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Saint John police commission warns about lack of officers

The head of Saint John's police commission says chronic understaffing could affect the health of front line officers.

Budget troubles at city hall are leading to chronic understaffing, says commission head

CBC News ·
Saint John's police commission is worried about chronic understaffing in the city's force thanks to budget problems. (CBC)

The chronic understaffing of the Saint John Police Force could affect the health of front-line officers, according to the president of the police commission.

The city is looking at cutting $270,000 from the police force`s budget next year. The proposed cut would effectively give police less funds than were budgeted for 2015.

Nicole Paquet, the president of the Saint John Police Commission,  says the organization approached budget discussions with city hall in good faith.
Nicole Paquet, the chair of Saint John's police commission, and police chief John Bates appeared at city council during a recent meeting. (CBC)
"We really felt like going in at zero per cent, it was the right thing to do for the city," said Paquet.

"I don't know how we would be able to manage with a cut to our budget."

The department was not asking for an increase in 2016.

Paquet says it is vital the department be allowed to replace some of the officers who left over the past year.

There are seven vacant positions on the force.

That ability to protect our citizens is in question in our belief.- Peter Alexander, Saint John Firefighter Association

She says by cutting costs elsewhere the force would have been able to hire four new officers even with no budget increase.

She says the proposed $270,000 cut would kill that opportunity.

"We've made a lot of cuts in order to hire those four officers. It would have allowed us to do that," she said.

"We absolutely need to start hiring some of our officers back. This is to the point where I think we're going to be running into some real issues on the front line in terms of health and wellness."

Too much overtime

That concern is echoed by Jeff LaFrance, the president of the police union, who says understaffing is causing officers to work too much overtime.

"You might work a night shift, be expected to go to court the next day and back in for night shift the next night," said LaFrance.

"It's having a huge drain on our manpower and our people."

The draft budget also proposes cutting the fire department budget about $90,000 below 2015 levels.

It is also expected the department will generate $150,000 in revenue through such things as training programs for firefighters from outside departments.

Peter Alexander of the Saint John Firefighters Assocation says there aren't enough first responders to get to all the places they need in a city spread out over a lot of area. (CBC)
But Peter Alexander, the president of the Saint John Firefighters Association, said he is concerned about the department's ability to serve the needs of a population in a spread-out city.
"That ability to protect our citizens is in question in our belief," said Alexander.

"We can't get to those scenes as quick as we possibly can with the amount of people that we need."

Saint John received a $1 million reduction to its annual Community Grant from the New Brunswick government. That cut wiped out more than half the modest, 1.5 per cent growth in the municipality's tax assessment base. 

The proposed $151.5 million operating budget for 2016 is up just $400,000 over this year's total.

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