Andrew Knack refuted that in a reply, and linked a blog post by Anne Stevenson.
Our central communities of downtown and Chinatown have received a significant amount of attention over the few months, and rightfully so. Conditions in the heart of our city have deteriorated significantly, culminating in the heartbreaking loss of two members of the Chinatown community in violent as
www.annestevenson.ca
Paquette made the argument like this:
"I make a motion 2 years ago to enhance public safety in transit. After debate, it passes. A report comes first. Then Council uses the report as the springboard for a costed strategy. That comes back. 6 months to a year have passed by this time. Then Admin begins implementing the strategy. That takes money and hiring and training. There goes another 3-6 months. Then it goes live if we haven’t been delayed by a pilot project first to ensure the right money is going to the right places in the right way for results. So then we reach today, where EPS and Admin finally roll out more bodies to enforce and support.
In the meantime, Council is prodding, pushing, pulling for more rapid deployment, but logistics and budgetary restraints keep slowing everything down. Here we go, though. At last. I’ll be watching this effort with as much interest as everyone else. The process is super frustrating and slow and that is all about fiscal constraints and hiring restraints - basically attempting to ensure the budget isn’t blown out of proportion. Additionally, with these specific issues, we are WAY out of jurisdiction (mental health, addictions, houselessness) and have to justify that legally and financially.
Folks may have been concerned about transit safety in the past 6 months but we started the work 2 years ago or more.
Heck, it took me 4 years to get Food and AgriBusiness embedded as one of our economic pillars going forward and I had a ton of skepticism and eye-rolling when I first began. Now it’s a no-brainer."
And in another comment:
"The Transit Police Officer training that just occurred is an example.
We began asking about transit safety before the pandemic, and as things were in flux during that time and initially ridership was very low it was difficult for Administration to get an accurate bead on what was required as an investment (if anything - when these strange times were over, did things go back to normal?). What began to emerge is that due to factors beyond City control there was a steep increase in houselessness, mental health issues, and addiction issues in our streets. In addition to the pandemic we were (and are) now facing multiple crises at once.
The only reason it’s not worse is because of investments the City was making into mitigating these concerns already over the past few years - sadly the sheer human numbers increased more rapidly than could be forecasted for.
An example is that I started work on the COTT program 2 years ago, and a pilot was launched about one year ago. The pilot proved successful and in February Council approved a $3.9m safety plan presented by EPS and Admin that included the COTT approach. Since then, dozens of new Peace Officers have recently completed their training and are, as we speak, beginning the next phase of that safety plan approved last winter and folks should be seeing increased presence (I’m hearing that people ARE noticing a difference). The next batch of officers are now being trained but the City is having difficulty hiring social workers - the field is exhausted due to COVID, but we are being proactive.
That is just one thing Council and Admin have been working on in the area of Community Safety and Well Being."
So it's not that they waited until we hit "rock bottom" before acting. But could they have rushed the reports or pilots, or done something else to go faster - all while provincial supports keep getting cut? Maybe; I'd love to hear what you guys think.
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