RCMP costs are projected to reach over $6M by 2030 for Cold Lake

City council passed the five year financial agreement with the RCMP last week, but not without some frustration on the province’s role in funding police officer positions.

The realities of just how expensive it is to fund policing in the community was highlighted while presenting what the RCMP costs from 2025-2030 project out to be for Cold Lake in their next contract.

There are a total of 36 RCMP members in the Cold Lake detachment: 20 are under the City contract, 16 are contracted by the province. Plus there are seven  municipally funded employees, to the four funded through provincial dollars.

The City budget in 2024 is approximately $4.6 million for municipal police enforcement. Under the five year agreement, plus the full compliment of officers, that will be roughly $5.6 million in 2025.

That could balloon to $6.3 million by 2030.

Mayor Craig Copeland said part of last year’s tax increase was in funding new police officers. At the Your Region, Your Voice chamber event, he said he wasn’t sure if city council was going to continue to fund brand new positions.

He believes the province, currently in surplus, should be funding more positions.

“We’re going to go into budgets in a month or so, and we can decide if we want to find another police officer. It’s about a $200,000 touch,” Copeland said on The Morning After. 

“Our argument is that the city last budget did a couple of percent tax increase in regards to enforcement. Does council have the appetite to keep on doing this?  

“I’m sure our objective this year on budget is to try to keep this thing down as low as we possibly can. Our question is, is that the province is making gobs of money right now with the oil sands, and the oil sands are paying out full royalties now. About 22 to 25 per cent on every barrel of oil is going to the province, right off the hopper here. We have issues in Cold Lake. It’s no secret. Why doesn’t the province come in and fund some of these RCMP positions for us, take the pressure off us, and put in a handful of positions here in Cold Lake?”

Support

The total budget figure presents the full contract, debt financing, maintenance, janitorial contract, utilities, insurance, salaries for clerks, supplies, and equipment. Last fiscal year, the City had to dole out $300,000 in overtime as well.

City notes do state there has been an intention “in principle” of increasing the detachment’s strength by two members.

“Right off the hop each year, we’ve got 1 per cent [tax increase] just related to policing, and it’s becoming close to 25 per cent of our operating budget,” said Copeland. 

When asked, Copeland reiterated his support for the RCMP, and the relationships they’ve fostered with S/Sgt. Wes Bensmiller and Sgt. Ryan Howrish, and is not fond of a provincial police force idea.

However, the notion that a municipality like the City of Grande Prairie is contracting their own policing, is something to pay attention to.

“I don’t think we should race around and create our own provincial police force. I think we gotta work with what we have and watch Grande Prairie and see how they make out, and watch and observe.” 

Detachment building update

Another needs assessment for a new Cold Lake RCMP detachment building was conducted in the summer.

This has been something the RCMP has been looking for dating back to 2016.

CAO Kevin Nagoya said at last Tuesday’s council meeting that the costs were “extreme.”

“The bottom line is that the funding that was there before for detachment replacement is not there now to that degree. The concern is we have to be looking at frugal options for a new or, I’ll say, a renovated detachment,” Nagoya said.

“The detachment that you see here is not that old. That was agreed to by the RCMP when we had our last meeting, pushing back, because the costs are extreme. You’re looking at well into the double digits, like 30 million, 40 million.”

The Morning After