The proposed Toronto police budget would see nearly 300 additional police officers patrolling Toronto’s streets by 2021, a complement the force says is necessary to expand community-policing and traffic-enforcement initiatives and respond to a growing number of emergency calls.

The additional cops would bring the total number of police officers to 5,038 by 2021, up from the current count of 4,754 — a size that was initially discussed as a target number as part of the 2017 Toronto police modernization plan.

Critics question increasing staffing levels, stressing the overall need to reduce a police budget that’s once again proposed to be above the $1-billion mark.

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“The staff of the police service is expanding quite considerably,” wrote John Sewell, of the Toronto Police Accountability Coalition, in a letter sent to the board Monday that also questioned increased civilian staff levels.

“We believe every city department has an obligation to pursue efficiencies, both to ensure that staff do useful work, and to ensure public money is well spent,” he wrote.

In a recent report to the board, Toronto police Chief Mark Saunders said the average number of uniformed officers on staff has declined by 685 since 2010. That has meant the service has relied heavily on overtime “to help ensure public safety was not compromised” — something he noted is not financially sustainable and is causing employee burnout.

The service would use $11 million of a requested $40-million budget increase to fund additional uniformed officers, Saunders said, including 140 new cops to address rising calls for service and major crimes, eight new traffic officers, and 40 additional neighbourhood community officers.

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City police spokesperson Allison Sparkes said Monday that multiple factors support the need for more officers, including increased calls for service, emergency and crisis calls, as well as a spike in almost all major crime categories.

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“The chief is requesting an investment in people and technology to ensure the service is appropriately resourced to support the changes in the city, and to begin to move towards greater proactive policing,” she said in an email.

Sewell said he supports moving officers into traffic enforcement and community policing, but said they could “easily be found from within the service.”

Toronto police have asked the Toronto police board for a net operating budget of $1.076 billion, a sum that’s $40 million, or 3.9 per cent, higher than the approved 2019 budget. The majority of the proposed 2020 increase — $28.9 million — is to cover salary and benefits requirements, including collective agreement responsibilities with the Toronto Police Association.

Reducing the cost and size of the police service was among the aims of the 2017 modernization plan, brought forward by the Toronto police and its board. A hiring and promotions freeze, which lasted just six months, was aimed in part at bringing the number of uniformed officers to about 4,750. (Sparkes noted that the 4,750 number was “discussed in the context of right-sizing, realignment of duties and finding efficiencies during modernization” and was not in the modernization plan.)

Asked about the increase in officer numbers, Mayor John Tory said the board is “making necessary investments to support our police as they work to keep our city safe.”

“Through the modernization, we have seen fiscally responsible budgets including 0 per cent budget increases in 2017 and 2018 and $100 million in efficiencies in that time,” he said in a statement.

In an email, Toronto police board chair Jim Hart said it is the chief’s responsibility to determine staffing levels “in keeping with modernization principles and based on the changing circumstances and community safety needs.

“The Board has always viewed the modernization plan as dynamic and evolving, with the understanding that a change in the policing context might require adjustments to some of the plan’s details,” Hart said.

Mike McCormack, president of the Toronto Police Association, said in an interview Monday that the move to increase uniform levels supports the association’s contention that staffing has been too low. Citing an increase in violent crime and traffic fatalities, this is “finally recognition” that more officers are needed, he said.

The proposed Toronto police budget also includes the hiring of eight additional traffic officers at a time when the force is facing mounting criticism about transit enforcement.

Recently released Toronto police statistics show that Toronto police charged fewer drivers in 2018 than any year since amalgamation, despite a 20-year high in collisions. Those statistics also show a continuing pattern of declining local enforcement of criminal traffic offences.

Asked why the service didn’t hire more than eight officers, Supt. Scott Baptist said the additional officers will enhance the capacity of about 190 police in the Traffic Services Unit and in divisions across the city.

“All frontline uniform members of the Toronto Police Service also deliver traffic enforcement services in support of Vision Zero in their day-to-day assignments,” Baptist said in an email.

In an interview with CBC Radio’s “Metro Morning” on Monday, Saunders denied that declining enforcement was leading to drivers believing they could break rules of the road with impunity. He said increasingly complicated roads necessitate more than just policing.

“Us running around and just enforcing may make a difference, but I will say that the education piece becomes a huge factor,” Saunders said in the interview.

McCormack told the Star Monday that it is evident that declining traffic enforcement was leading to an increase in collisions — “drive around this city, it’s out of control.”

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Last month, the Toronto police board approved the reinstation of a traffic enforcement squad, albeit smaller than the one that was disbanded in 2013. The move came after accusations from some city councillors and safety advocates that police had ceased traffic-enforcement duties, even as pedestrian and cyclist deaths in the city have increased.

Thirty-seven pedestrians have died in Toronto so far this year, and at least 24 of those killed have been over the age of 60. Saunders said in the interview with CBC that the city needs to be made more “age-friendly.”

The police board’s budget committee meets Thursday.