Saskatoon city council greenlights transit safety report

Saskatoon city council has greenlit a report on transit safety after a city councillor brought forward a motion calling on city administration to look into the validity of a transit police program.

David Kirton said transit operators are facing an increasing amount of threats and harassment.

"According to one operator, a lot of situations get elevated much quicker than before. It's like people don't care what they do when an operator mentions the fare, or tries to enforce a rule. They swear, yell, and scream, sometimes spit, or physically assault an operator," Kirton told city council Monday.

Kirton said bus operators have told him that fights have broken out on buses multiple times between passengers and that upset passengers have smashed and shot windows.

"A maintenance person on a changeover has a gun pointed at her, demanding a ride downtown," Kirton added. "I could go on and on, but the stuff is becoming more commonplace and quite frankly is only getting worse."

Kirton said he hoped uniformed officers could be posted on buses and at transit stops. He said community service officers would be ideal for such a program as they're trained in de-escalation and can offer people support.

"On 20th Street, the CSOs know the names of the people on the street. They've gotten to know them that well, and the people on the street know the names of the CSOs," Kirton said.

Councillors had many questions about the intended goal of a transit program, and said more data needs to be collected on the extent of the problem in the city.

"I think one of the challenges I'm personally facing here is that we are collectively trying to find a solution without a particularly robust understanding of the problem," said Coun. Mairin Loewen.

Kirton withdrew his original motion and amended it so the city administration could come back with a report on incidents on transit buses and facilities. The amended motion was unanimously carried.

Saskatoon Transit's acting director says in the coming months, city administration will provide the most recent metrics on transit incidents as directed by city council.

"Saskatoon Transit regularly gathers such information and has reported on this information in the past, albeit not as comprehensively as is expected for the upcoming report," Tracey Davis in a statement.