{"id":60644,"date":"2021-01-01T08:00:17","date_gmt":"2021-01-01T13:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/?p=60644"},"modified":"2025-02-12T11:29:18","modified_gmt":"2025-02-12T16:29:18","slug":"defund-or-rethink-policing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/","title":{"rendered":"Defund or Rethink Policing?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Police organizations worldwide\u2014 including those in the United States\u2014are facing calls to significantly reform or even defund police agencies, leading to a clear need for reenvisioning the role of police in modern society.<\/strong> While Canada is not an exception in this case, the country has been actively rethinking and changing the very mission of policing for over a decade already; thus, Canada has early successes and lessons learned that might benefit others who are in the early stages of this process.<\/p>\n<table class=\" alignleft\" style=\"width: 424px; border-collapse: collapse; border-style: none;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 100%;\">\n<p><figure id=\"attachment_60658\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-60658\" style=\"width: 420px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-60658\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-7-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-7-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-7-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-7-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-7.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 420px) 100vw, 420px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-60658\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The active members of the HART represent policing and most public sector and community-based health and human service partners in the Fraser Cascade district of British Columbia.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 100%;\">\n<p><figure id=\"attachment_60659\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-60659\" style=\"width: 420px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-60659\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-2-11-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-2-11-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-2-11-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-2-11-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-2-11.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 420px) 100vw, 420px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-60659\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Representatives of local human services and criminal justice agencies received training in Burnaby, British Columbia, to introduce rapid-risk-based response and to advance CSWB in their city.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Like every other developed nation that has descended from Euro-centric colonial beginnings, the structures and attitudes that define Canada\u2019s social norms still conspire to present privilege, social inequity, and systemic racism as a daily reality for many Canadians, although the residents\u2019 infamous politeness might temper its expression in comparison to other cultures. Most notably, promises to reconcile with indigenous peoples still ring far too hollow. The concept of multiculturalism is firmly embraced and reflected in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, yet across the human services and criminal justice systems, there is a striking overrepresentation of aggrieved and underserved black, indigenous, and people of color (collectively referred to as BIPOC, but notably distinctive in their lived experiences).<\/p>\n<p>This year, perhaps more than ever before, as fires have raged in U.S. cities and on television and device screens worldwide, Canadians can no longer look away from their own reflections in the glass. Some have tried harder than others to do so, and overt denials of racism have become commonplace\u2014nowhere more so than within the policing system\u2014even among senior leaders who should (and likely do) know better. Understandably, nobody wants to wear that label, and dedicated police members who risk their own health and safety to serve others with honor legitimately resent being pushed back on their own heels.<\/p>\n<p>So, it seems, while one could debate anecdotal differences in the degrees of intensity, Canada and the United States (among many other countries) may indeed be starting into this renewed reckoning from the same square. Agencies in both countries share the deeper nature of the challenges in mobilizing and achieving systemic reform, while also delivering higher degrees of safety and well-being to their police officers.<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #9a1b22;\"><strong>Rethinking the Mission of Policing<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>In 2016, then-commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police, present IACP Global Policing Director Vince Hawkes authored a paper entitled, \u201cMobilizing and Engaging Your Community to Reduce Victimization and <em>Reinvest Police Resources<\/em>.\u201d<sup>1<\/sup> (Emphasis added.) That last part sounds a little bit like \u201cdefunding,\u201d does it not? In fact, driven more by economics than any moral cause, at least in the beginning, Canadian policing had begun to embrace such ideas more than a decade earlier. The publication that featured the former commissioner\u2019s paper is the <em>Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being, <\/em>launched earlier that same year to reflect a renewed mission in which police are but one of many partners in crafting safe, healthy communities. In many ways, the community safety and well-being (CSWB) mission being widely adopted in Canada derives easily from any rereading of Peelian principles.<sup>2<\/sup> It was always the job description.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"pullout alignleft\"><strong>CSWB in Action: Situation Tables<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>It is estimated that Situation Tables now operate in more than 100 locations across Canada, with 5 operating under the FOCUS model in the city of Toronto, Ontario, alone, involving a total of 130 agencies across several neighborhoods. At these informal, action-oriented tables, frontline representatives from multiple human services meet at least weekly to triage real-time situations in which individuals are facing what has been defined as \u201cacutely elevated risk\u201d (AER). If the table agrees that this AER threshold is indeed present, supportive interventions will be mobilized within 24 to 48 hours to ensure that the individuals and families involved are connected to all of the services they urgently require, before the point of crisis or incident. Tables apply a strict regimen to carefully navigate limited information sharing under a \u201cdo no harm\u201d principle. Evidence reveals that individuals at an AER threshold will typically be facing six to nine composite risk factors when viewed through multiple agency lenses. Police bring about 60 percent of situations forward for triage, but they take a lead in as few as 10 percent of the resulting interventions.<\/p>\n<p><\/aside>\n<p>Over the past century, that mission drifted in many countries, as reflected by the commonplace use of the term \u201claw enforcement\u201d as a default for police. Sure, ostensibly, enacting and enforcing laws is one among many legitimate and sometimes essential solutions for protecting societies and communities from wrongdoers. However, in practice, most police agencies spend as much as 80 percent of their response capacity not on violent crime or even property crime, but on exercising various forms of law enforcement action mostly upon persons simply living on the margins of society.<sup>3<\/sup> In many, if not most cases, these same people have been pushed to and held on those margins by failures in an economic system not of their making, an economic model that greatly favors an ever-decreasing and miniscule percentage of people, brutalizes those at the lower end, and leaves a fighting chance for those in the middle. For many of those with the greatest likelihood of meeting the police on their worst days, their simplest aspirations for a life free of fear and free of want have been thwarted and stolen away by childhood and adult trauma; abject intergenerational poverty; inadequate housing and unsafe neighborhoods; deficient education and employability; poor health and unmanaged mental health challenges; substance use; and yes, overt gender-based and race-based exclusion.<sup>4<\/sup><\/p>\n<p>Police officers are not the orchestrators of this system, nor are they particular beneficiaries of it. And yet, by accepting and reinforcing their law enforcement mantle, to many members of the public, the police have become the most recognizable and unfriendly face of the state. In addition, the job of policing has become more dangerous and less gratifying for many members who recognize full well that the criminal justice response is least likely to be an effective, long-term solution to most of these challenges, while simultaneously evoking the most hostile response from aggrieved communities. With all these factors in play, is it any wonder that officers\u2019 physical and mental health and officer retention have become urgent issues approaching crisis proportions everywhere?<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #9a1b22;\"><strong>Getting Back on Task: Better Lives and Stronger Communities<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_60651\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-60651\" style=\"width: 420px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-60651\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"420\" height=\"280\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3-272x182.jpg 272w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-3.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 420px) 100vw, 420px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-60651\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Members of the multiagency Chelsea Hub meet weekly to triage and plan acute risk interventions.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Conversely, a renewed CSWB mission refocuses a greater share of police resources toward an emphasis on upstream solutions, the kind that can be achieved only through deliberate, well-disciplined multiagency collaboration, supported by active and meaningful community engagement. Inspired by lessons learned from Scotland, such approaches as the multiagency risk intervention Hub or Situation Table have been underway since 2011 to varying degrees in almost every Canadian province and territory and shown significant promise.<sup>5<\/sup> The notion of collaborative, local CSWB planning has even been enshrined in law under the Police Act in the province of Ontario, with local police considered only one among many partners actively committed to community safety and well-being outcomes and collectively accountable to local authorities.<sup>6<\/sup> The direct inclusion of BIPOC- and gender-related service providers and advocates in such collaborations presents additional opportunities to break down barriers; build greater trust; and generate new, lived experience insights into better ways of addressing community risk factors that cut across all social determinant indices.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, such determined commitment to working across sectors and silos is less about \u201cdefunding\u201d any one agency or sector and much more about smarter, collective investments and shared energies being directed to CSWB outcomes at every level of the system.<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #9a1b22;\"><strong>Mobilizing Others to Help Break the Polarity<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n<p>Many police agencies in the United States already have considerable experience and success with collaborative models, in particular with regard to bilateral mental health responses and supportive alternatives for individuals experiencing substance use disorders or homelessness. However, a widespread commitment to sharing in a broad CSWB mandate remains largely elusive. This reticence, or simple inertia, may derive from some of the political and structural realities unique to the United States.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"pullout alignleft\">CSWB in Action: Shared Responsibility and Mandated Collaboration<\/p>\n<p>In the province of Ontario, the Comprehensive Ontario Police Services Act legally requires every municipality to engage multiple prescribed public and community-based agencies in the development of evidence-based and data-informed community safety plans, accountable to the mayor and city council. While not yet mandated outside Ontario, similar practices are taking root in other provinces and territories as a result of the wider adoption of public health approaches to crime, victimization, trauma, and the many other factors that affect community well-being.<\/aside>\n<p>The intense current partisanship in the United States has contributed to a zero-sum game when it comes to criminal justice, and by extension, to the contemplation of different CSWB approaches. To wit, any step toward active police investment in upstream social solutions is often regarded as a step away from so-called \u201claw and order\u201d promises made by some elected officials at the local, state, and federal levels. Add to this the fact that most police leaders in the United States are either directly accountable to an elected mayor and council or, as in the case of sheriffs, are elected officials themselves. This is not the case in most Canadian jurisdictions; chiefs of police are more typically appointed by and held accountable to civilian oversight boards, operationally arms-length from elected municipal authorities, though still dependent on them for annual funding allocations.<\/p>\n<p>At the risk of overstating an as-yet-imperfect truth, Canadian police leaders and their agencies have evolved to a point where they are held much more accountable to the most promising and evidence-based practices that inform their profession than they are to the whims and peculiarities of any elected official or prevailing political regime. In effect, if they see a better path, they will take it, and politicians, for the most part, have learned to follow their lead.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_60654\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-60654\" style=\"width: 420px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-60654\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-1-16-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-1-16-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-1-16-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-1-16-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-1-16.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 420px) 100vw, 420px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-60654\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Representatives of local human services and criminal justice agencies received training in Burnaby, British Columbia, to introduce rapid-risk-based response and to advance CSWB in their city.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>It is difficult to know how this might be achieved in the United States, especially when one considers the evident culture of \u201clocalism\u201d that prevails. The United States has about 10 times the population of Canada, but it has about 80 times the number of individual police agencies. Those working in Canadian policing are often frustrated by their country\u2019s interjurisdictional differences, not-invented-here tendencies, and often absurd duplications of effort even among the largest police agencies, sometimes in close proximity to one another. However, Canada has just over 200 of those fragments to contend with; the complexity is increased in the United States with upward of 18,000.<\/p>\n<p>Notwithstanding these factors, one might offer the advice that if you\u2019re feeling constrained by the room you are in, get into a bigger room. This is where community engagement and mobilization come into play. The small city of Chelsea, Massachusetts, as one example, has gone from topping the list of the 100 U.S. cities with the highest rates of violent crime to not even appearing on that list, in a span of about five years.<sup>7<\/sup> The Chelsea Police Department did a lot to bring about this change by building a bigger room in which to have the essential conversations about CSWB outcomes. Using the Hub model as a place to start, which they adopted and adapted from Canada, the agency leadership made early believers of their own police and criminal justice authorities, and just as importantly, their human service partner agencies and local community leaders and advocates. Multiagency collaboration, supported by active community engagement right down to the street level, has since come to generate sustained attention to the most recurrent risk factors in that community, and the police arrest numbers have been reduced by staggering levels as a result. This is \u201cdefunding\u201d in action.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"pullout alignleft\">CSWB in Action: Noncriminal Diversion from Drugs and Harm<\/p>\n<p>In July 2020, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police (CACP) surprised a number of observers when it issued its formal statement calling for noncriminal, diversion-based approaches to all illicit drug use. In practice, de facto forms of so-called decriminalization and harm reduction models have been underway in many Canadian cities for several years, but the CACP statement takes this recognition of substance use as predominantly a health issue to a new level of commitment. Work is now underway across multiple sectors to build the collaborations necessary to give reality to these ambitions.<\/aside>\n<p>The Chelsea leaders have also become active ambassadors for these new approaches across their state, and, in particular, they have assisted police partners in many other communities to lead and adopt similar solutions around the broader Boston area. Again, sometimes more can be accomplished in a bigger room. Across Canada, there has been a slow but determined effort to break down silos even within the policing sector itself. Driven by member, executive, and governance associations; active collaborations with police and social science researchers; and enriched learning and development programs for all levels, fealty to the shoulder flash is gradually yielding to a mutual respect for the unifying ideal of a well-informed police professional. Fewer wheels are being invented, and the most promising wheels are turning together across multiple jurisdictions. This is especially true of the movement toward collaborative CSWB and community-engaged models in Canada. It is also very evident in the way the Canadian policing community is striving, together, to meet the health and wellness needs of its own serving members.<\/p>\n<h3><span style=\"color: #9a1b22;\"><strong>The Compelling Argument Internal to Policing<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n<figure id=\"attachment_60656\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-60656\" style=\"width: 420px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-60656\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-4-8-300x260.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"420\" height=\"364\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-4-8-300x260.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-4-8-1024x887.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-4-8-768x665.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Image-4-8.jpg 1110w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 420px) 100vw, 420px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-60656\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Author, along with his business partners, introduced multi-sector CSWB mobilization to about 100 \u201csystem leaders\u201d in Worcester, Massachusetts, in January 2018.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>When the language shifts from law enforcement to a shared mission toward broader CSWB outcomes, many others will more readily step forward to recognize and put real action behind their own vital roles in that same mission. When the targeted outcomes make as much sense to those professionals with a public health mandate, a social equity mandate, a school completion mandate, an employment mandate, a mental health mandate, or a child protection mandate, to name but a few, many hands can indeed make for lighter work\u2014and for much more effective and gratifying work as well.<\/p>\n<p>Thus, at the same time as they successfully mobilize other essential partners into a renewed and shared CSWB mission that promises better outcomes for society, police can also substantially reduce the stigma that too often falls on them alone as the unfriendly face of a hostile state. Dedicated police professionals are suffering, in Canada, across the United States, and elsewhere around the world. Much of that suffering owes to the obvious and apparent conclusion that detaining; arresting; incarcerating; and, far too often, simply traumatizing already marginalized individuals and communities have long ago become a Sisyphean mistake of epic proportion. Not only are officers forced to watch the stone roll back down the same hill over and over, they are increasingly being harassed, harangued, and even shot at as they try to roll it back up, again and again and again.<\/p>\n<table class=\"alignleft\" style=\"width: 454px; border-collapse: collapse; border-style: none;\" cellspacing=\"5\" cellpadding=\"5\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 487px;\">\n<table class=\" alignleft\" style=\"width: 445px; border-collapse: collapse; background-color: #102c4e; border-style: none;\" cellspacing=\"5\" cellpadding=\"5\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"width: 100%;\"><span style=\"color: #ffffff;\"><big><strong>IACP Resources<\/strong><\/big><\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-left: .5in; text-indent: -.2in;\"><span style=\"color: #ffffff;\">\u25a0 \u201c<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a style=\"color: #ffffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/seattles-law-enforcement-assisted-diversion-lead-program\/\">Seattle\u2019s Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion (LEAD) Program<\/a><\/span>\u201d (article)<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-left: .5in; text-indent: -.2in;\"><span style=\"color: #ffffff;\">\u25a0 \u201c<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a style=\"color: #ffffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/the-police-and-faith-communities-an-opportunity-for-partnership\/\">The Police and Faith Communities: An Opportunity for Partnership<\/a><\/span>\u201d (article)<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin-left: .5in; text-indent: -.2in;\"><span style=\"color: #ffffff;\">\u25a0 \u201c<span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\"><a style=\"color: #ffffff; text-decoration: underline;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/our-people-our-communities\/\">Our People, Our Communities: Ontario Provincial Police\u2019s Mental Health Strategy for Crisis Response<\/a><\/span>\u201d (article)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<p>Police leaders can choose to stand by and watch as officers engage in an ever-growing game of \u201cYes, you are\u201d and \u201cNo, I\u2019m not\u201d a racist. They can choose to argue for more funds to further militarize an essential civic service suffering from intense mission-creep. Or they can simply watch as misguided knee-jerk defunding decisions are imposed upon their already cash-strapped agencies by vote-frightened politicians.<\/p>\n<p>Or they can lead policing back into the mission for which it was created. Better ways are possible, and among other innovative nations, Canada is ready and willing to share.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Notes:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><sup>1<\/sup>J.V.N. Hawkes, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/journalcswb.ca\/index.php\/cswb\/article\/view\/11\/27\">Mobilizing and Engaging Your Community to Reduce Victimization and Reinvest Police Resources<\/a>,\u201d <em>Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being<\/em> 1, no. 2 (August 2016): 21\u201325.<\/p>\n<p><sup>2<\/sup>Sandy Nazemi, \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.lacp.org\/2009-Articles-Main\/062609-Peels9Principals-SandyNazemi.htm\">Sir Robert Peel\u2019s Nine Principles of Policing<\/a>,\u201d <em>Los Angeles Community Policing<\/em>, 2009.<\/p>\n<p><sup>3<\/sup>Sarah Holder and Kara Harris, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2020-09-03\/alternative-policing-models-emerge-in-u-s-cities\">Where Calling the Police Isn\u2019t the Only Option<\/a>,\u201d <em>Bloomberg CityLab<\/em>, September 3, 2020.<\/p>\n<p><sup>4<\/sup>United Nations, \u201cPreamble,\u201d <a href=\"https:\/\/www.un.org\/en\/universal-declaration-human-rights\/\"><em>The Universal Declaration of Human Rights<\/em><\/a> (Paris, France, December 10, 1948).<\/p>\n<p><sup>5<\/sup>Dale R. McFee and Norman E. Taylor, <a href=\"https:\/\/cfbsjs.usask.ca\/documents\/research\/research_papers\/ChangeAndInnovationInCanadianPolicing.pdf\"><em>The Prince Albert Hub and the Emergence of Collaborative Risk-Driven Community Safety<\/em><\/a>, Change and Innovation in Canadian Policing (2014). <em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p><sup>6<\/sup>Government of Ontario, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ontario.ca\/document\/community-safety-and-well-being-planning-framework-booklet-3-shared-commitment-ontario\"><em>Community Safety and Well-Being Planning Framework: A Shared Commitment in Ontario<\/em><\/a>, 2017.<\/p>\n<p><sup>7<\/sup>Chelsea, Massachusetts, Police Department, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/chelseapolice.com\/community_services\/hub.php\">Chelsea Hub<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<aside class=\"pullout pullout--wide alignleft\"><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-60671\" src=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Taylor-214x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"210\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Taylor-214x300.jpg 214w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Taylor-731x1024.jpg 731w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Taylor-768x1075.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/Taylor.jpg 915w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 150px) 100vw, 150px\" \/><big><strong>Norman Taylor<\/strong> has served Canada\u2019s policing community for over 25 years as a policy advisor, an educator, a researcher, and an author. As co-founder and program director of the CACP Executive Global Studies Program, he has led global research studies in 50 countries, and he is the founding editor-in-chief for the <em>Journal of Community Safety and Well-Being<\/em><\/big>.<\/p>\n<p><\/aside>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Please cite as<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">Norman E. Taylor, \u201cDefund or Rethink Policing? Promising Solutions from Canada,\u201d Police Chief 88, no. 1 (January 2021): 36\u201341.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Police organizations worldwide\u2014 including those in the United States\u2014are facing calls to significantly reform or even defund police agencies, leading to a clear need for reenvisioning the role of police in modern society. While Canada is not an exception in this case, the country has been actively rethinking and changing the very mission of policing for over a decade already; thus, Canada has early successes and lessons learned that might benefit others who are in the early stages of this process.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4042,"featured_media":60650,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[127,129,179,126],"tags":[639,399,1587,179],"class_list":["post-60644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community-police-engagement","category-criminal-justice-reform","category-policing-strategies","category-topics","tag-collaboration","tag-community-partnerships","tag-police-reform","tag-policing-strategies"],"acf":{"subtitle":"Promising Solutions from Canada","post_author":"Norman E. Taylor, President, Global Network for Community Safety","main_category":"Criminal Justice Reform","legacy_article_id":"","legacy_issue_id":""},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v24.4 (Yoast SEO v24.5) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Defund or Rethink Policing? - Police Chief Magazine<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Defund or Rethink Policing?\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Police organizations worldwide\u2014 including those in the United States\u2014are facing calls to significantly reform or even defund police agencies, leading to a clear need for reenvisioning the role of police in modern society. While Canada is not an exception in this case, the country has been actively rethinking and changing the very mission of policing for over a decade already; thus, Canada has early successes and lessons learned that might benefit others who are in the early stages of this process.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Police Chief Magazine\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheIACP\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2560\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Margaret White\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@TheIACP\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@TheIACP\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Margaret White\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"15 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Margaret White\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/8ccef21069086f34ed017e84cdf4fe52\"},\"headline\":\"Defund or Rethink Policing?\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\"},\"wordCount\":2923,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"collaboration\",\"community partnerships\",\"police reform\",\"policing strategies\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Community-Police Engagement\",\"Criminal Justice Reform\",\"policing strategies\",\"Topics\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\",\"name\":\"Defund or Rethink Policing? - Police Chief Magazine\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg\",\"width\":2560,\"height\":1920},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Defund or Rethink Policing?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/\",\"name\":\"Police Chief Magazine\",\"description\":\"Police Chief Magazine\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Police Chief Magazine\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/logo-name-blue.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/logo-name-blue.png\",\"width\":500,\"height\":246,\"caption\":\"Police Chief Magazine\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheIACP\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/TheIACP\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/theiacp\/\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/international-association-of-chiefs-of-police\/\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/8ccef21069086f34ed017e84cdf4fe52\",\"name\":\"Margaret White\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b67fdacd41a113c9b50b72876662774?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b67fdacd41a113c9b50b72876662774?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Margaret White\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/author\/nimble__whitetheiacp-org\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Defund or Rethink Policing? - Police Chief Magazine","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Defund or Rethink Policing?","og_description":"Police organizations worldwide\u2014 including those in the United States\u2014are facing calls to significantly reform or even defund police agencies, leading to a clear need for reenvisioning the role of police in modern society. While Canada is not an exception in this case, the country has been actively rethinking and changing the very mission of policing for over a decade already; thus, Canada has early successes and lessons learned that might benefit others who are in the early stages of this process.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/","og_site_name":"Police Chief Magazine","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheIACP","article_published_time":"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00","article_modified_time":"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00","og_image":[{"width":2560,"height":1920,"url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Margaret White","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@TheIACP","twitter_site":"@TheIACP","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Margaret White","Est. reading time":"15 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/"},"author":{"name":"Margaret White","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/8ccef21069086f34ed017e84cdf4fe52"},"headline":"Defund or Rethink Policing?","datePublished":"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00","dateModified":"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/"},"wordCount":2923,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","keywords":["collaboration","community partnerships","police reform","policing strategies"],"articleSection":["Community-Police Engagement","Criminal Justice Reform","policing strategies","Topics"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/","url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/","name":"Defund or Rethink Policing? - Police Chief Magazine","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","datePublished":"2021-01-01T13:00:17+00:00","dateModified":"2025-02-12T16:29:18+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","width":2560,"height":1920},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/defund-or-rethink-policing\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Defund or Rethink Policing?"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/","name":"Police Chief Magazine","description":"Police Chief Magazine","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#organization","name":"Police Chief Magazine","url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/logo-name-blue.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/logo-name-blue.png","width":500,"height":246,"caption":"Police Chief Magazine"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheIACP","https:\/\/x.com\/TheIACP","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/theiacp\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/international-association-of-chiefs-of-police\/"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/8ccef21069086f34ed017e84cdf4fe52","name":"Margaret White","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b67fdacd41a113c9b50b72876662774?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/7b67fdacd41a113c9b50b72876662774?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Margaret White"},"url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/author\/nimble__whitetheiacp-org\/"}]}},"category_objects":[{"term_id":127,"name":"Community-Police Engagement","slug":"community-police-engagement","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":127,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":126,"count":359,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":129,"name":"Criminal Justice Reform","slug":"criminal-justice-reform","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":129,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":126,"count":106,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":179,"name":"policing strategies","slug":"policing-strategies","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":188,"taxonomy":"post_tag","description":"","parent":0,"count":3,"filter":"raw"},{"term_id":126,"name":"Topics","slug":"topics","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":126,"taxonomy":"category","description":"","parent":0,"count":333,"filter":"raw"}],"thumbnail_url":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/CSWB-Image-5-blur-gs-scaled.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4042"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60644"}],"version-history":[{"count":29,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60644\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79732,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60644\/revisions\/79732"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.policechiefmagazine.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}