OPP says 'just' going after costs

Obscenely high and unsustainable policing costs. OPP bills are destroying communities its officers are supposed to protect. Apparent self-interest is cloaked in the guise of public safety needs. Where is the political outrage while OPP costs continue to climb? Who is going to bring policing costs in this province under control?

OPP says 'just' going after costs

Postby Thomas » Wed Feb 18, 2015 4:04 pm

ALMAGUIN – The effects of the new OPP billing model — good and bad — are being seen across the region as municipalities begin their 2015 budgeting process.

Of the 12 townships served by the Almaguin Highlands OPP detachment, three are experiencing a decrease or remaining the same for 2015 and nine are facing an increase.

But the reasons why aren’t quite as clear cut.

“It’s a cost recovery model. It’s truly just providing the costs that we know it actually takes to provide policing to municipal police service,” Acting Staff Sergeant Lianne Spong, a representative from the OPP municipal policing bureau, says. “So if the workload demands it then it will be reflected in the billing going forward.”

One of the reasons why many Almaguin bills are increasing so much is due to the number of properties in the township. Most have a high percentage of seasonal households, and some area leaders have questioned whether those should have been included in the billing model at equal weight with permanent properties.

“Seasonal properties were incorporated because seasonal properties generate policing just as much as people who live there year round,” Spong says.

“You can have break and enters at empty places as much as you can have break and enters at ones where people are there year round as well. Things can happen whether someone’s living there or not living there. There can be fires, there can be mischief, there can be things that occur.”

Questions have also been raised about whether unincorporated areas, which were not included in the billing model, should be charged in the same fashion.

“The OPP has a budget of approximately $1 billion,” Spong says.

“What we’re looking at recovering is approximately $396 million, an apportionment of that $1 billion budget. All those other services happen under the other portion of the provincial obligation to respond to other matters. A lot of misinformation has gone out about subsidizing those other areas and those things aren’t true.”

Despite the increases occurring across the region — the total the cost before phase in for all 12 Almaguin Highlands detachment municipalities an increase of $1.4 million — the level of OPP service is remaining the same.

“Service has never changed. This is a cost recovery model. And it’s designed to recover the costs that we know it takes to provide municipal policing services across the province and it allocates that across all municipalities in a more fair manner and it’s not linked to the level of staffing provided as it has been in the past,” Spong says.

“All those things the municipality has a responsibility to provide, as a service we do that for them, so that has never changed. Never has, never will. Billing is billing and service and staffing is something different.”

In 2012, the Auditor General of Ontario released the annual report and one of the areas examined was the OPP. The report indicated that the then-billing model was out of date and needed to be adjusted. According to the OPP, several municipalities were paying upwards of $800 per property, while others were paying just $10.

After months of talks, in August 2014, the Ontario government voted through a new billing model in the hopes of creating equal billing across the province. The model decided on charges municipalities with a 60:40 formula — 60 per cent of the bill is a base cost of $200.51 per property, while 40 per cent is based on call for service. This results in a cost per property that was given to each municipality.

The new bills started arriving in fall 2014, with the billing model implemented effective Jan. 1, 2015.

The Village of Burk’s Falls is one of the few enjoying a decrease. In 2014, they paid $280,000 for their 577 properties, and in 2015 they’ll pay a forecasted $265,000, for a cost of $459 per property.

The Municipality of Magnetawan wasn’t so fortunate though. In 2014 they paid $155,000 and this year their estimated bill is $237,000 — a 52 per cent increase. Yet their cost per their 2,011 properties is $118, a significantly lower figure than Burk’s Falls.

“There’s a big difference in the number per properties, obviously,” says Spong.

“Burk’s Falls only has 577 total properties and Magnetawan has 2,011. Also, the percentages are quite different under calls for service category. … What we look for in that second category as well, the calls for service, it would be something where it’s a request for police assistance. Some examples would be motor vehicle collisions and provincial statutes.”

According to Spong, the total of all calls for service across the province have been calculated on a four-year rolling average, which comes to $138,122,392. The OPP then looks at the actual data specific to a municipality to find out their share of the $138 million and that figure is the township’s portion.

That percentage varies widely from municipality to municipality, based on a number of factors.

“Every municipality’s unique, so the total per property is going to be unique to that municipality based upon MPAC data and the total per property based on that apportionment or category of the bill is going to be that municipality’s unique workload divided against the provincial cost,” Spong says.

“And then there’s the additional line items where you get into the court security, the prisoner transport, the combination of cleaning services, and those are all unique to each place depending on whether you supply a building, don’t supply a building, and a number of variables that are usually available within the notes pages [of the municipality’s bill].

“There’s not one thing that you can just say ‘this is the difference. It’s because there are a number of factors that are unique to each municipality that affect what their cost was and that increase or decrease is applied on the phase in.”

The phase in is a measure put into place to assist municipalities. Municipalities with a forecasted increase were given a cap of $40 per property each year for the next five, and those with an estimated decrease were given a cap of $18 to $30, though that is not calculated until after the decreases are in place so the ministry can remain revenue neutral. In theory, if property assessments from MPAC, the calls for service, and other variables were to remain exactly the same over the five years, the cost before phase in would be the bill the municipality could expect to receive in 2019.

But Spong says it isn’t that clear cut.

“There’s no way to project what it will be in 2019,” she says.

“They’ll just have to be calculated every year. We’ve had people try to do that. You could if you think there will be no growth, but because of those other variables, calls for service piece and the percentage of the workload, it’s tough to try and take a guess at what it would be in 2019. … I can’t say or speculate at all. It completely depends upon on a number of factors. And it’s going to depend upon what’s happening in the municipality.”

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