A former member of the Amherstburg Town Council who voted against a policing deal with Windsor says, "he knew it wasn't a good deal from the start."
In 2018, Jason Lavigne was one of two town councillors who voted against approving a 20-year deal to have Windsor provide policing and disband the former town police service, a deal that was passed in a 3-2 vote.
Lavigne says we lost our identity when we lost our police force.
"We lost control over our police force. We lost our community policing. We lost our voice completely, as the mayor has pointed out. We don't get to say a darn thing about Amherstburg policing now," he says. How many officers are there? What are they doing when they're there? Who's in control? Who do you call when you have certain situations in your schools, whatever? This is under another community's control now. We lost all of that. Was it worth it?"
Under the agreement, the mayor of Amherstburg is not part of the Windsor Police Services Board but is considered an advisor to the board.
The current Amherstburg Council will meet in-camera before Monday night's council meeting to discuss the future of policing in the town and potential options moving forward after city council voted to serve notice that it plans to end the policing contract.
The 20-year agreement between the town and the city is divided into four five-year segments, and in late 2023, the town approved the first five-year renewal phase of the contract.
Under the terms of the original agreement, an 18-month notice of termination must be provided, but the agreement would not end until the current renewal expires, which is Dec. 31, 2028.
Lavigne says if you don't stay with Windsor, the options are to go with the Ontario Provincial Police, see if LaSalle would be interested, or reboot your own police service, which is highly intricate.
"You have to assemble a police services board, you have to train them, and you have to assemble language policies, an entire administrative task that isn't covered in your current budget process. So you have to change your budgeting process and so much stuff that it almost makes it cost prohibitive," he says.
At the time the deal was approved, it was expected to save the town $570,000 a year.
Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens said Monday that every year, city council evaluates the effectiveness of this program.
"When we watch the numbers each and every year, we're getting close to the point where we feel it's on the border of Windsorites subsidizing the provision of policing to Amherstburg, which isn't right," he said.
Dilkens said it really comes down to being a financial decision.
"We can sit down with the Town of Amherstburg and negotiate a new agreement that satisfies all of the outstanding issues that we have; then we're absolutely willing to do that. If we can't, then we certainly respect their decision, and we've given them four years notice to find a new provider for policing in the Town of Amherstburg," he said.