The head of the Saint John Police Association says it would be good to have community policing back in the city.
It was one of three units eliminated when the city cut more than $1 million from the police budget in December.
But thanks to the ‘new deal’ with the province, Saint John’s finance committee approved an updated budget to restore that funding.
Duane Squires was one of the community officers moved back to regular patrol and tells us he built many relationships within the community.
“I was still receiving calls from different schools or agencies that I had dealt with,” says Squires,” so I had my patrol responsibilities and I still felt like I had the responsibilities of the people that you had made connections with in the community.”
Changes in the budget brought about by the “new deal” mean officers will likely be returning to the Street Crime unit, Traffic services and Community Policing in a matter of weeks. https://t.co/4x69mpobfZ pic.twitter.com/c1LGpLqnyU
— CHSJ News (@chsjnews) March 14, 2018
Squires says a lot of people and groups really interact well with community police officers and like that connection.
It’s his understanding the units will be reinstated thanks to the new money, but Squires says they won’t know for sure until council approves the budget next week.
Squires says there are concerns they could be back in the same boat once the deal is up, but all they can do is wait and see.
“We’re always holding out hope that something else may change between now and then,” he says. “We deal with the issues that we have at hand and try to work towards things in the future.”