Police, EMS Sacrifice New Jobs For Budget Cuts
Posted January 11, 2011 6:55 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Although the TTC has found money to avoid a proposed fare hike, two other crucial city services remain under pressure: police and EMS.
As with other departments, the city had asked EMS to reduce spending by five per cent. On Tuesday, the unit offered a cut of 1.7, but said it can no longer hire much-needed workers.
This, at a time when calls to EMS are going up, and response times are slower than they should be.
“Seconds can save lives,” said Toronto EMS Deputy Chief Wayne Vibert. “Certainly from where we are today, we’re saying we’re not really happy with the direction we’re going with Toronto EMS as far as response times.”
The police are also putting a freeze on new hires. A day after meeting with Mayor Rob Ford, Chief Bill Blair presented the Toronto Police Services Board with a budget increase of two per cent – down from the original three per cent he asked for last week.
When retiring officers are taken into account, it will mean as many as 200 fewer officers on the street.
“The full impact of those retirements won’t all be felt this year because we have people that we hired in December that will be graduating in May,” Chief Blair said on Wednesday.
“That will take up part of the shortfall that we’ll experience through not hiring. The impact will be more significantly felt into 2012.”
The chief says safety won’t be compromised and he’s confident the mayor will be happy with the new numbers. Police are also looking at contracting out custodial services to save more money.
