The committee met at 1:13 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Doug Routley. I’m the MLA for Nanaimo–North Cowichan and the Chair of the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act. It’s an all-party committee of the Legislative Assembly.

I would like to acknowledge I’m joining today’s meeting from the traditional territories of the Malahat First Nation, with gratefulness.

I would like to welcome all those who are listening to and participating in the meeting today.

Our committee is undertaking a broad review with re­spect to policing and related systemic issues in B.C. We are taking a phased approach to this work and are meeting with a number of organizations and individuals over the fall to follow up on input we have already received and to learn more about new models and approaches that have been drawn to our attention in the process.

For today’s meeting, we’ll be having discussions with the Surrey Police Service as well as Rachel Bromberg from the Reach Out Response Network in Toronto.

[1:15 p.m.]

As a reminder to the presenters, all of the audio from our meetings is broadcast live on our website, and a complete transcript will also be posted.

I’ll now ask the members of the committee to introduce themselves. I first call on my friend Trevor Halford.

T. Halford: Hi. Trevor Halford, MLA for Surrey–White Rock.

G. Begg: I’m Garry Begg.

Hi, Norm.

We know each other from working together in the RCMP in the Lower Mainland district.

I’m coming to you today from the traditional territories of the Coast Salish peoples, including the Kwantlen, the Katzie and the Semiahmoo First Nation.

Congratulations, Chief, on, I understand, first boots on the ground in Surrey today.

H. Sandhu: Hello, Constable Norm. I’m Harwinder Sandhu, MLA for Vernon-Monashee.

I’m coming to you from the traditional Syilx territory of the Okanagan Indian nations.

Thank you for joining us today.

A. Olsen: Good afternoon. Adam Olsen, MLA for Saanich North and the Islands.

I am working today from my home office here in the W̱JOȽEȽP village.

R. Glumac: Hi, I’m Rick Glumac, MLA for Port Moody–​Coquitlam.

I am on the traditional territory of the Coast Salish peoples.

G. Lore: Nice to have you here today. I’m MLA for Victoria–​Beacon Hill.

I’m calling in from the territory of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ peo­ples of the Esquimalt and Songhees Nations.

R. Singh: I’m Rachna Singh, MLA for Surrey–Green Timbers. Welcome. I’m really looking forward to hearing from you.

I’m joining you from the shared territories of the Kwantlen, Kwikwetlem and Semiahmoo First Nation.

D. Routley (Chair): Thanks, everybody.

We get amazing assistance on our committee from the Parliamentary Committees Office in the name of Karan Riarh, who is always there for us. Today from Hansard it’s Billy Young. Thanks very much to them for the support.

I’ll now introduce Const. Norm Lipinski of the Surrey Police Service.

I thank you for joining us.

Go ahead, Chief Constable.

Presentations on Police Act

SURREY POLICE SERVICE

N. Lipinski: Well, thank you.

Let me begin my remarks with recognition that the work of the Surrey Police Service takes place on the ancestral, traditional and unceded territories of the Coast Salish peoples.

Since my appointment as a chief constable one year ago, a great deal has been accomplished, and today, in fact, is an important day, since at 11 o’clock this morning, Assistant Commissioner Edwards and I had a joint press conference announcing that the first Surrey police officers already are in orientation. They started yesterday, and hopefully, this weekend they’ll be on the street, taking calls and working with their colleagues in the RCMP.

When it comes to the philosophical approach to policing, one word is at the core of the Surrey Police Service’s approach, and that is: community. The establishment of the SPS gives us an opportunity to embed community policing into our DNA, from the people we hire to our training to what we anticipate will be our front-line problem-solving.

In addition to a community policing ethos, we have already taken the first step towards community engagement. My team and I just wrapped up the most extensive community consultation that I have ever been a part of in all my policing. Two parts to this: part A was a survey, and part B consisted of over 100 interviews with community leaders, faith groups, business groups and non-profits, to name a few. I personally took part in a number of these interviews. The results of this community consultation will form the backbone of our very first strategic plan that will come out in January.

In building a Surrey-specific community policing model, I’ll give you a number of points of where we want to go. First, there are five districts to Surrey, and we will build a specific policing plan for each. In some cases, these areas are vastly different in policing needs, so it stands to reason that we must tailor our approach. Second, community consultation is not a one-and-done endeavour, so we will look to developing community district advisory committees in each of those five districts. This allows the SPS to be on top of emerging community needs.

[1:20 p.m.]

There has to be an accountability process through the chain of command, so I, as chief, have a good understanding as to the policing needs. Therefore, a senior officer will be assigned to each of those districts to coordinate those district advisory committees. I myself will be meeting with those people. Again, there is a difference in the five districts. We heard it loud and clear when we did our community consultation.

At the grassroots level, in certain high-need areas, we are looking to introduce a new concept called CPOs, that is community partnership officers. Part of their time could be on foot, or they could be on bicycles, but their main focus is to get to know the community and work with the community to solve a broad spectrum of community issues — not just crime issues, but community wellness issues. In my view, this builds public trust.

In order to make this financially viable, we look forward to hiring community safety officers. That’s different. These are peace officers, but they’re not full-on police officers. Their costing is about half the price of a police officer. They can do a number of small tasks that need to be done, such as traffic control, investigating minor collisions, picking up exhibits. This would free up time for the full-on police officers to engage with the community. These are the community partnership officers, specifically, I’m talking about. So there’s a cost saving on one end so we get the professionals, the specialists, to do their work with the community.

A key aspect of our community are the First Nations and urban Indigenous groups. They have a unique and valued place in our community, which is why the Surrey police board, very early on, committed to developing an Indigenous strategy to embed their philosophies and ap­proaches in our work. That is a piece of work that is ongoing and well underway.

I would also like to speak to you about alternate res­ponse models for those suffering from mental illness. We have been researching and considering a couple of different models, first about where and how the Surrey Police Service can support the community as part of community safety and well-being. Again, this goes to community wellness; it’s not specific to criminal behaviour. Most of the calls that police officers go to do not have a criminal element, but there is a need for us to be there to assist the community. How can we best do that with the network that’s built within Surrey and the non-profits and the government, etc.?

Second, we are keen to explore opportunities with our stakeholders on how best to partner in response to individuals that are in crisis. There are a number of different models across Canada and, in fact, North America. But we want to develop something specific to Surrey, given our demographics, given our call load, given the stakeholders that are presently trying to do some good in the community.

One strategy that I’m interested in piloting is to place a mental health worker in our dispatch centre. If we receive a call from someone in crisis, why wait until the police ar­rive and then we start de-escalating? De-escalation could start immediately when the call is received in dispatch. Potentially this could lead to safer outcomes when police arrive.

I want to talk a little bit about de-escalation. Much has been said about it over the last few years. We are looking to refining a program which teaches polices officers the steps that they should take in talking someone down that is in crisis. This is very specific. This is something that we developed in consultation with negotiators. It has to do with not only listening, but empathizing, asking appropriate questions, paraphrasing in order to reach a good outcome.

[1:25 p.m.]

This is very difficult because, as we know, it’s sometimes hard to connect. It’s sometimes hard to communicate with somebody that is in crisis. I intend to have that training program implemented, and each year, Surrey police members need to demonstrate this perishable skill by having a scenario that they need to walk through, with actors or actresses.

Second, if force is to be used, we’re developing a training program where we believe less strikes will be used, strikes being punching or using the baton. We are looking at leverage-based techniques, essentially wrestling or ju-jitsu. We’re just developing that program. It’s complicated. It takes a little bit more time in teaching our members, and it is another perishable skill. But we believe that it could lead to better outcomes for all.

In closing, I’d like to talk about the present transition process. The SPS will be integrating within the RCMP. The RCMP are the police of jurisdiction, the POJ. Because the Police Act allows for only one POJ in a municipality, this process will work for sure. But for the future, consideration should be given to amending the Police Act to allow for two POJs in one municipality.

Everything I talked to you about today is difficult to do until the Surrey Police Service is the POJ, until we’re in charge, and that is months away. Depending on the ramping up of the SPS and the ramping down of the RCMP, again, that could be months away.

The simple fact is that we are building our police service with the community. We desire our own culture, and we desire our own model. Allowing a municipality to stand up a municipal police service alongside the contracted police agency with a phased handover is, I think, the best model, going forward. It represents a viable alternative to the present model, where we are embedded as an integrated team.

Again, this model we are presently working through is going well. We will get there. It will work. But there should be, in the future, some allowances for two POJs in any given municipality. It gives a little bit more flexibility for the two agencies to work together but to have a differentiated geographic policing model, if you will.

I’ll stop there. I thank you for your invitation today, and I look forward to any questions that you may have.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you very much. We’ll go straight to questions, then.

T. Halford: Thank you, Chief Constable Lipinski.

I will start with this. A handful of your officers started today. I will say I’m a resident of Surrey, and no matter what badge they’re wearing or what stripe they have, any officer deserves our thanks. I want to put that out there right away. It’s an incredibly tough job, and in our city, it’s an important one.

You talked about the integration with the RCMP. I would like your comments on how that relationship is currently, because it’s important. Not only is Surrey going to be the largest municipality in B.C. in the very near future; it’s also a border town. I live right on the border of the United States. The RCMP that are there right now…. I don’t suspect that that will change, right? There are quite a few incidents, whether they’re border jumpers, things like that, down in that area. So it’s imperative that there is a strong working relationship, and I expect that’s your expectation as well.

[1:30 p.m.]

On that, if you can kind of give a bit of a status on how the current relationship is right now, how that integration is going, how the communication is going directly, with yourself and the head of the Surrey RCMP. Then, overall, what lessons learned? What’s going well? What can we do better? And how are we moving forward for all of Surrey? That’s a loaded question. I’ll probably come back with more, but I wanted to start with that.

N. Lipinski: Thank you for that question. To frame it, it’s not only the RCMP and Surrey Police Service. We have a committee with three levels of government, two ADMs and the city manager, the RCMP in Ottawa, the RCMP in E division, the RCMP in Surrey detachment, myself and my team. This committee has been in place, prior to me being here, I think two years. Certainly, it’s been very focused in working through a number of different areas. It is challenging from the perspective of….

First of all, there are a lot of legal agreements. As somebody who’s a member of the bar, I’m even surprised how many legal agreements there are that we have to work through. And we’re almost there.

Two, you’re talking about people here. It’s a little bit easier for me to hire. We don’t have an issue hiring, but it’s a little bit more difficult to have a detachment scale down, because they have to be transferred somewhere if they don’t join us. Yes, we do have a couple of dozen already — Surrey police members that are part of the Surrey Police Service. What we are establishing now is…. Certainly there are challenges, certainly there are different needs in either side, but I’m happy to say that we are establishing a template, and that’s what’s important.

We have 50 people here that are ready to go, and we are in the process of mapping out 2022. We are watching how this template is working with the injection of these police officers into the SPS. Obviously, we’re going to have to adjust, and then we do another one. We feel we’ll find a rhythm probably about the third intake. Are there challenges? Yes, you bet. But we work them out.

There are different levels of committee; there are different levels of decision-making. We’ve come a long, long way in a short period of time to come to a point where today…. In fact, my people are over there right now, just getting acquainted with the Surrey detachment.

I’ve often believed that once the Surrey Police Service is deployed…. I’ve seen this over and over again with integrated teams: police officers are police officers, and they work together. Whether you are talking IHIT, whether you are talking about the other integrated teams, such as ERT, or the dog unit, when there’s a job to do on the street, when the call comes in, it doesn’t matter the stripe. They take care of what they have to do, professionally and effectively.

All that to say we are just getting into it, and we are collectively building momentum. There’s no playbook on this. We’re making decisions as we go, and the communication has been very good. It’s every week — my deputy chiefs and I. There are nine committees, sub-committees from this large committee. One committee does scheduling, deployment. One does HR. One does equipment. It goes on and on and on. So “building good momentum” is really the phrase that I’ll use.

G. Begg: Chief, I wonder if you could comment on…. I’m sure it’s a unique opportunity that you have, to sort of create from nothing, as it were, a standing police department. Harkening back to your experience at various police departments, I wonder if you see this as an opportunity to correct some historical issues in policing.

[1:35 p.m.]

Just your general comments on how unique, in Canada at least, this situation is. I can’t recall the last time a police department was formed from the ground up. I just want you to comment on the issues that you think you can help to overcome, generally, that are historic to policing.

N. Lipinski: Yeah. Thanks for that question, Garry.

Just to frame it for the audience, I was with the Edmonton police service as a deputy chief. I went to the RCMP as an assistant commissioner. I was a deputy chief in Delta, and then I’m here now. So I’ve had an opportunity to work in large municipal departments, in the RCMP and in small municipal departments. This is a great job — I often say that to people — because it suits my temperament, my background and my education. But most importantly, it’s an opportunity to build something from the ground up — essentially, have a clean canvas.

One of the things, right off the bat, when I pick my executive team, is developing what we feel is the appropriate culture within policing. Our number one criterion when we pick people — we’re up to almost 150 now — is character. It’s developing that culture. This has to do, internally, with how we treat each other.

I’m referring specifically to harassment or bullying. This has to do with how we treat the public, the use of force, etc. This has to do with — I’ll put an umbrella on this — professionalism. We have that opportunity, and I sense that we’re pointed in the right direction, because there’s some really, really good energy here, and we’re all on the same page.

Two, we’re in a position now where we can build a community policing model that is really reflective of the community. Before we have a collective agreement — we’re negotiating this collective agreement — we can work with our union and we can work with the community to ensure that there is that interplay between the collective agreements, whether it’s to do with overtime or with moving people in and out of certain units, and what is required by the community.

We can get away from all the baggage of collective agreements that have been in existence for a long, long time, that just never got around to changing and that may not be the best for the organization to be really accountable and really effective to the community. Secondly, when we’re talking about community policing, which is a passion of mine, then we have an opportunity to look at best practices.

The RCMP do some very, very good things, and we’re just going to evolve that. I often say this: some of the best police officers I ever worked with were in the RCMP. But it’s a big machine, and it’s all over Canada, with 20,000 members, etc., so it moves a little bit slower than in a mun­icipal environment.

We have an opportunity here to do an e-scan across Canada about various programs. When you are talking about alternate response to those in crisis, we have an opportunity to do that and build it now, instead of, “Okay, what have we got? Do we have to change it? How does it work? We’ve got a unit, but they may not be doing what they should be,” etc. It’s totally brand-new on a collective agreement, totally brand-new on a community policing model and totally brand-new on the culture. Those are the three big things.

A. Olsen: Thank you, Chief, for the opportunity to connect with you on this. I was just thinking about what you’ve pointed out with respect to the POJ and the Police Act, and just the challenge that you’re given in creating a policing service from the ground up while there’s a policing service already providing the policing services, and having the job to actually deliver on what the political decisions were.

One of the unique aspects that we’ve heard consistently in this committee is around the desire by the community to have this community policing model or community engagement piece.

[1:40 p.m.]

I’m wondering if you can talk about how, organizationally, you’re rolling this out. It seems to me there’s an opportunity to put a much, much larger focus at the front end on establishing the district advisory councils, implementing the mental health in the dispatch, starting to deliver on the kind of work that the RCMP does on the daily policing — and, at the very beginning of this, really establish and ingrain that community partnership by putting a heavy focus on it.

Can you maybe talk about the amount of focus you’re putting on replacing the RCMP day to day and establishing that culture and the community presence? I mean, I really love the idea of these community safety officers. It reminds me of the kind of system that the Ministry of Health is talking about by having doctors working alongside nurses and nurse practitioners. You’ve got a team of public safety officials that can be deployed to do the kinds of things that need to be done. It’s not always just a police officer.

Anyway, I’m doing a lot of talking. Ultimately, the question that I have is: how are you rolling out this community partnership piece? Is there a heavier focus on that now than, perhaps, just the replacement of the Surrey RCMP?

N. Lipinski: Overall, there are two models that could be viable. Right now we are being embedded in the RCMP. They are the POJ, which is to say that they are in charge, just like with IHIT and others. It’s difficult for us to do this until we build up, and there’s a bit of an art and a bit of a science to this.

The Surrey RCMP…. Let’s use the number: 800 police officers. When we build up — this is just theoretical — to 400 plus one, we become the POJ. We become in charge, because we have the bulk of police officers. There are other indices involved in that, but that’s going to be quite some time. Until we get to that point, they are in charge. So some of the things that I talk about here are difficult to do.

The other model is two POJs, which is to say: “Okay, Norm. Build up to 100 police officers embedded in the RCMP and then take over the district of Whalley. That’s your little police department. When you build up another 100, you can take over Newton, another district, etc. That way, you can run your programs, your philosophies, your processes as a start-up.”

The way we’re working it now is with the RCMP, and we will be under their command until such a time. We will figure out, in the next couple of months, when that time will be, because we are working on a staffing plan for 2022 — exactly how many more SPS police officers will be there in 2022. But it will be sometime after that that we will, in fact, be police of jurisdiction, which is to say 400 plus one.

A. Olsen: Chief, how many community safety officers do you have now?

N. Lipinski: I don’t have any at the present time. That is what our plan is. I will be putting, into the budget, community safety officers for next year. Then we’ll see where we go with that. Of course, there’ll be an interplay between myself and Assistant Commissioner Edwards, etc., but we get into this little bit of a dilemma.

A. Olsen: Are your community district advisory committees fully engaged and established?

N. Lipinski: No. That is going to be part of the strategic plan. The community consultation is the basis of the strategic plan. The board is going to put together that plan in January. Part of that will be Indigenous strategy and the community build — the community policing model — to the extent possible, because we are not in charge.

A. Olsen: Well, I respect the fact that you’re not in charge. However, couldn’t it be negotiated — the development of the community offices, the community districts, the community presence, and the information-gathering your organization could have to really put a local stamp on those five districts — all of that work?

[1:45 p.m.]

I’m kind of surprised to hear that the focus…. The presentation opened with community and a focus on community policing. I think anybody who has been watching us — and I’ve been watching it from the other side of the Salish Sea — has noted the fact that there’s going to be a challenge in establishing a police service while a police service exists there. That’s going to be a tough job. It always was going to be.

I’m just a little bit surprised to hear that the really strong community investment that could have been rolled out over 24 or 36 months is less the focus than the replacement or who the primary policing service in that jurisdiction is.

N. Lipinski: Let me comment on that. Our present focus, of course, was to get the first group of people out on the street. What I’m talking to you today about are my thoughts, which will be embedded in the strategic plan.

The board approves the strategic plan. My intention, then, is to work with the RCMP, as you indicated, and say: “Essentially, we are going to be in charge sooner or later. We want to go down this road about this community policing model — district advisory councils, CSOs, community partnership officers. Can we not start now? Can I put five community partnership officers on foot or on bicycle in Newton or Whalley or any other district? Can we do that?”

That is the thought process: build a strategic plan, work with the RCMP, and start that process of the SPS and our model of doing business.

A. Olsen: One more question, Mr. Chair.

I just want to ask a question about the Indigenous en­gagement and relationships. Again, an opportunity, I think, at the beginning to really sit with the Elders and the communities there and put a really strong stamp from our relatives there in Katzie and Semiahmoo — very close families to ours over here in Saanich. What was the process with the Indigenous relationship-building in the groundwork that you laid in there?

N. Lipinski: Prior to me getting here, the police board started an Indigenous strategy. Chief Harley Chappell is a board member. He commenced that. I have a deputy chief who is in charge of uniformed policing, an Indigenous individual that will be working with Chief Chappell. They have just started their community consultation, meaning Indigenous community consultation. Of course, we have Katzie and Semiahmoo here, but we also have a large urban Indigenous population.

There’s a lot of opportunity — I have been part of those meetings — to connect. There’s a group there, where they’re the Indigenous leaders of the various non-profits, etc. We had a very, very good discussion about building — this is very key — an Indigenous strategy together. It’s not our strategy; it’s doing it together and what is needed. We want to hear from the Indigenous community. I’m excited about that. It’s going to take a little bit of time. There’s a lot of communication going on right now. We do have momentum there.

R. Singh: Thank you, Chief. I would also like to congratulate you. It’s a historic day today. We are — especially us, the Surrey MLAs — in a really historic position, as well, with this transition happening between the two police forces.

My question would be: with Surrey being the fastest-growing community and different challenges…. What this committee is looking at are the mental health challenges and the systemic racism. How do you see it in Surrey? I completely agree: for the police force — whether on the RCMP side or on the city side — their main focus is the community. What do you think are the challenges that Surrey is looking at?

[1:50 p.m.]

N. Lipinski: Thank you for that. It’s safe to say, when you’re talking about drug addiction, when you’re talking about mental health, the graph is going up. There’s just more and more. It’s not just Surrey. We know it’s every major city. The challenge for the Surrey Police Service is: what can we do to bring it down?

The starting point is our involvement at the table with the non-profits in assisting to try and bring the numbers down. I personally believe that a lot of times they look to police for the answer. Sometimes the circumstances people are born in, raised in and choices they make lead them to a life of addiction, lead them to a life of mental illness. My role in that would be to get them off the ramp of the criminal justice system. They do not belong in the criminal justice system.

Of course, resources are scarce in the non-profits and government agencies, etc., but it’s been my experience that when you have a police person, myself, at the table, we tend to be doers and action-oriented people to galvanize groups in order to do something.

Look, we know with fentanyl, it’s an issue. We have to go after the drug dealers. The gang stuff is a whole different topic area, but it’s there because of profits in drug trafficking. We have to really take care of that and have a spectrum of how we deal with that.

We do have to look at alternate ways of dealing with the mentally ill. We do have to look at housing. There are a lot of social things here that policing has been involved in and should continue to be involved in. But it is very much a community, a government, a policing issue, and we’ve got to come together and look at different ways of being more effective.

Personally, it’s about: what is the best ROI, return on investment? If I have my police officers involved on the street, walking the beat or on bicycles, where can they be placed to have the most effect to get the people off the criminal justice path and onto something else where they can get some assistance?

There’s a lot of good work that’s being done already, and I intend to work with the city. My long-term plan is to seek funding, working with the various city, provincial and even federal — where I can, but certainly the provincial — elements because it’s a health issue.

There is a lot of work to be done. My starting point is to look at where we are now. What’s the data? Where are the calls? Where can we help? Go in there, and build from there.

G. Begg: You’ve identified one aspect of the British Columbia Police Act that you think that we might be helpful in reforming, which is the POJs. Are there other aspects? You’ve been a senior police leader in Alberta and elsewhere. I wonder if there are other aspects of the B.C. Police Act that you see as salient for us to take a look at as we do our work.

N. Lipinski: Yeah, thank you for that. As a general statement, and you have probably heard this before, but when we are talking about misconduct by police officers, it’s, where possible, to streamline the process. Sometimes the process is very, very onerous. It’s unfortunate, but sometimes it takes a very, very long time. That’s not the best outcome for the complainants. That’s not the best outcome for police officers.

Sometimes, especially if we’re talking low-level infractions, if there is a way to smooth that out, to speed it up and move on — to do that. Certainly, now I think everybody on the committee knows there’s a possibility for some mediation under some alleged offences. But when there is a full-on investigation, is there a way that we can smooth that out and move it along a bit quicker?

[1:55 p.m.]

That’s probably the number one thing people will say about the sections in the Police Act having to do with misconduct.

D. Routley (Chair): Thanks. We all very much appreciate this presentation and your efforts. It’s a unique situation and opportunity. Thank you very much for enlightening us. We really appreciate your willingness to share this with us.

N. Lipinski: Thank you very much. I enjoyed that. Have a great afternoon, everyone.

D. Routley (Chair): Likewise. Thanks.

Members, since we’re well behind here, we’ll go straight into our next presentation.

Welcome, Rachel, to the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act. I’m Doug Routley. I’m the MLA for Nanaimo–North Cowichan and the Chair. The members…. We’ve kept you waiting a long time, so I’ll ask them introduce themselves as they ask their questions. We’ll just jump right into it.

I will let the members know — as they already do, but to put it on the record — that we are joined by Rachel Bromberg. She is the co-founder of Reach Out Response Network in Toronto. We’re very appreciative that you take the time to help us way out here in B.C.

With that, I’d ask you to go ahead, Rachel.

REACH OUT RESPONSE NETWORK

R. Bromberg: Thank you so much for having me. I’m the co-founder of the Reach Out Response Network. I’ll just say a little bit about our organization. Our organization has been working with the city of Toronto to develop a framework for our civilian-led crisis response service, which is going to launch in March of 2022.

Just a little bit about the pilots. We’re going to have four different pilots that will send mental health crisis workers rather than police to respond to some categories of non-violent mental health crisis calls in four catchment areas in our city. It’s not a co-responder model that sends police out with mental health workers. It’s entirely civilian-led.

The service will be a partnership between the city of Toronto and community agencies in each of the catchment areas. The community agencies will deliver the programming. Crisis workers will be employees of the agencies, rather than employees of the city or employees of the pol­ice or EMS or fire.

Our service is going to be accessible via 911 as well as through 211 and through its own direct number — for example, calling the agency directly. Our organization has been supporting the city in an extensive community engagement process. We supported them in doing close to 50 town halls last summer, several large surveys, many individual and key stakeholder interviews to hear what folks in the community wanted to see in the new service and how to effectively build trust in the service when it launches.

Our organization is also the anchor agency for the International Crisis Response Association, which is a service providers network connecting folks across Canada and the U.S. who are building or leading non-police crisis response services in their communities. As of right now, there are about a dozen operational community responder models, the majority of which are in the U.S. and the majority of which are based at least somewhat on the CAHOOTS model in Eugene, Oregon.

There are several dozen more cities across the U.S. and Canada that are currently developing these kinds of models, many of which will launch over the next two years — obviously including Toronto but also including the Durham region, Ottawa and a lot of U.S. cities.

There is also a large body of research being developed on these types of models and best practices, including research done by the Center for American Progress, the Law Enforcement Action Partnership, the Wellesley Institute, the CSG Justice Center and the Vera Institute. If you’re interested in learning more about that, those are all places that you should check out.

For today, I’m just going to speak a little bit about CAHOOTS and similar models that are based somewhat off CAHOOTS. I’m going to talk a little bit about the importance of incorporating people with lived experience onto these teams and onto the advisories developing these teams. I’m going to run through a couple of our most frequently asked questions, and then I’m going to finish off with key takeaways for this new model of care.

CAHOOTS is a team in Eugene, Oregon. They’ve been around since 1989, so more than 30 years. What they do is pair a mental health crisis worker with a medic to respond to crisis calls through the 911 dispatch system in the city of Eugene. Eugene is a pretty small city, obviously a lot smaller than Toronto. It has about 200,000 people, so it’s a model that for large cities — like, for example, Vancouver or Victoria — probably will need to be scaled up substantially. That’s what we’re doing in Toronto.

[2:00 p.m.]

There are a lot of cities, including New York, including Albuquerque — very different sizes, very different demographic makeups — that are taking this model and adapting it to meet the needs of their communities.

I’ll say one thing about 911 integration. In my perspective, that is the big key to CAHOOTS’ success and what allows them to divert a large number of calls away from police and to this new team. So 911 is often the only number that folks in crisis know to call, and it’s also the number that is accessible, basically, to anyone.

People can call 911 when their phone is out of minutes. They can call 911 from a payphone. When they’re in a crisis, they can remember 911 a lot better than a random ten-digit number of a random community agency that maybe they heard of five years ago.

We also know that 84 percent of 911 crisis calls in relation to a mental health crisis are not made by the person in crisis themselves. They’re made by third parties. So about 30 percent are made by family members and friends of the person in crisis. About 30 percent are actually made by service providers like doctors, nurses, social workers, case managers. About 25 percent are made by bystanders — so people who don’t know the person in crisis but are just witnessing something unfold and thinking: “Oh, here’s a problem. We should call 911 to address that.”

What we know from the town halls that we did with family members, in particular, and regular community members is that they’re not necessarily aware of mental health resources, and also, often, particularly if they’re bystanders, they might not be aware that what they’re witnessing is a mental health crisis. They’re just seeing some behaviour that concerns them, so they think: “Oh, I should call 911.” So making sure that even folks who don’t know about existing community resources are able to still access those resources via 911 is really essential.

Because of 911 integration, in my view, in 2019, CA­HOOTS was able to take about 24,000 calls, which is about 20 percent of all 911 calls in their city that year. They res­pond to lots of different types of calls. Some are traditional mental health calls, but some of the calls they respond to are for people experiencing homelessness.

They also respond to substance-use-related calls. They do general welfare checks. They do other assorted things like death notifications — so, basically, a lot of things that require some immediate response, but don’t necessarily require an officer with a badge and a gun to show up.

CAHOOTS has been working with lots of different cities over the past couple of years to help those cities develop similar services. New York City, Denver, Olympia, Portland, Albuquerque, San Francisco and a whole bunch of other cities have launched CAHOOTS-style services — over the past year and a half, most of them. There are a few different models that those cities are using.

The way that CAHOOTS works is it’s a partnership be­tween a community health clinic, the White Bird Clinic, and the city of Eugene and their police department. Even though it’s completely civilian-led, a lot of the funding for CAHOOTS comes from the police department, and obviously 911 is operated through the police department in Eugene. I know that that’s not the same in British Columbia. But that is the same in Eugene. Basically, the calls come through the public safety system, and then the team employed by the White Bird Clinic is dispatched via police radio, and they go out to respond to those calls.

Some cities are not using that community partnership model. Some cities — like, for example, Albuquerque and Sacramento — are creating a brand-new city department that will operate the service. The staff would be city em­ployees, who would go out and respond. So it’s basically like you have EMS. You have fire. You have police. You basically have a fourth emergency service that’s a city department that can be dispatched.

For some cities — like, for example, New York City — their team is run through EMS. Their teams are dispatched via EMS. Portland’s team is run through the fire department, so they’re dispatched via the fire dispatch. Then you have cities like Toronto or like Denver, Colorado, that are partnering with multiple community agencies rather than just one, like the White Bird Clinic, to operate the program.

There isn’t a body of data yet, because a lot of these programs are quite new, to show what kinds of models might be best for a given community. It seems, from preliminary data, that all of these models have some benefits. All of them might have drawbacks, depending on the community that you’re in. But really, all of them seem to show substantial success in the communities that they’re built in.

[2:05 p.m.]

Obviously, some of the benefits of these models are re­ducing criminal justice system involvement and reducing unnecessary hospitalizations. We know that the majority of people who are brought to the ER by police are not actually admitted to the hospital, because they don’t actually qualify for involuntary admission under the Mental Health Act.

The police, when they show up, really don’t have a lot of options. They can arrest someone if that person has committed a crime. They can do an apprehension under the Mental Health Act and take someone to the hospital, or they can do nothing and be like: “This isn’t really a place for us.”

Crisis workers obviously have greater options. We want to make sure that if people don’t actually need to be in a hospital, if they don’t meet the criteria, if they’re not going to be admitted, they don’t end up sitting in the ER for four, five, six hours only to be sent home. It’s much better for them to be de-escalated, referred, connected to appropriate resources.

One of the main, essential ingredients to these models is making sure there are effective referral pathways. A crisis service is only as effective as the services it can divert people towards. If the ER is the only service available in your community, you’re not going to be able to divert people away from the ER, because that’s the only place. Making sure that there’s an additional funding push, when you’re building these models, for crisis beds, peer respite centres, reducing wait times for mental health services, supportive housing…. All of those are really important.

When we were doing our town halls, we heard a lot from families that often they called 911 on their loved one just because they were told that was the only way for their loved one to be eligible for services, or the quickest way for their loved one to be eligible for services. But obviously, instead of getting services, a lot of the time their loved one wound up in the criminal justice system. That’s not what we want. We want people to be able to access services immediately when they need it, without having to be on a wait-list for a long period of time or having families, in desperation to get services, calling 911 and police showing up and then the cycle of criminalization.

That’s what I will say about models. I’ll talk a little bit about including people with lived experience. That’s something that’s really important, both to have peer workers working on the front lines of the service but also advising in the development of the service. Peer support is really beneficial, because first of all, it promotes better outcomes. Peer workers often have a lot of expertise based on their own experiences in how to provide support to someone in crisis. Also, peer workers sharing their own stories when someone is in crisis can build a really genuine connection and a sense of safety and trust.

Often someone who’s been in crisis themselves knows intuitively what kinds of things are helpful or unhelpful. That also goes for having people with lived experience in advisory roles. They have a lot of insight to offer in how to effectively develop these full services. Peer support also really promotes hope for people in crisis.

Someone in crisis is often really overwhelmed. They sometimes feel like this moment is all there is, and that’s all they can really see at that time. So having a peer worker there can help them look outward and see beyond this moment and imagine the possibility of a future. It can help reframe a crisis as something that isn’t stigmatizing or shaming but is an experience that someone has and then comes through and can maybe use that experience positively in the future.

Similarly to that, peer support can really reduce stigma and shame when someone is experiencing a crisis or when they’ve struggled with mental health. Often they feel very alone. They can feel shame. They can feel like there’s something wrong with them. Response from police and hospitals can often really compound that sense of isolation and shame, and having a peer worker can really combat that and be really powerful in helping clients shape their views of themselves in a much more positive way and see the value of their own experience.

I’m going to go quickly to two frequently asked questions. Our No. 1 most frequently asked question is: what about the risk of violence? Aren’t these kinds of teams setting civilian crisis workers up to potentially get hurt by dangerous, scary people in crisis? Our organization actually did a report to answer this question because we were getting it so often.

We talked to each of the existing community responder teams across Canada and the U.S., and we asked them about their actual rates of injuries to their front-line staff. What we found was that there have never been any serious injuries or deaths of any staff member on any of the teams ever. Some of these teams, like CAHOOTS, have been around for 32 years. They take maybe 20,000 calls a year for decades, and it just hasn’t happened.

[2:10 p.m.]

We also looked at some research that was put together in Ontario that looked at 911 mental health crisis calls, basically from the 911 dispatch centre. What they found was that 84 percent of these calls don’t involve any kind of violence or weapons whatsoever.

Also, best practice for these teams is that staff carry police radios, so if they are in a situation where initially it wasn’t violent but it’s getting violent, or maybe there’s a risk of that, they can call police for backup very quickly. This very rarely happens. CAHOOTS called for police backup fewer than 1 percent of the time last year. And most of that wasn’t even related to violence. It was mostly related to if they needed to do a Mental Health Act apprehension, and only police are able to do that in Eugene, as in Ontario and, I think, in B.C. as well. So risk of violence is way overstated in public perception.

The second question we get a lot of is the relationship between the civilian-led service in co-responder models that pair police with a mental health professional. I mean, we know, like I said, that most crisis calls are non-violent. For the ones that do involve weapons or violence, obviously, you don’t want to send an unarmed social worker to deal with a situation in which guns are involved. That’s not what this team is for.

In an ideal world, you would have a continuum of care where the 84 percent of non-violent crisis calls could be responded to by the civilian-led team. Then for the others, where a mental health perspective may be useful but safety may also be at risk, you would have a mental health worker attend with a police officer. The police officer focuses on the safety issue. The social worker or mental health worker focuses on providing psychological support and de-escalation. It is isn’t really like an either-or between police or civilian-led teams. There’s a place for both of them within the system.

Okay, final takeaways for this. What we’re developing in Toronto, and what I believe is the best model, is a community responder model that can send civilian crisis workers to respond to non-violent mental health crisis calls, which, as we know, are the majority of mental health crisis calls. It’s really important for the team to be accessible via 911 but also through other avenues, like through 211 or a direct number, in order to promote as much ac­cess as possible and to create a No Wrong Door type of system.

Teams should include people with lived experience both working on and advising the team. Teams could be run centrally through the city or through a partnership with community agencies. Either of those models works, but it’s really important to build and fund secondary services to develop appropriate referral pathways. Your crisis team is only as good as the other services in your community.

That was 15 minutes. I’m going to stop talking now.

D. Routley (Chair): Wow, thank you very much for that.

I’ll go straight to questions from members.

H. Sandhu: Thank you so much, Rachel. Such a wonderful presentation. The work you’re doing is pretty exciting. I just want to know…. There are several questions, but one very important question you mentioned.

When there is violence expected, then there will be pol­ice officers — some support, extra support. For the responders, what strategies do you have in place or are you developing in a case of an unpredictable situation where we can say that…? There are still a large number of health care workers and unions who are concerned about safety. I wonder if there are strategies that you can share. There always — oftentimes, perhaps, if not commonly — or rarely might be unpredictable situations people walk in.

If you could share, that would be wonderful.

R. Bromberg: Yes. There are a few different aspects to this question. One of them is making sure from the very beginning, through 911 dispatch, that calls that are likely to become violent are not sent to the civilian-led teams. That’s something about training your dispatchers. There are lots of decision-making models that other cities, particularly Denver, have developed for this.

Then you have the question of: okay, once your staff get out there, what kinds of supports are they given? One of the supports that a lot of the teams get is police radios, so they can call police immediately for help if they need it. Again, it happens very rarely, but they can if they need it.

In a situation where it might not be initially assessed as violent but might be assessed as that maybe it could be useful to have police close by, sometimes police will come but will sort of wait around the corner. They call this staging. They’ll be nearby so they can get there very, very quickly if needed, but they won’t be in the eyesight of the person in crisis, so it’s not escalating them.

[2:15 p.m.]

Another thing just goes to staff training: teaching staff to use their judgment, teaching them to assess risk and also teaching them that if they’re in a situation where they feel unsafe, not to stay in that situation. CAHOOTS gets that training also, where their workers are told: “Trust your intuition. If you get on the scene and something doesn’t feel right, leave the scene — if someone is starting to yell at you or starting to get very aggressive.”

The model that CAHOOTS and other services have is a consent-based model. If someone isn’t consenting, leave. If you need to call in police or call in EMS or whomever, call them. Don’t stay on the scene. They also receive de-escalation training and physical self-protection skills training so that if someone is aggressive, then they have the physical self-defence skills to respond to that. Again, this happens very, very rarely.

H. Sandhu: Thank you. I really appreciate it. I know, existingly, we have code white training in B.C., and we do high hazard assessment not only for mental health calls but also for community nursing as well. I really appreciate it.

It’s exciting to know there are some strategies in place which can…. As you mentioned, it doesn’t often happen, but rarely. There are always chances. It’s good to know that there are some things that can be placed. Appreciate it.

D. Routley (Chair): Thank you.

Go ahead, Garry.

G. Begg: Chair, it was answered in the last exchange. Thank you.

R. Glumac: A quick question building off the last question. I think you said earlier that 84 percent — was that the number? — of the calls were not from the individual but from family members or other people. Is that correct?

R. Bromberg: Yeah.

R. Glumac: You also said that CAHOOTS is kind of a consent-based model, and the individual has to consent. Are there times where somebody might be having a mental health crisis and they don’t want help? Then what happens in those cases?

R. Bromberg: That’s a good question. That situation does arise sometimes with CAHOOTS and with other teams.

The way that the teams are approaching the person in crisis isn’t like, “We are going to help you by forcing you to go to the hospital if you don’t want to,” or: “We’re going to make you do something you don’t want to do.” It’s very much about conversations like: “What do you need right now? How can I help you?” Usually that approach is quite effective.

In a situation where someone doesn’t want that, then it’s up to the team to do an assessment. If this is a situation in which someone might meet criteria for involuntary apprehension under the Mental Health Act, then police are the only ones who are able to do that. If the person doesn’t want to engage, the team might say to the person: “I really want to support you right now. If you don’t want to engage with me, legally, we’re mandated reporters who might have to call police.”

Usually that works. It’s kind of a coercive model. It’s kind of icky to talk about a little bit, but that is sometimes what happens because of mandated reporting laws.

Usually people do engage. Sometimes people don’t en­gage. They don’t want help, but they’re also not doing anything violent. They are not doing anything dangerous. They’re not suicidal. They don’t meet criteria for involuntary apprehension. The team can’t really do anything. That sucks, but it happens occasionally.

R. Glumac: Yeah. In someone that is going through a mental health crisis of some kind, it can add further, I guess, to their trauma, too. They don’t want help — a “just leave me alone” kind of thing or whatever — and being taken away by the police in handcuffs and things like that can add further to the trauma.

When it gets to that point where maybe the people that are there realize that this person should go to the hospital, are you working with police in a way that getting to the hospital can be less traumatic for that individual?

[2:20 p.m.]

R. Bromberg: Yeah. The team — like CAHOOTS and other teams across Canada and the U.S. — can definitely transport people to the hospital themselves without police if the person is willing to go.

Often there would be a conversation about that. The cri­sis worker would be like: “I really don’t want you to have to go with police or go in an ambulance. I’d really like to take you myself in my van. I’ll stay with you. What can we do to help you be more comfortable in the hospital? Can we maybe bring a family member with you? Can we maybe pack a bag that will have some comfort items for you?”

It’s very much about a conversation and very much about the training that crisis workers get to engage in these conversations. Calling police to do that would be the absolute, absolute last resort. That happens very rarely.

R. Glumac: I see. Okay. I guess I didn’t realize that they can be transported to the hospital. I guess they stay there at the hospital when the person is there, that kind of thing, till everything is….

R. Bromberg: If the person wants them to, yeah. Some people don’t. Some people feel like: “I want you guys to go.” Some people feel like: “Yeah, it’s helpful to have company in the emergency room.” The emergency room can feel like a scary place. So the team is able to stay there with someone if they want the support.

R. Glumac: Oh, okay. I mean, that’s another thing. I don’t know if it’s the same out in Toronto, but out here, if a police officer takes someone to the hospital, they have to stay there with them. Again, you’re saying that it’s up to the individual as to whether they want that. That’s interesting. Okay.

The last question I have is basically…. I get a much clearer picture from you, and I really appreciate your coming to the committee today. You’re basically describing this CAHOOTS model as something that is propagating throughout many cities across North America. Is every city kind of approaching this journey on their own? Or is there…? Is CAHOOTS working directly with these municipalities to bring these changes into place?

R. Bromberg: Yeah, CAHOOTS is working with a lot of cities, doing consulting work and developing protocols with them. Our organization is also doing that. With the Crisis Response International association, we have about 70 cities that are represented at our table. We have monthly meetings. We share resources. We do presentations. Folks can get support from CAHOOTS, as well as the other cities — like Olympia, Denver, Portland — that have already been doing this work for a while.

R. Glumac: I appreciate, again, all of your knowledge in this area. You mentioned that you’ve already done some reports, talking about some of the frequently asked questions and things like that. We would welcome it if you could send that our way — and any other reports that you think might be helpful. It’d be great to have an opportunity to look through that.

R. Bromberg: Yeah, definitely. The reports are available on our website. I can put that into the chat, if that would be helpful — where you can find those. We have the long version of our reports and then the short version of our reports.

Also, the CSG Justice Center is going to be publishing — in December, I believe — a comprehensive toolkit that is basically intended to support cities across Canada and the U.S. that are developing these models. It’ll have a lot of information about best practices in things like training, hiring, 911 dispatch protocols, safety. There’s a whole section on safety. I can send that once that’s published, or you can keep an eye out for that.

R. Glumac: Thank you so much.

A. Olsen: I just wanted to thank you for this presentation. As Rick was pointing out, I think what you did was to clarify — for me, anyway — in this presentation the specific rollout of how someone who would be experiencing a mental health crisis might access it through the CA­HOOTS model.

[2:25 p.m.]

One of the things in this conversation that I’ve landed on is how much we stigmatize someone in a mental health crisis — assuming, almost at every turn, that that call is going to end in violence. I would really like to know the statistics of the number of times, because I really think that part of the work that we have to do, just globally, is talk about a mental health crisis in the context of what it is.

I’ve witnessed several of them in my life from people around me. Never have they been a violent incident. They have always been a time when somebody needs something — a conversation, help and assistance. So the idea of being able to triage this at the time of the call and really identify who the correct resource is to be sending to support that person….

To me, I think we continue to frame mental health crises in the context of a violent outcome. I find it hard to believe that the majority of them are actually violent outcomes.

I’ll just leave it at that, Chair.

D. Routley (Chair): Anybody else? Do we have any more questions? I don’t see hands up.

Really, I would like to, on behalf of the committee, thank you very much, Rachel, for this presentation and the work you’re doing. It really filled in some faces for us, for sure. Thank you very much for your willingness to….

Interjection.

D. Routley (Chair): Thanks a lot, Rachel. This has been very good. We’ve got important work to do. We consider it a huge opportunity to improve people’s lives, and there are examples all around, like yours, that we’re drawing from. We really appreciate the really important things you brought to us.

R. Bromberg: Thank you so much for having me. If anyone does have any more questions, feel free to reach out to me via email, and I can answer as many as I can.

D. Routley (Chair): Thanks, everybody. This is good. It certainly filled in some blanks as to how the process works around CAHOOTS and how the model was built.

We have time now for deliberations until 3. I suggest maybe a five-minute recess. Everybody okay with that? Okay. We’ll be back at 2:35.

The committee recessed from 2:27 p.m. to 2:40 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

Deliberations

D. Routley (Chair): Now that we are back to order, I would ask for a motion to move the meeting in camera for deliberations. That’s from Garry, seconded by Grace.

Motion approved.

The committee continued in camera from 2:40 p.m. to 3:06 p.m.

[D. Routley in the chair.]

D. Routley (Chair): Now I would ask members — thank you for the meeting — for a motion to adjourn. Rachna, seconded by Grace.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 3:07 p.m.