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There’s been a lot of grumbling this week over news that the local OPP put a $1,200 price tag on its help with the Fort Frances Canadian Bass Championship’s annual parade of boats.
The tournament’s board of directors, already squeezed by a bare-bones budget, asked that the town cover this unexpected cost. But at its meeting Monday night, a “disappointed” council balked at the fee and refused to pay it—suggesting that the FFCBC look at other options, including perhaps requesting the assistance of the Treaty #3 Police instead.
With the parade just a week away, the FFCBC board is left scrambling over what to do, whether that involves changing the route so it does pass through intersections with traffic lights, trying the Treaty #3 Police, or simply going ahead and paying the $1,200.
There’s no question this sudden policing cost has thrown a hitch into the boat parade, and that’s a shame. The larger issue at play here, however, is that this popular community event got caught in the cross-fire of an ongoing squabble between the OPP and town over staffing levels.
Council did opt to reduce police services here as a cost-cutting measure. And that reduction in the number of officers on duty is the excuse given for why more would need to be called in to help with the parade—and hence the added expense. To its defence, the town was told, reportedly by the OPP’s number-crunchers themselves at a meeting in Toronto, that our community could manage with two fewer officers.
Clearly, not everyone is on the same page here.
That needs to change. While the boat parade is a relatively minor issue, police response times to calls, coupled with community policing efforts, are a much more serious matter that must not be held hostage to behind-the-scenes posturing which affects residents and our police officers alike.