Brandon police hope for provincial grant that would let them explore better ways to deliver services

Manitoba's second-largest city wants to find ways to make its police service more efficient by delivering services differently.

The Brandon Police Service has applied for funding from the municipal service delivery improvement program to enhance the capacity of the city's police force. If granted, the funding will target service delivery improvements.

"We have police officers and highly trained professionals … doing work that hasn't always traditionally fallen to the police service," Chief Wayne Balcaen said.

"Some of it may cross boundaries with the health and wellness rather than core policing functions."

If approved, the funding will study how best to make use of the skills and knowledge of BPS officers, he said.

The funding will be used to look at the service model for calls that police officers don't necessarily have to attend, so the deployment of police officers in the city can be improved.

Downsizing the number of police officers is not being considered, Balcaen said; an emphasis has been placed on increasing the capacity of police services overall.

There are currently 94 officers and 38 civilian Brandon Police Service members.

"I think not only in our community is it very important, but globally, this is a trend that's starting to be looked at.… What do you need a fully trained police officer to do?" Balcaen said. 

The Brandon Police Service will only go ahead with the study if funding is approved. 

Support community wellness

Florence Halcrow, co-ordinator of Ask Auntie, which supports vulnerable people in Brandon's downtown core, hopes officers develop a more nuanced understanding of her clients' experiences.

"It would be nice ... to have somebody who is understanding," she said, "of people [and] what they're going through and the understanding of their environment and their homelessness."

She wants police services to reflect on these experiences and meet people where they are.

In some cases, a sobering or mental health centre could work better than police intervention, she said.

Having opportunities to intervene with clients before a crisis happens offers another form of efficiency, Halcrow said; proactive care has the potential to remove the need for enforcement because a crisis can be prevented.

Brandon has many resources, programs, groups and organizations downtown, Halcrow said, and this compliments overall community wellness.

"With the mental health going on in our community and the psychosis with the lack of mental health and psychiatrists in our community," Halcrow said, "it would really help to have somebody intervene and find out and know where they're at, you know, and meet them where they're at prior to things exploding and escalating."

 Antoinette Gravel-Ouellette, co-chair of Brandon's Community Wellness Collaborative, said she hopes that by looking at alternative strategies, the Brandon Police Service will develop a broader continuum of care. The CWC provides opportunities for people to discuss strategies centred on tackling core community issues.

"Working with people that have substance use disorders, or I like to say 'wellness issues' … needs to come from a trauma-informed perspective and lens," Gravel-Ouellette said.

"[The proposed study] will bring it to not only the police service and the individuals that are employed there, but also on a community level … awareness to be able to view it through a different lens."

There's still a need to examine what wellness means on a continuum of care, she said, along with looking at how people are treated and supported when they are in a precarious situation or in crisis.

"How do we, how do the police interact with individuals that it may not necessarily be a policing issue, but it may be … a mental health or a substance use issue?"