Many communities in our area are struggling to strike the balance between protecting citizens and keeping the price of policing down.

When Gerry Marshall became the mayor of Penetanguishene in 2010, the town was facing a budget crunch. Penetanguishene's contract with the OPP was about to expire and Marshall didn't like what he was seeing in the numbers.

“Twenty-five per cent of our town budget was policing costs,” he says. “Those costs were about to double. We were looking at a $300,000-increase and a four or five per cent tax-increase.”

As more policing contracts expired around the province, a growing number of municipalities faced the same problem: skyrocketing policing costs.

In the City of Orillia, the cost of its OPP contract doubled over seven years and now eats up more than 20 per cent of the city's annual budget.

Ralph Cipolla spent 17 years on city council and is a member the city's police board. He says tax payers are tapped out with everything – from garbage and sewers to policing – they have to pay for.

Pay Increase for Police

While municipalities searched for savings in their budgets, the province negotiated an 8.5 per cent pay increase for the OPP.

The pay hike came after a two-year wage freeze; as of January 2014 a first-class constable can expect to earn more than $94,000.  According to Statistics Canada, that's more than three times the average wage of earners in Ontario.

But wages are only part of the reason costs are going up. One of the few academic studies done on the issue recently found that it's taking longer for officers to handle each case because a higher standard of evidence is needed by the crown to lay charges.

  • a break and enter can take 10 hours to process compared to six hours 10 years ago
  • an impaired driving charge could take five hours, which is two-and-a-half times longer
  • a domestic assault takes almost 10 times as long for an officer to report to the standard required for charges to be laid

Officers Deal With More Than Crime

Retired OPP officer Steven Starr was drawn into the debate when the Town of Meaford started looking at its costs. He says police are being called to handle much more than just criminal matters

“I could talk about lost persons, I could talk about sudden deaths,” he says. “Snowmobiles hit trees, planes crash - there are all sorts of issues that have to be dealt with by the police that have nothing to do with crime.”

 Dealing with more people who suffer from mental illness is another growing trend for police since the number of beds in psychiatric institutions has been declining in the province. Police are often the only help available especially after business hours.

In Ontario, policing now costs more than $3.6 billion annually and the way that cost is shared between the province and municipalities is being reviewed.

The changes will come into effect next year and it's becoming clear that some towns will be paying less while others will be paying much more. 

Tomorrow on CTV News at 6: Roger Klein looks at the costs and implications towns and cities face when they decide to go with a provincial or municipal police force.