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For the community
Everyone loves a community parade. Waving. Fun floats. Candy. But with rising costs left on the shoulders of small community groups, parades are in jeopardy.
It’s an issue I take personally. In my spare time, I chair the Wellington Recreation Committee. With that, comes the responsibility of preparing road closure paperwork for Wellington’s main events—Canada Day, Pumpkinfest and Christmas in the Village. I started working on Pumpkinfest paperwork last week.
In mid-October, during Pumpkinfest, a parade will make its way through Main Street Wellington. At the end of the parade will be an OPP cruiser complete with two officers. The cost for this mandatory service—paid for entirely by the Wellington Recreation Committee—will be $738 plus HST.
The OPP require a four-hour minimum for every booking. The vehicle costs $25 per hour. The two officers ring in at $72.21 each, per hour, and last but not least, there is an administration fee of $60.62. This applies to every single parade—a huge cost for a recreation committee to justify for a 40-minute parade.
The big questions is, why are community groups with limited budgets paying this kind of money for officers to attend these events?
According to Detachment Commander John Hatch, these requirements are put in place by the municipality. “From my perspective, for a typical parade, an OPP officer and cruiser is required to lead the parade. This is a requirement as outlined by the County,” says Hatch. “The reason why we encourage a paid duty officer is that they are committed to that event, and won’t be called away to a priority one call.”
To be clear, I am not questioning the importance of an officer to monitor the traffic before and during the parade. And, I will admit that for the Canada Day parade, Commander Hatch cut the Rec Committee a bit of a break and let us squeak by with one paid officer instead of two.
But, in reality, the County is already paying for this service. The police services budget for 2019 is $4.85 million—up 2.3 per cent from 2018. The majority of this cost covers wages and benefits for the 41 officers who service Prince Edward County.
The Prince Edward OPP even have a Community Safety officer—an officer who is tasked with engaging the community, to make it a safer place. What better way to do exactly that than to be in a parade, meeting and speaking to residents?
The costs carried by volunteer groups need to be rethought. The Wellington Recreation Committee receives $7,000 annually from the municipality. Double that amount is spent on Canada Day alone. Having to pay for an OPP officer to drive down Main Street during a parade threatens the future of these events.
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