Thank you for your vote.
| Given OCCPS recommends five additional officers bringing the OPP quote closer to the KPS quote, should council be revisiting their decision? |
| No |
100 |
42% |
| Yes |
136 |
58% |
| Total Votes:
236 |
|
Bob smith (
December 20, 2008)
Enough is enough. Lets get on with the OPP policing our city. Council was elected – the police service board was not. When did the tail start to wag the dog. HELLO 4.5% wage increase for the KPS. Nine KPS officers making over$90.000 a year. Give me a break. |
LENNY (
December 20, 2008)
I'd like to go on record for stating the following suggestion (R C M P) but this won't happen so let's all do ourselves a favour and go OPP. Its a no brainer. |
The real cost. (
December 20, 2008)
I was wondering if anyone else had questioned that petition because I noticed some of those same problems. However, my concern deals with real people, not statistics. For argument sake, if the KPS is now given the contract, 11 OPP officers will be transferred out of our community. Yes, they will have an opportunity to join the KPS, but everyone knows they will not and will leave. That is 11 established professionals, many with spouses with good jobs as nurses, teachers etc. I am proud to know some of these officers and they and their families are "doers" in our city. They are coaches, volunteers with children who are enrolled in everything from swimming to hockey. What is the impact, both economically and socially, to the loss of 11 active families with well paying jobs? I hear some complain that the OPP officers do not have a connection to Kenora? That is simply not true. I know at least 5 officers here now that were born and raised here! One of the statistics that came out during this actually showed that a significantly higher percentage of current OPP officers in Kenora had lived here more than 10 years. Perhaps more telling, are the large number of retired OPP officers still living here. Some people need to stop getting caught up in negative politics and take a closer look. |
Concerned citizen (
December 20, 2008)
I remind citizens to attend the meeting at Monday noon at city hall where policing will be voted on, as council did not give adequate notice of this meeting. |
One of the Fools (
December 20, 2008)
You know what, it is telling when some resort to name calling on such a large issue. Here's a fact some will not like; The so called petition to keep the KPS, the one that a few always seem to gravitate to in order to justify bad behaviour is ridiculously flawed. During the course of that petition process, I was almost bullied into signing it without even having the chance to read it. Further, it has 2 spots for information; 1. A Printed Name and 2. a Signature. There was no place to put an age, an address .......NOTHING to show any proof that the person(s) signing it even paid taxes in this town. Here are some of the things I saw at different locations where it was posted. I saw folks putting down more than one name, I saw people from out of town encouraged to sign, I saw full pages with the same handwriting, I saw young kids being encouraged to sign, I saw the same names showing up in different stores. Quite frankly, it was a joke. Anyone ever officially vet this thing? Not blood likely. Council had better get this soon or the BS and misinformation from the noisy few will bury all good common sense. |
AAArrrrggggHHHH! (
December 20, 2008)
Pay Attention! Read the previous posts, read the actual bids, read the actual OCCOPS findings. The KPS has good people, what they will never have is access to sufficient resources to provide the tools necessary to properly the job mandated in this day and age. The numbers are nowhere near close when you talk of actual bodies on the street doing the actual work. The OPP will have 87. THATS 87 officers available ....IMMEDIATELY!. Where the heck do you think the KPS is even going to find the additional 10, 15, 20? officers to even start meeting the standard? How much will it cost to train the new officers? How many training spots would the KPS manage to get at the Ontario Police College even if they found them? How about asking some hard questions of the KPS bid for a change? The statistics used to mandate the officers have been provided by the KPS. Does anyone really believe that Kenora has worse social issues/problems than Sioux Lookout or Red Lake... but they don't fall in the same category for crime rates that Kenora does? How is the KPS reporting their incidents compared to other regional communities? How about this one; "Anybody in the media ever ask what the difference in City insurance premiums might be when we don't have to be liable for a police service?" We currently have 20,000,000 in outstanding law suits right now? Are there other liability issues pending? These are questions our media should be asking. |
Hockey dad (
December 20, 2008)
Fools, this is no longer a KPS vs the OPP question. The question is what deal with the devil did our council make in order to ignore all of the information put before them showing the Watkins proposal was incorrect. OCCOPS said the numbers were wrong, Tom Gervais, the Police Services Advisor for the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services said the numbers were slanted and wrong, Howard Hampton said the numbers were wrong and every deputation put towards coucil proves the numbers were wrong.
And now council is prepared on Monday to give the OPP a blank check.
And it is a blank check. The OPP gave Watkins a quote over a year ago using 2003 support costs. C'mon people, I dont care what side of the argument you are on here, the numbers are so old they stink. The council is going into Mondays meeting making assumptions on what the cost is yet not knowing for sure. Look at your own money. If something in your budget took 25 cents from every dollar you spend, would you not take more than five minutes to investigate it? If you wouldn't, then you are a fool. |
Above all, process must be observed. (
December 20, 2008)
This decision must be revisited. The OPP have been instructed to modify their bid twice now, and KPS must be allowed an opportunity to do the same.
Kenora has a good police force with a plan in place to service our unique policing needs. Why do we need another "cookie cutter" solution imposed on us from Southern Ontario? The fact that the numbers are likely similar makes the McCann team decision to ram this through makes it all the more repugnant.
If we're going to have any influence at all, I think we all need to concentrate on Councillor McMillan. He was the one councillor whose decision confounded most citizens. He was seduced by some questionable numbers and negated his lifelong "Kenora community values" position in an instant. It's Time for Rory to stand up to the bullying, take a long hard look at the numbers and get back on track. This could be his most important legacy for his last term. He has to ask for a realistic review of the numbers.
send him a note: rmcmillan@kenora.ca He need to hear from us this weekend, before the special meeting at noon Monday, the meeting at which council will vote to dissolve the KPS.
I also think that this council has messed up the process so much that it should be dropped and re-visited by the next council. That will also give the KPS time to prove they can do the job. |
Enough Already (
December 20, 2008)
I am sick to death of reading the same 4 or 5 people rail on about their cause to save the KPS. Their officers are very capable, but will never have the resources to do all jobs properly. What you should be questioning is the 3 police board members that see fit to waste our money with ridiculous legal challenges. Most do not know, but they have an outstanding $37,000.00 bill that they don't have the money to pay and it is not the final bill. It is also estimated that every month that drags by on this costs us taxpayers an additional $80-100,000.00. Get this done already and dump those police service board members that feel they are smarter than the elected representatives. |
Progressive Redneck (
December 20, 2008)
I find it astonishing that we haven't had a rally to fire the Kenora Police Association, who have done nothing but spent thousands and thousands of taxpayers dollars trying to save their 'Christmas donkeys'.
The truth is that they work for our council and council should have dealt with them quickly and decisively. The majority of Kenorites like the idea of the OPP managing the town. Heck, even the Kenora police themselves like the idea. Even with 5 more officers handling the job, we will be getting more bang for our buck. No KPS officers will be losing their jobs and most of the civillian jobs will be kept. It's just our board and Jorgensen who will be going and they're the ones who are creating our town tonnes more of financial woes!
Does anyone care if taxpayers are handed an astronomical lawyers bill because of this board fighting this issue? We could've had this all settled and the transition gone smoothly and money saved had this gone through when it should've.
I hope our council stays strong at the helm and does what's good for our town.
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