week either. Basically the operating budget (that we were just talking about in the previous paragraphs) is the day-to-day costs for the year (like paying utility bills and salaries). But the City has this whole other budget called the capital budget. This budget is for longer term big projects such as constructing libraries, building roads, neighbourhood renewal, and buying land or, say, hellicopters.
We’ve already talked about the paltry funds our police have to work with in their operating budget, but they’re also being DENIED at the capital budget level. Admittedly, according to the City of Edmonton 2019-2022 Capital Budget, the EPS was recently approved for a $9.3 million Information Technology project. It looks like they also have another small amount, oh just around $101 million or so, in existing “Renewal” costs too (which includes “Police Asset Renewal” and two Police Stations), for a total of $110 million in capital budget funding. But what you don’t see on this list are all the items on the EPS “Wish List” that didn’t get funded.
For example, in their 2019-2022 Business Plan the EPS asked very nicely for a $7 million new canine facility (Fu-unn! The EPS canine unit has about 15 dogs and this would give us $466,666 per dog to really make their new bedrooms/offices totes snazzy! Yeah, we describe our current facility as “one of the finest kennel facilities in North America” but you can’t believe everything you read). Did the City fund this project? No. Amidst many other requests which didn’t get funded, the EPS also asked for $17.5 million in capital funding for a “Police Seized Vehicle Storage Lot”, which (again) they didn’t receive. Where will the cars sleep, I ask you? Outside, exposed to the elements? What are we, monsters?
Terrible, terrible recent news
I hate to bring you bad news like this, but City Council just voted to cut the police budget by $11 million dollars. DON’T WORRY, that cut will be spread out across 2 years, and it comes out after the $16 million increase that EPS got this year (based on the 4-year $75 million deal that City Council made back in 2018) so I guess what this cut really means is that EPS only got a $5 million raise this year… but still. It’s just awful for so, so many reasons. Below I present 3 serious reasons why this HUGE cut to the EPS’ yearly bonus will be catastrophic for Edmonton Police and city safety:
This budget cut means goodbye to the women and minorities. Remember those women and minorities that make up a WHOPPING 20% and 12% (respectively) of the police force? Well, budget cuts will force EPS to layoff these people, because keeping (white) senior officers happy and employed is more important than a representative police force or the safety of Edmontonians. Those are just the rules! We don’t make them. Oh, wait, the EPS do make the rules via their very-powerful-union the Edmonton Police Association… (in a secret Ol’ Boys Club room somewhere the EPA and EPS perform a secret congratulatory handshake).
The police are special and important and we need to give them all the money they ask for OR ELSE. Wait, that sounds threatening. What I mean is: or else our city will devolve into a lawless nightmare where people can get assaulted and kidnapped right out of a Circle K, for instance! We might end up in a place where assaults have to be recorded on video for anyone to be actually be found guilty and charged, and wouldn’t that be awful!
You know the best way to change systemic racism and violence within a system? By giving that system more money, of course! As Chief McFee states, the answer isn’t to take money away from EPS but rather to give them money to integrate “Community Safety” into the police force. The Community Safety division would just thrive in the EPS environment. It’s not like there is documented evidence of systemic anti-Black racism within Edmonton policing that we could look at, plus it’s so much more lovely to think of everyone frolicking together! I’m picturing spring flowers, BBQs and lots of photo ops, tra-la-la!
In defense of the poor police
Some Edmontonians (like the 15,000 at the BLM rally or 10,000+ who wrote letters to City Council) are acting like the EPS system creates meatheads hopped up on steroids. But really the system creates sensitive knights in shining armour, complete gentlemen! There are never any complaints about sexism or harassment, and if there ever was a complaint, I’m sure it would be dealt with promptly and without delays!
In conclusion, you simply can’t get rid of one of the original six without catastrophic consequences. If there are no more police, what will we do about mental health issues – actually get those people ongoing funded mental health services?! Or what about the homeless roaming our streets – do we give them homes? Most importantly, what costumes will we use for Strip-O-Grams if the police get retired???*
And with that, I rest my case.
* answer: obv. firefighters
