Regional Policing: "a no-brainer", (*continued)
“Some obvious financial savings of course would come through shared communication, equipment, and administrative support and leadership/supervisory functions. However, we should also expect efficiency and capacity to respond gains with respect to analytics, investigative services, and patrol. In mentioning regionalization, we are reminded that the collective geography of Victoria and its neighboring communities is such that as a combined area it would still amount to a relatively small and well defined policing jurisdiction.
"From our perspective, regionalization for the area is a “no brainer”, and the question for all jurisdictions concerned should be “Is there any good reason for regionalization not to occur”? In this regard, the most commonly raised concern about regionalization is that outlying areas of a regionalized police jurisdiction will be at risk of suffering a lesser quality of service.
"Our own research on police service delivery strongly confirms for us at least that this should not be expected to occur with zone/district/area staffing of patrol watches. Further, there is move-up efficiency enhancing technology currently available to audit and ensure that there is an equally of service at all times no matter where a call for service comes from within a jurisdiction.
"In any case, we can’t emphasize enough the cost saving importance of Victoria and Esquimalt looking first to a regional model over the current relatively small and single jurisdiction policing model which most observers of policing would agree is simply not financially sustainable in the long term anyway.”
“Some obvious financial savings of course would come through shared communication, equipment, and administrative support and leadership/supervisory functions. However, we should also expect efficiency and capacity to respond gains with respect to analytics, investigative services, and patrol. In mentioning regionalization, we are reminded that the collective geography of Victoria and its neighboring communities is such that as a combined area it would still amount to a relatively small and well defined policing jurisdiction.
"From our perspective, regionalization for the area is a “no brainer”, and the question for all jurisdictions concerned should be “Is there any good reason for regionalization not to occur”? In this regard, the most commonly raised concern about regionalization is that outlying areas of a regionalized police jurisdiction will be at risk of suffering a lesser quality of service.
"Our own research on police service delivery strongly confirms for us at least that this should not be expected to occur with zone/district/area staffing of patrol watches. Further, there is move-up efficiency enhancing technology currently available to audit and ensure that there is an equally of service at all times no matter where a call for service comes from within a jurisdiction.
"In any case, we can’t emphasize enough the cost saving importance of Victoria and Esquimalt looking first to a regional model over the current relatively small and single jurisdiction policing model which most observers of policing would agree is simply not financially sustainable in the long term anyway.”
