Overtime costs from the G20 summit and to a lesser extent the Vancouver Olympics are being blamed for a dramatic rise in Toronto police salaries.

The number of Toronto Police Service employees taking home income of at least six figures last year was up by more than 60 per cent from 2009.

Last year, 2,159 police personnel — the majority of which are uniformed officers — earned more than $100,000, not including taxable benefits. That number is way up from 2009, when only 1,329 employees made the province’s so-called “sunshine list.” In 2008, that number was 1,006.

“I don’t have a specific breakout of the G20, but overwhelmingly, a very significant amount of the increase is G20,” said police spokesperson Mark Pugash.

The Toronto Police Service also had a “significant” presence at the Vancouver Olympics, which drove salaries higher. However, Pugash added, the federal government has reimbursed the service for the overtime.

Roughly half of the 10,000 officers on duty during the June summit were from Toronto. Many were working on time-and-a-half overtime, on 12-hour shifts.

Scheduled annual salary increases also played in the six-figure spike, said Pugash.

At the end of the day, he added, “as years go by, there’ll be more and more officers whose starting pay puts them on the list without earning a penny of overtime at all.”

Detectives and sergeants, for example, make between $92,217 and $99,529. Staff sergeants earn anywhere from $101,966 to $109,278. And before overtime is taken into account, a first-class constable takes home $81,249 to $88,561 each year.

Making the list for the first time this year is Const. Adam Josephs, a.k.a. “Officer Bubbles.”

Josephs, who last year earned $108,197.45, threatened to arrest a G20 demonstrator for blowing bubbles, a moment that was captured on video and became a YouTube hit last summer.

Chief Bill Blair made $325,940.14 in 2010. In 2009, the chief earned $309,491.19.

And for the third year in a row, Traffic Services Const. Michael Thompson was included on the so-c1alled “sunshine list” of public sector employees in Ontario who earn at least $100,000. Last year, Thompson made $166,095.43, about double his base salary.

The salaries listed include base pay, overtime, court time and retroactive pay, but do not include paid-duty assignments — guarding construction sites and the like. Toronto officers who accept paid-duty shifts earn $65 an hour. In 2009, Toronto police worked 40,919 paid-duty assignments.

Asked if the roster of high earners among Toronto officers will be down next year, Pugash said it’s possible, given that nothing similar to the G20 or Olympics is on the 2011 calendar. However, salaries will continue to climb with collective bargaining commitments.

Pugash also noted that steps have been taken in recent years to monitor overtime tightly and that last week, Blair announced a service-wide belt-tightening review.

“We must ensure the money invested in policing is spent economically and appropriately,” Blair wrote in an internal memo. “We will do whatever we can to help the city reduce the projected budget shortfall for 2012.”

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Blair will target efficiencies in each department, as well as look for sources of cost recovery. (The service has long complained it is doing work, such as border control, for which other police jurisdictions should be footing the bill.)

The province’s sunshine list was released Thursday afternoon.