Police pension remains budget obstacle, says Bowman

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This article was published 18/11/2021 (1431 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A multi-year funding formula aimed at making policing costs “sustainable and predictable” won’t be ready until long after next year’s city budget is approved.

When council ordered the formula for the Winnipeg Police Service in December 2020, it set a deadline of the end of this year.

Instead, council’s executive policy committee approved a public service request on Wednesday to extend the deadline by four months, primarily to provide more time for public consultation.

That means no changes will be considered until after the city unveils its 2022 budget on Nov. 26.

Catherine Kloepfer, the city’s chief financial officer, said six public engagement events are planned for mid-January.

WPS received about $301 million in this year’s budget, which accounts for about 27 per cent of the city’s total operating budget.

Mayor Brian Bowman has long argued the police budget has grown at an unsustainable pace and blames the police pension for much of the cost.

“It is a very lucrative pension and it is a very high-cost pension,” he said. “We recognize it’s not sustainable.”

Council had ordered an overhaul of the pension to save millions each year, but an arbitrator ruled the unilateral move violated the collective bargaining agreement. So, the changes were cancelled. As a result, WPS was ordered to find $5.1 million of in-year savings to compensate for the lost savings in the 2021 budget.

Bowman said the Winnipeg Police Association has not shown “any appetite to reduce the entitlements in the pension.”

Police recently asked the city to cover as much as $7.3 million of cost overruns this year, due to the savings target and an actuarial assessment that found the pension plan is short $5.8 million.

The head of the Winnipeg Police Association said shortfalls in the pension fund are a direct result of the city’s decision to draw surpluses out of the pension plan years ago.

“Quite honestly, it shouldn’t be in the police budget… because (the city) used those surpluses back in the day. It should be coming out of the city’s pocket,” said president Moe Sabourin.

Sabourin rejected the mayor’s claim that the union is unwilling to consider changes to the police pension plan, calling that a “flat-out lie.”

“They tried to arbitrarily change the whole pension plan when we had agreed to sit down and negotiate… We are agreeable to changes to the pension plan, but you can’t (just) take them,” he said.

Sabourin said he’s concerned the multi-year funding formula will result in cuts just as calls for police service increase.

Winnipeg Police Service public affairs manager Kelly Dehn said it would be “premature” for police to comment on the funding formula while it is being developed.

joyanne.pursaga@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @joyanne_pursaga