The Saskatoon Police Service preliminary budget has been approved by the Board of Police Commissioners, and now the first ever multi-year budget moves on to City Council. It proposes an increase of 4.49 per cent for 2020, which works out to almost $99-thousand, followed by a 4.39 per cent increase for 2021 at around $103-million.

Some of the items include 3 more officers and 5 civilian positions, including a full-time clinical psychologist. An in-house psychologist has been helping members for the past year, and Chief Troy Cooper would like to see it become a permanent position.

Vice-Chair of the Board, Carolanne Inglis-McQuay, believes this budget combines the need for more staff and their supports with the ability to move officers around to different units as necessary. She gives the example of more officers allocated to homicide this summer after a string of incidents.

Inglis-McQuay says a benefit of the 2-year budget is it forces all city departments including the Police Service to look ahead and the challenge will be operational needs that can’t be anticipated. Although it’s a two-year budget, they will be passed by City Council one year at a time.