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Helicopter set to fly

Council expected to approve purchase today

By: Bartley Kives

15/12/2009 1:00 AM | Comments: 24

BORIS.MINKEVICH@FREEPRESS.MB.CA Sam Katz: helicopter will help police

BORIS MINKEVICH / WINNIPEG FREE Enlarge Image

BORIS.MINKEVICH@FREEPRESS.MB.CA Sam Katz: helicopter will help police

City council is poised to approve the purchase of a police helicopter today and then wait until the new year for a report about the costs and benefits.

Winnipeg's 2010 capital budget, a $431-million plan for infrastructure upgrades and equipment purchases next year, calls for the Winnipeg Police Service to spend almost $3.5 million on a helicopter, as long as the province agrees to provide new cash to cover the $1.3-million annual operating cost.

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This morning, the budget is expected to sail through a special meeting of city council, despite lukewarm support for the helicopter from some of Mayor Sam Katz's allies and skepticism from opposition councillors.

While Chief Keith McCaskill of the Winnipeg Police Service has briefed the mayor and executive policy committee about the helicopter, a formal report will not come before council's protection and community services committee before January, Katz said in an interview Monday.

"My gut tells me, the way things are going, that information will be out there in the very near future anyway," said the mayor, who is convinced a helicopter will improve both the workplace safety and efficiency of city police.

McCaskill has said the aircraft will allow the police service to marshall patrol cars more effectively and allow officers to respond to more calls. Two Winnipeg police officers spent six months doing nothing else but study the use of a helicopter by police in Calgary, Edmonton, Ontario's York region and B.C.'s lower mainland, the chief said earlier this month.

While the mayor said any member of council could have taken the initiative to speak to McCaskill about the officers' findings, some councillors still want to see a report.

"We're making a decision without seeing a single piece of paper that analyzes whether this is a good use of police resources," said Fort Rouge Coun. Jenny Gerbasi. "If there's a report that's written, release it. People need to know the rationale and it has to be based on facts.

"On many issues, we're being asked to simply trust the mayor without knowing the facts. We have to be more accountable than that."

The left-leaning councillor's concerns are echoed by Colin Craig, the Manitoba director of the fiscally conservative Canadian Taxpayers Federation, who said the public needs to see a solid business case for a helicopter purchase.

"Buying a chopper should not be an emotional decision," he said.

But even council's support for the helicopter hinges upon entirely new operating funding from the province. St. Vital Coun. Gord Steeves, who sits on EPC, has said he would not agree to the purchase if it meant diverting existing funds away from other police operations. The NDP government made funding for a police helicopter part of its Nov. 30 throne speech, but has yet to agree to cover the operations with entirely new cash, Katz and a spokesman for Premier Greg Selinger have confirmed.

Manitoba's Opposition leader says he doesn't believe Selinger has any choice. "If you're going to get the headline, and you're going to make it the centrepiece of the throne speech, you have to be prepared to fund it," said Tory Leader Hugh McFadyen.

bartley.kives@freepress.mb.ca

OPPOSITION councillors are mounting a last-ditch effort to insert rapid-transit funding into the city's long-term spending plans.

This morning at city hall, Fort Rouge Coun. Jenny Gerbasi and River Heights Coun. John Orlikow will try to add $63 million in city funding for the second phase of the southwest rapid-transit corridor into the city's five-year capital budget forecast, which covers infrastructure spending until the year 2015.

The budget forecast does not include any funding for the second phase of the bus corridor, a six-kilometre busway slated to run alongside Pembina Highway from Jubilee Avenue to Bison Drive. The city and province have pegged the price tag of Phase Two at $189 million.

Gerbasi and Orlikow want the city to set aside $21 million a year in 2012, 2013 and 2014 to complete the busway, which is supposed to be finished in 2014, in order to show other levels of government the city is serious about completing the project.

"The benefit of putting it in a projected budget is you're committed to doing it," Gerbasi said on Monday. "We often put projects (in the budget forecast) that include funding from other levels of government before we have their commitments. The water and waste improvements are a good example."

The opposition motion is bound to fail today, as Mayor Sam Katz and his allies on council do not support the amendment. Katz has said he doesn't believe in using budget documents to pressure other levels of government into funding announcements.

Negotiations about the second phase of rapid transit are continuing with the federal and provincial governments, he added on Monday.

"I don't think the aspect of seriousness is in question," the mayor said.

The first phase of the southwest bus corridor, a $138-million link between Queen Elizabeth Way and Jubilee Avenue, is slated to be finished in 2011.

-- Bartley Kives

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition December 15, 2009 B1

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24 Commentscomment icon

For what its worth, at an annual salary of $60,000, the amount spent on this helicopter could put 58 (FIFTY EIGHT!) new police officers on the street. And maybe, just maybe, we could get a couple to actually walk the beat, on foot, and get to know the communities they work in.

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So what they're saying now is all that money spent on "more feet on the street" wasn't good enough and now we need some "eyes in the sky"? And with no formal report? What next?! Surveillance cams on every corner of Winnipeg?

Sure, let's keep tossing around tax-payer money into new toys to look cool to your friends, Sam. Thanks, but no thanks.

Are most people blind to the chopper that's been flying around downtown for many months...what is that one for?

@ watchingout...

When does the March on City Hall begin...Totally agree with you...Vote first on the Helicopter Issue then lets figure out how we will pay for it or if it is all worth it...Study to be released in the new year...

Does Katz have to put a study together because a real one hasn't been done yet and that's why no other council members or the public got to see the study before council voting?

Can we all vote without having and election?...Bye, bye Sammy...You just got to go...

The public should study the issue after the vote...GGF

Once again Fort Rouge Coun. Jenny Gerbasi is crying about how this is going to effect her liberal (criminal) constituents. Whenever there is a positive aspect to police spending or enforcement Gerbasi is against it. She is anti-police, anti-government, anti-public safety, anti-intelligence.

Smoke and mirrors! Our mayor & his city council lackeys rush to commit money to an expensive toy that has not been properly studied by an independent party or proven to be a viable crime fighting tool for Winnipeg. Who cares if the province is stupid enough to pick up the operating costs? It's still a waste of my tax dollars!

"Two Winnipeg police officers spent six months doing nothing else but study the use of a helicopter by police in Calgary, Edmonton, Ontario's York region and B.C.'s lower mainland..." Translation: 2 cops went on a travel junket and did a few 'fly-alongs'. Oooh, neato! We got to ride in a helicopter - Yippee!! Wouldn't it be neat if Winnipeg had one of these??? Is this what passes for a 'study' of this issue?

Winnipeg needs real solutions to its crime problem. Just yesterday, Stats Canada released figures on police personnel & expenditure in Canada, and guess what? Winnipeg is number one with the highest per capital number of police of all major cities. We have lots of police, we spend lots on policing, and yet the crime problem persists. And we should buy an expensive helicopter now??? Someone needs to think rationally, not emotionally about the crime issue. More police & expensive toys won't accomplish anything. A well planned multi-agency strategy like WATSS does actually pay real dividends (auto theft -70%). But hey, WPS union boss Mike Sutherland & Katz don't like real solutions because it doesn't suit their cynical agendas.

Clearly some people haven't spent time listening to a police scanner.
The number of high speed chases that get away is ridiculous.

A helicopter out a few nights a week would certainly help fix that.

Awesome! I hope this sweet new chopper looks like Airwolf!!!

If this is such a good idea WHY ISN'T IT BEING RUN THROUGH THE PROPER PROCESS? The same Mayor who killed the original BRT and LRT plans, only to spend more money to get similar plans years later, now has the gall to fast track a pet project before any formal analysis is done? WTF? Wake up Winnipeg we are being swindled yet again by smilin' Sam.

Way to go Sam, ramming something through without the rest of council having the reports first. Brilliant. *sarcasm*

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