The Nelson Police Department has requested a 7.9 per cent increase in its budget for 2025.
Chief Donovan Fisher presented the 2025 police budget to Nelson city councillors on December 6.
His report highlighted the department’s priorities and challenges while emphasizing the urgent need for more staff and resources to address rising crime rates and officer workloads.
Crime rates and workload
His report revealed a significant increase in both violent and non-violent crimes. The city saw a 44 per cent increase in violent crimes from 2020 to 2022, followed by a slight 1.4 per cent decrease in 2023.
Property crime rates surged by 28 per cent from 2022 to 2023, which Chief Fisher attributes to the effects of the pandemic, decriminalization, housing pressures, and repeat offenders.
“The final factor, without being too critical, is that the justice system has that revolving door effect where, when you’ve got a chronic high-risk and habitual offender in a community, it’s very hard to remove them. And unfortunately, in the last couple of years, we’ve had some significant repeat offenders that drive the numbers up.”
The department’s annual call volume is expected to exceed 7,750 by the end of 2024. Fisher says there has been a consistent 10 per cent annual increase in call volumes since 2022, adding that Nelson has one of the highest crime rates for a municipality of its size in all of B.C.
“The crime rate is the second highest, particularly with the municipal policing side of things. We have over 7,700 calls for service, and the caseload per officer is the highest in B.C. That’s averaged over the officers on paper in the department.”
Staffing
Despite the detachment being authorized for 23 sworn officers, Fisher says it needs at least 25 to meet and maintain its service requirements.
He also noted that the department hasn’t hired any administrative staff since 2002, despite workloads increasing.
That’s why the detachment aims to hire three new dispatcher positions—one full-time and two part-time—to help improve scheduling, reduce overtime, and allow staff to be cross-trained for succession planning.
These changes aim to enhance efficiency and reduce overtime costs, potentially saving the city $100,000, with a net increase of $60,000 to fund the proposed positions.
“If we get rid of casual dispatchers and have committed employees available when we need shift coverage, it would eliminate a lot of the overtime. By making those changes, we shaved over $100,000 off the existing costs. Of course, there are additional costs with adding new people, but I think when you look at all the benefits you get with it, it’s an insignificant increase.”
Body-worn cameras
Staffing challenges have also prevented the department from rolling out its police-worn body camera program.
Fisher says the department has the technology but hasn’t been able to use it due to the administrative workload required to implement the program, which he says is a similar constraint for dash cameras.
“They’re an excellent tool for a number of reasons, but they also come with a fair bit of work involved—managing them, uploading, and holding the data. I would say that’s one reason why we haven’t gone to dash cams for the police cars too. They’re fantastic tools, but if you don’t have the infrastructure and the staff to manage those things, you just can’t do it—it creates more problems than it fixes.”
Budget impacts
If Fisher’s 7.9 per cent increase is approved, the Nelson Police budget for 2025 would total $26,554,134.
For the average household, this would mean an annual increase of about $161.25 or $13.44 per month.
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