Skip to content | Skip to institutional links

Common menu bar links

Site navigation menu

Publications

Police Resources in Canada
2007

Page content follows

Part II Police personnel in municipal police services, 2007

Warning View the most recent version.

Archived Content

Information identified as archived is provided for reference, research or recordkeeping purposes. It is not subject to the Government of Canada Web Standards and has not been altered or updated since it was archived. Please "contact us" to request a format other than those available.

Introduction

Municipal police services employ 66% of all police officers in Canada and provide policing services to over 25 million Canadians (79% of the Canadian population). Summary information on Canada’s municipal police services is presented in this part of the report. Municipal policing includes all police services that are paid for by the municipalities including contract policing provided to municipalities by provincial police services and the RCMP. It also includes self-administered First Nations police services. It should be noted that offences investigated by federal RCMP personnel within a municipal policing jurisdiction are included in the crime statistics for that municipal police service; however, personnel and expenditures associated with the federal RCMP are not included.

Part II and III of the report are organized by province. Within each province, municipal police services are grouped into one of five population ranges and the municipalities within each group are listed alphabetically. Within these groupings, municipalities that are policed by the RCMP or OPP under municipal contracts are separated by a blank line from the other municipal police services.

Part II includes only personnel in municipal police services that existed on May 15, 2007. Municipal police services that ceased to exist and/or were amalgamated by other new police services on or before May 15, 2007 are not included.

Part III includes only operating expenditures from municipal police services that existed on May 15, 2006. Municipal police services that ceased to exist and/or were amalgamated by other new police services on or before May 15, 2006 are not included.

Part II of the report presents detailed data on the number of police officers reported for 2007. Crime data and expenditure data for 2007 are not yet available, therefore data presented in Part III of the report are for the year 2006.

Important notes

Population

Most municipal populations are derived from postcensal estimates for July 1 (based on 2006 Census boundaries) as provided by Demography Division, Statistics Canada. The population estimates are based on usual place of residence. Population data are updated regularly and figures published in this report may differ slightly from figures published in earlier reports. In 2006, populations for most police forces were calculated based on estimates using the 2001 Census in 2006 Census sub-division boundaries.

Populations for British Columbia municipalities were provided by the province. In the case of Aboriginal police services, the populations are provided by the Department of Indian and Northern Affairs by band. This includes registered band populations only. Some Aboriginal police services may police larger populations comprising both band and non-band members. Hence the actual population policed by some forces may be higher than indicated in this report. Comparisons should be made with caution.

Municipalities are grouped according to the following population ranges:

100,000 +
50,000 to 99,999
15,000 to 49,999
5,000 to 14,999
< 5,000

Population density (exclusive to Part II of the report)

In order to provide context for the relative urban or rural composition of a municipality, a population density figure is provided. Population density refers to the number of persons per square kilometre. The calculation for population density is total population divided by land area.

Land area is the area in square kilometres of the land-based portions of the census geographic area, in this case the census subdivision (municipality). The land area measurements for the census subdivision reflect the boundaries in effect on January 1, 2006 (the geographic reference date for the 2006 Census of Canada). Since the population density is a summary calculation of total municipal population divided by total municipal land area, it will not reflect the distribution of urban and rural segments within a municipality. However, it can be descriptive of the general urban or rural structure; for example, a highly centralized city such as Vancouver, British Columbia. has a population density of 4,888 persons/km² whereas an expansive city such as Greater Sudbury, Ontario. has a population density of 48 persons/km².

Police officers

Counts represent the “actual” number (full-time equivalents) of permanent sworn police officers of all ranks as of May 15, 2007 data. This number also includes officers who are deployed to contract positions (e.g. airport policing, U.N. missions) and who are not available for general policing duties in their community. Police officers on long-term leave (e.g. secondmentout, disability, education leave) who are not being paid by the police service’s annual budget are excluded.

Population per police officer

Counts represent the population of the area serviced by the police service divided by the number of police officers. For some services, particularly those patrolling cottage or tourist areas, the population policed can fluctuate dramatically throughout the year, usually peaking during the summer months. Correspondingly, the number of police officers assigned to these services may also fluctuate to accommodate these peak periods. Because the personnel data are collected for a specific point in time (May 15, 2007) and the population estimates are based on usual place of residence only, these aspects are not captured.

Police officers per 100,000 population

Figures represent the total number of police officers per 100,000 population. This is simply an alternative way of presenting the population per police officer.

Other personnel

Counts include civilian and other personnel (e.g., clerical, dispatch, management, cadets, special constables, security officers, school crossing guards, by-law enforcement officers) on the police department’s payroll as of May 15, 2007. There are no “other personnel” included in the counts for the RCMP municipal policing contracts. The municipality may hire other personnel, but they are not included in this report.

Total operating expenditures (exclusive to Part III of the report)

Figures include salaries, wages, benefits, and other operating expenses that are paid from the police service budget, as well as benefits paid from other government sources. They have been rounded to the nearest thousand. Revenues, recoveries, and those costs that fall under a police service’s capital expenditures are excluded.

Under the RCMP billing agreement, most municipalities with a population under 15,000 are billed 70% of total expenditures, and those with a population of 15,000 and over are billed 90% (in most cases) of total costs. The costing formula takes into consideration the costs of providing federal and other RCMP policing duties while also performing municipal policing duties. First Nations Policing Program (FNPP) agreements are cost-shared 52% by the Government of Canada and 48% by the relevant province or territory.

As operational situations may vary considerably between police services, so will the operational costs that result. For example, some costs (accommodation, by-law enforcement, court security) and some services (computing, personnel, and financial services) may be included within the police service’s operational budget for certain municipalities, but in other municipalities they may be paid for by other departments or through the police service’s capital budget (which is excluded). In some police services, there may be police officers who are funded by external agencies (e.g. an airport authority or a community organisation). While these officers are included in this report, the expenditure of these funds is not. Conversely, some police forces provide cost-recovery services (e.g. 911 call-takers and dispatchers). Revenues and recoveries from such services are excluded from this report. Therefore comparisons should be made with caution.

Per capita cost (exclusive to Part III of the report)

Figures represent expenditures divided by the population of the area serviced by the police service (rounded to the nearest dollar). For the reasons described above, comparisons should be made with caution.

Major expenditure categories (exclusive to Part III of the report)

This section examines five major expenditure categories which may, or may not, be part of the police service’s operational budget. The purpose of this section is to highlight differences in costs between forces due to different accounting policies and practices.

Rate, total Criminal Code (C.C.) (exclusive to Part III of the report)

Figures represent the total number of incidents per 100,000 population. This rate reflects both violent and property crimes, as well as other Criminal Code offences (e.g., damage to property, prostitution). Criminal Code traffic incidents are excluded.

Percentage change in Criminal Code rate (exclusive to Part III of the report)

This figure represents the year-over-year percent change in the rate of total Criminal Code incidents (excluding traffic) per 100,000 population.

Clearance rate (%) (exclusive to Part III of the report)

When a police investigation leads to the identification of a suspect against whom a charge could be laid, then that incident can be cleared. Criminal incidents can either be “cleared by charge” or “cleared otherwise”. When an information is laid against the suspect (i.e., the person is formally charged), then from a statistical point of view the related actual incident can be cleared by charge. In cases where the police do not lay an information, even though they have identified a suspect and have enough evidence to support the laying of such, the incident is cleared otherwise. Examples include instances where extrajudicial sanctions or alternative measures are recommended by the police, where police issue a warning or caution, where the complainant declines to proceed with charges or cases where the alleged offender dies before he or she can be formally charged.

The clearance rate reflects the total number of incidents cleared (by charge, or otherwise) during the year divided by the total number of incidents during the year. Since the process of solving crime is often time-consuming, a criminal incident may be solved months or even years after it was reported to police and recorded by the UCR Survey. Therefore, it is possible for the number of incidents cleared in a year to be greater than the total number of “actual” incidents that year, and thus for the clearance rate to exceed 100%.

Any comparison of clearance rates among police services should be made with caution. The reporting practices of some agencies could result in high levels of citizen reporting, including minor offences, to help track neighbourhood crime trends. These minor, generally less-serious offences (e.g. mischief, minor thefts) tend to be high-volume and, by their very nature, tend to have low clearance rates. Police services reporting higher levels of these minor offences will tend to have lower than average overall clearance rates.

Note: The statistical tables included in Part III utilize 2006 crime data from the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Survey. For more information regarding the UCR Survey and crime statistics, please refer to Canadian Crime Statistics, Juristat, Statistics Canada Catalogue no. 85-002-XIE, vol. 27, no. 5.