Over the weekend, Barrie Mayor Jeff Lehman dropped a bombshell on social media.
“OK Barrie, this is appalling,” wrote Lehman on Facebook. “The Ford government has cut funding to the Barrie Police.”
Lehman wrote that the City of Barrie had received a letter from the Ministry of Community Safety and Correctional Services on Friday indicating they had cut a grant received by the city to go toward policing by $300,000, on top of cancelling the typical annual increase of $400,000 provided by the previous government.
“This means a $700,000 cut to public safety,” Lehman wrote.
When contacted on Sunday by BarrieToday, Lehman clarified exactly what the letter said and where this funding was allotted.
“The letter specified that we will get $2.7 million – which is $300,000 less than last year – for the Court Security Grant, which funds Barrie police costs for protecting the provincial courthouse,” he said. “The previous government had been increasing this grant by $400,000 a year because they were moving towards paying the full cost. So we had expected $700,000 more than what is being provided.”
Lehman said the wording of the letter is careful not to refer to the change in funds as a cut.
“The letter says nothing about a cut,” he said. “It references the formula for calculating the amount but does not explain why our allocation went down.”
During 2019 budget talks in January, Barrie Police Service asked for $53 million total, which is a 2.8 per cent increase over last year. The 2019 budget was approved with this ask.
For our full story on a breakdown of the budget ask, click here.
In regards to the how this news will now affect the Barrie taxpayer, Lehman says the numbers speak for themselves.
“Barrie Police Service had budgeted for $3.4 million (for this task), which was still $500,000 short of cost recovery. So now with the $700,000 less, Barrie taxpayers are being downloaded $1.2 million of costs for the provincial courthouse,” he said.
Lehman said he has many concerns about what this will mean for Barrie going forward.
“I am concerned we will have to cut other police services to fund the court cost cut,” he said. “In the midst of an opioid crisis in which the police are front-line workers, it's absolutely ridiculous that the (Progressive) Conservative government would cut funding.”
When reached for comment on Sunday, Barrie police communications co-ordinator Peter Leon told BarrieToday that the Barrie police will reserve comment at this time with respect to this matter.
Calls to Barrie-Innisfil MPP Andrea Khanjin and Barrie-Springwater-Oro-Medonte MPP Doug Downey were not returned by publication time.
