Article content

A London police budget increase almost twice as high as council wants has some city politicians talking about ways to divert tax dollars from cops to counselling.

“I certainly understand why the demand on police services is up. I don’t think that the answer to it, though, is investing more in policing. I think that’s the most costly way,” Coun. Shawn Lewis said.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Police budget request has councillors thinking about ways to cut costs Back to video

“I would frankly rather see the police budget kept as low as possible and we make more investment in social services that will take police off (non-police) calls.”

That can’t happen immediately, but the conversation about it has to, Lewis said.

“As far as the police go, I think we have to have a frank conversation with them about how can we not have you answering these non-police calls, and take budget pressure off of you by redirecting some of our budget into services that mean the police aren’t answering these calls. “

Council and city staff have asked London’s boards and commissions to keep their annual increases at 1.5 per cent maximum as the city prepares to draft a multi-year budget beginning in 2020.