Report on Windsor police ‘overstaffing’ inaccurate, says chief

Windsor’s chief of police isn’t impressed by a study that says our area has one of the most overstaffed police forces in the country.

“It’s not accurate, from the Windsor police perspective, at all,” said Chief Al Frederick about the Police and Crime Rates report recently released by the Fraser Institute — a conservative think tank.

The study rates our Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) – which includes Windsor, LaSalle, Amherstburg, Tecumseh and Lakeshore — as the third worst out of 32 CMAs when it comes to efficient policing.

According to the report, our actual number of sworn officers per 100,000 population is far higher than our “ideal” number of officers, relative to our crime rate.

Only Saint John, N.B., and Winnipeg, Man., were ranked as being more overstaffed with police.

The study bases its analysis on Statistics Canada data from 2001 to 2011.

An excerpt from the Fraser Institute report Police and Crime Rates in Canada.

But Frederick pointed out that the study isn’t really about the efficiency of the Windsor Police Service or any other specific police service. The data concerns per capita rates, and does not distinguish between organizations.

As well, the figures used for the study are out of date, Frederick said. He noted that from 2011 to 2014, WPS reduced its complement of sworn officers by 26 — bringing the total from 466 in 2011 to 440 in 2014.

Frederick said the reduction was the cumulative result of retirements in the mid and upper management levels. At the same time, WPS actually grew its number of front-line officers through restructuring.

Windsor’s Chief of Police Al Frederick in April 2014. (Tyler Brownbridge / The Windsor Star)

“When I took over as chief, (I had) an obligation and a commitment to the community that our service would be just as effective, yet efficient,” Frederick said. “We identified some areas … We have really flattened the organization over the last three years.”

Finally, although the study mentions the consideration of “socio-economic factors” in a region’s ideal number of officers, Frederick feels it doesn’t go far enough to account for local circumstances and conditions.

For example, he pointed out that Windsor’s downtown core has about 26,000 seats at establishments with liquor licenses. That’s 26,000 potential drinkers in an eight-block radius, in a border city.

“Other communities, university towns — they prepare once a year for homecoming (type events), for that kind of influx,” Frederick said. “We prepare every weekend, year-round.”

There’s also the fact that Windsor hosts a major casino backed by the provincial government — with the province contributing full funding for 21 front-line officers.

“These are significant local variances,” Frederick said. “(The report) itself says it’s difficult to anticipate (such factors) from one community to another.”

Windsor police officers at the scene of a shooting, May 2014. (Nick Brancaccio / The Windsor Star)

Told of Frederick’s criticisms, the report’s author — Livio Di Matteo — mostly agreed.

He said the main reason for the Windsor CMA’s poor showing in the study is that our crime rate has dropped by 35 per cent over the analyzed period, but our number of officers per 100,000 population during that period has appeared to remain relatively the same.

“It doesn’t automatically mean you’re overstaffed. There may be extenuating factors,” Di Matteo said. “The report doesn’t go into all those … There are 32 CMAs — and 32 unique cases is a difficult way to structure a statistical study.”

Di Matteo said the study’s basic goal was to provide a benchmark that could then lead to more in-depth discussion on a local level.

Windsor police officers deploy tactical gear at a standoff, Sept. 9, 2014. (Dan Janisse / The Windsor Star)

Frederick said that although he disagrees with the report, he understands it’s “a starting place for conversation” on the best use of taxpayer dollars when it comes to police.

“Without question, we have a policing model in Windsor that is expensive,” Frederick admitted. “We are not regionalized. And regionalization is a much more efficient model.”

Frederick noted that WPS is required by legislation to maintain specialized units such as tactical, K-9, marine, and bomb disposal.

“Those are expensive,” Frederick said. “If I had an opportunity to leverage those (units) into other communities, it would reduce our costs immensely.”

Asked about the possibility of Windsor-Essex adopting a regional policing model in the future, Frederick replied: “That’s where political will comes in. There has to be a lot of co-operation amongst different municipalities to make that happen.”

“I’ve said from Day One of my term as chief, that’s a model we should be exploring.”