Help for the frontlines: Police chief wants to hire 100 officers by end of 2020

OTTAWA — Ottawa's new police chief wants more boots on the ground as soon as possible.

On Wednesday, Chief Peter Sloly unveiled his plan to hire 100 new officers by the end of 2020. 30 officers were already set to be hired this year, but Sloly wants 70 more added to the force. They would be placed into the chief's priority areas including neighbourhood policing, guns and gangs, frontline patrol and violence against women.

Sloly says he's consulted with numerous community members and groups, including the mayor and councillors, businesses and his own leadership team and frontline officers.

"There are important concerns being raised by our community and our frontline members and we need to make key investments in officer staffing now to address the issues we are facing and to improve public safety in Ottawa," Sloly says in an emailed statement.

The plan will cost $14.7 million, with the money coming from re-allocated funds in the existing OPS budget. More than $9 million would come out of a reserve fund set aside for the modernization roadmap plan. A report on the hiring plan clearly states that no new budget request is being made and that no additional funds are needed to implement it.

To come up with the money, the OPS says it conducted a review of all ongoing projects and identified ones "that were proving ineffective, did not deliver value or better service to the community, or had a negative impact on morale." The move will also mean no officers will be hired in 2021 or 2022, and the number of new officers hired in 2023 reduced to 20.

The hiring plan will be brought to the Ottawa Police Services Board meeting on Monday, January 27th. An Equity, Diversity and Inclusion action plan will also be put forward at that meeting.

According to Sloly's report, there's been an increase in the number of female and racialized officers. 66 recruits were hired by the OPS in 2019. 27 of them were women, with two of them racialized. 14 of the 39 men hired were racialized.