Some municipalities in Essex County are considering alternative options for policing in their communities after the Ontario Provincial Police told them the cost to provide their services will increase in 2025.
For the Town of Essex, the increase is 20 per cent according to the Canadian Press, while on Pelee Island, the jump is 107 per cent.
The Town of Tecumseh is eye-balling a ten per cent increase next year, an additional $300,000 on a policing bill of about $3.7-million.
Tecumseh's Mayor is cautioning against "throwing the baby out with the bathwater." Gary McNamara told WindsorNewsToday.ca that even with the increases, the OPP is the most cost-effective way to police smaller municipalities.
"Marine, K-9, tactical units, all of that can be brought into a community very quickly," he said. "A standard municipal force has to have a lot of those services in place."
He said Tecumseh has used the OPP since 1947, and residents there pay far less for policing than Windsor residents.
"It is a huge difference," said McNamara, adding municipalities would have to pay for the infrastructure for policing themselves.
The increase in costs is mainly attributed to salary increases for OPP officers. Their contract, negotiated last year, includes a retroactive 4.5 per cent increase, another 4.5 per cent for the second year, and 2.5 per cent increases the following two years.
McNamara said municipalities should have anticipated an increase. He said his council did, although it did not expect the jump to be so much.
Still, McNamara insists it's worth it.
"In 2014, when we had that huge fire at Bonduelle, we ended up getting 200 officers immediately," he said. "Officers as far away as Kitchener were back-filling to make sure that the resources were spread so they could continue to police, and there was no cost to the municipality."
The province and municipalities are still communicating about the increase, but the idea of exploring regional or separate municipal policing services could come up at a special meeting of Essex County Council in January.