Charity (
March 10, 2008)
I have sat back and watched the 'yes' votes suddenly climb one after the other. Seems like there is as much cheating going on here as there was throughout the police costing process! Successes that aren't earned are not worth having. No one should ever be that desperate. |
Informed member of the public (
March 10, 2008)
I wonder how many people have read the Final Report & Recommendation to the City of Kenora Police Costing Review Committee. If not here are a few very interesting comments in that report.
1. The Senior Crown Attorney and the Head of the Department of Pathology at Lake of The Woods District Hospital held strong opinions on the superior investigative qualities of the Ontario Provincial Police.
2. The process was mired by two factors. Chief Dan Jorgensen advised the Consultant in August 2007 that all correspondence with the Kenora Police Service had to be in writing which restricted the Consultant from having direct open discussion with any member of the Kenora Police Service as well as senior management of the Service. This restriction hindered the position of the Kenora Police Service by not allowing their full input or assisting them in designing their proposal. This requirement was never withdrawn during the process.
The second factor was the failure of the Kenora Police Services Board to provide the Ontario Provincial Police with the information that the OPP routinely seeks from municipal police services in developing a police costing. The requests relate to a variety of statistical and other information that is necessary to accurately determine the policing requirements of the community. The failure to provide this documentation created a situation where the OPP was deemed to not have had all of the information required to properly assess the policing requirements of the City. The Committee and Municipal Council have since required the production of these reports from the Kenora Police Services Board.
Then in the end recommendation. While the OPP have not had the benefit of all the information they requested in submitting their proposal they have committed to continuing all of the existing community programs and to provide additional community based programming as required.
The obvious question here is why did Chief Dan Jorgensen restrict the consultant`s ability to have open discussions with his officers and why did the Kenora Police Services Board not provide the requested material. It is not enough to say that they thought the review was somehow unfair as they would have to provide the same information and openness to employees to whoever did the consulting.
So many of you talk about being open and democratic, how open and democratic do you think this behavior is or is this what you will accept in order to maintain the Kenora Police Service. If you do then what will happen in the future.Beware of what you support or accept because in the end you just may get it.
3. The OPP report that they will be building and staffing a new 11,000 square foot Level-3 Forensic Laboratory in the City of Kenora with construction expected to commence in 2010. The actual staff requirements for this facility have not yet been determined but these staff positions will be funded provincially and will not result in additional cost downloads to the OPP contract in Kenora.
Perhaps more people should at least read the recommendations before arriving at an uninformed view. It is obvious that our media did not report on many factors that are important to the publc and as a result you are not getting the full picture. |
John (
March 10, 2008)
Villian, your comments suggest you believe the OPP to be above reproach. It’s fun to fling accusations around, but now let’s review some of the facts.
First of all, I completely understand people’s frustration and embarrassment over the Kakegamic fiasco, and I don't think you'll find anyone – either outside or inside the KPS – who thinks the case wasn't severely mishandled by the 3 officers who were ultimately singled out for discipline. They made bad choices, and the full extent of their liability will eventually be determined in the pending civil case.
However, we're talking about 3 officers who made these decisions, not the entire police force. Consider that the identification officer on that case was singled out by the judge as having been EXEMPLARY in his performance of duty. He's now the Chief of Police, by the way, fighting to save the local force. Consider too that the council of Treaty 3 VOLUNTEERED a letter in support of the KPS bid, based largely on the extensive efforts Jorgensen has been making since becoming Police Chief to mend fences, build bridges and WORK with First Nations communities. You squeeze out KPS, you lose a lot of hard won goodwill, because Treaty 3 has made it very clear that they would NOT be happy to see Jorgensen or the KPS go.
In short, it’s hardly fair to write off the whole police force based on the poor conduct of 3 officers. It’s pretty sanctimonious on your part, Villian, to presume KPS to be the only police force capable of making mistakes. The “highly professional” OPP, as you describe them, has had more than its fair share of scandals over the years. Unfortunately, sweeping out the KPS to bring in the OPP will not save the city from any legal fallout related to the Kakegamic case, and it certainly is no guarantee that future problems of this nature will never occur again. However, an open minded and well informed citizen would recognize that the KPS culture has changed significantly under Jorgensen's guidance, and it will only get better if he's allowed to continue down the current path. So please don't go degrading the whole force, and trying to bring these extremely positive gains to a screeching halt, because of mistakes made nearly a decade ago by a misguided few. That smacks of prejudice. The common goal here is to wipe out the way of thinking that underlies racism, bigotry and prejudice, not just point it at somebody else. If you want to fling accusations, get your facts up to date first.
SIDE NOTE: How ironic that it’s the KPS supporters who’ve been accused through all of this of being emotional and illogical. We’re passionate, yes! But I have yet to see a posting on any site, by any supporters of the OPP bid, that I can’t easily pick apart based on the FACTS. Stop being so emotional, OPP supporters. Get your facts straight for Pete’s sake! |
John (
March 10, 2008)
Folks, we need to add some perspective here. Let's look at this starting with Jan. 1, 2000 - amalgamation.
Before then, Kenora was responsible for the KPS budget only. The major problems with police costing have occurred since 2000, when the hybrid policing model came into effect and forced the city to start paying for two forces. Now that the city has been obliged to choose between those two forces, the question I'm hearing a lot is why hasn’t KPS been able to control its costs before now? Council themselves tossed that accusation freely about during the proposal submission interviews. What they should have been asking is, who really is to blame for driving up costs over that timeframe?
If you’d like an answer, just have a look at the following numbers.
First of all, here’s how many officers each force had to manage in its respective jurisdiction in 2007:
KPS: 35 (76% of total)
OPP: 11 (24% of total)
Here’s how many cases each force handled in 2006 (most recently available stats):
KPS: 2,036 (90.5% of total)
OPP: 212 (9.5% of total)
Now take a look at their respective budget increases between 2000 and 2007:
Total (hybrid force):
2000 - $3.47m
2007 - $6.00m
Increase $2.53m (73% total increase)
KPS:
2000 - $2.90m
2007 - $4.59m
increase - $1.69m (58% above KPS in 2000; 67% of total hybrid increase)
OPP:
2000 - $0.57m
2007 - $1.41m
increase - $0.84m (147% above OPP in 2000; 33% of total hybrid increase)
So here you can see that the OPP, who have 24% of the manpower and manage only 9.5% of the total workload, are in fact responsible for 33% of the TOTAL hybrid policing cost increase of the past 8 years.
Look through the consultant’s report all you like - you won't find these facts in there.
So… next reasonable question: How would KPS be able to bring costs under control in future? By off-loading these excessive increases brought on by the OPP budgets, KPS would have the resources to be able to afford to implement the proactive policing model outlined in their recent Business Plan – it’s an extremely well written and thought-provoking document that I highly encourage everyone to download off the city’s Web site and read. It shows very clearly how such a model would enable KPS to finally reduce Kenora’s excessively high crime rate, the only logical manner by which policing costs can be reduced. Why didn’t KPS undertake this approach before now? It was impossible because the hybrid policing model left them juggling more than 3 times the per-officer caseload as the OPP!
Now look at these projections for KPS vs. OPP budgets, based on the 2008 rates they bid in their respective proposals and then going forward 8 years applying the same rate of increase they each had in the past 8 years (i.e., KPS: 58%, OPP: 147%):
2008
KPS - $6.20m
OPP - $5.20m
2015:
KPS - $9.80m
OPP - $12.84m
Look at those numbers again! These projections, based on 8 years of ACTUAL PAST PERFORMANCE – which you can verify in public documents – would see the OPP start out in 2008 at a rate 19% lower than the KPS bid (if you overlook a lot of baseless and biased assumptions in the consultant's report that I won't get into at this point), and wind up 8 years from now costing 31% MORE than would the KPS. Again, this is based on ACTUAL DOCUMENTED PAST PERFORMANCE that was never pointed up during the bidding competition (except by Bob Stewart who wrote an editorial on it in the Jan. 29 edition that apparently no one paid much attention to). The OPP have presented no evidence to show that their proposal would lead to any reduction whatsoever in their existing rate of increase. The KPS, on the other hand, have provided a very CLEAR plan on how they would reduce their past rate of increase – which is already considerably lower than the OPP’s – by lowering the crime rate, given the resources to implement proactive policing. Taking this into account, the gap between the OPP and KPS budgets that I’ve projected above is actually CONSERVATIVE. It's very reasonable to assume that it will actually be much WORSE than 31% in 8 years; in any event, once OPP costs catch up and pass KPS, the gap will continue to widen, well, pretty much forever!
I sure hope these REAL numbers will help some folks to sort through all of the confusing double-talk that’s been tossed around over the past few months, mostly blaming Kenora’s rising policing costs on the KPS. The mayor and his consultant would like you to think KPS is to blame, but it just ain’t so.
But again, don't take my word for it. I dare anyone to refute these numbers and show a better case scenario under the OPP. You can't, because unlike all other anti-KPS pro-OPP arguments that have been put forth, these numbers are REAL! Go on, prove me wrong. I dare you. I know no one will, because to date only the KPS supporters have been dealing in fact while everyone else has been acting like a bunch of sheep. “Time to move on! Big Brother will take care of us! All this yackety-yak is hurting my head! Time to move on!” People, do your homework! If these facts were any more real they’d bite you in the arse – which is pretty much where anyone with a wallet in their back pocket is going to get it soon enough. |
~~no name~~ (
March 10, 2008)
Were a city NOT a town, towns that are too small for their own police force have OPP.. OPP is NOT Municipal It's Provincial keep it that way. Also most people can agree, they don't support one or they other..they don't agree on how it was done. |
STAN (
March 9, 2008)
I'm totally amazed how juvenile you people are by sitting there with absolutely nothing else better to do than stack the poll in favor of the stupid OPP! Don't you idiots realize that the Enterprise is well aware of how many times you press that 'yes' button,and, that you can loose your privileges for being moronic? I guess when you're losing, the only thing left to do is CHEAT! Remember – this is NOT American Idol! You only get ONE vote. |
(
March 9, 2008)
KPS down town office was just last minute posturing. Is it mannned 24/7?
It's time for OPP
|
(
March 9, 2008)
it's time to move on...
When KPS can't put a stop the the vandalism three nights in a row... and the come up with cut the
hedge down... it's definitely time. |
(
March 9, 2008)
When W-5 did there story on the KPS I was embarrassed for our Town. It's not about money IT'S TIME for OPP. |
(
March 9, 2008)
I believe a decision has been made and should be respected. Many people who are not tax payers signed the petition and also many people signed it more than once. Let's move forward in a professional manner. This issue is over; let it rest in peace. |
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