Peterborough Police Service

In 2010 there was a spike in the calls that the Peterborough Police Service (PPS) received and classified as mental health related. There has not been a significant decline in mental health calls since this rise in 2010. To understand why there was an increase in calls, this project investigated how the PPS currently classify the calls they receive and changes that may have occurred in the system for classification around 2010. Fact-finding meetings were set up by the host agency (PPS) to answer these internal questions. Online literature reviews were done and fact finding meetings with mental health service providers were requested via email. This was to determine whether mental health issues increased in 2010, whether other services knew of changes in the Peterborough community around 2010, whether similar increases in demand were experienced by the Peterborough mental health services, and whether there was a change, reduction or disappearance of services provided prior to 2010.

The purpose of this project is to explore if there was a significant increase in the number of mental health calls received by Police Services in Ontario outside of Peterborough since 2010 and if the number of mental health calls have remained at an elevated level since 2010. A literature review was conducted to gather information on mental health calls, legislation, the political landscape from 2010 to present, police officer training, and programs targeted to minimize the amount of mental health calls received by Police Services across Ontario. Data on the number of mental health calls received by Police Services was collected from Police annual reports and compared. Fact finding meetings were also completed with members from the Peterborough Police Service and the Ontario Provincial Police to gain a procedural understanding of the dispatch system.

The Peterborough Police have a great interest in social programs through their mandate of community policing through a harm reduction model, which means understanding and aiding where they are able in social programs such as supportive housing. The purpose of this project was to determine the scope, amount and level of need of supportive housing in Peterborough and the surrounding areas, and then to compare these needs and models to other communities to begin the development of best practices that could be implemented in Peterborough. In these comparisons, it was essential to determine the cost of these programs, and if they effectively reduced costs and stresses on public emergency services. Major positive findings of this study indicate that supportive housing is a reliable method for the development and support of at-risk populations. While there is a lack of supportive housing for specific high risk individuals in the Peterborough area, the framework for continued and improved support does exist. Finally, supportive housing has been shown to drastically reduce the cost and stresses that high risk individuals who would greatly benefit from support, put on public emergency services, including hospital visits, emergency shelter use and 911 calls.

The purpose of this project was to determine the best practices for educating youth about drug use in Peterborough. In order to identify best practises, extensive online research was conducted to determine what the evidence says about the most effective tools and methods for delivering drug education messages, the importance of police involvement in delivering these messages and the current drug education curriculum. Surveys were administered to local organizations to capture what resources local Peterborough agencies are currently using in their youth drug education and to establish local agency's needs in order to improve youth drug education.