Abolish the police and invest in our communities

As others have mentioned the astronomical police budget of greater than 350 million dollars is greater than all social services combined. Given the, at best, mixed reputation of the OPS, who are seemingly perpetually embroiled in controversy as a result of officers obvious disdain for the communities they are supposedly here to "protect," it is high time to at the very least re-examine the police budget downwards and reallocate that money to underfunded social services. Rather than criminalizing poverty and policing the poor, marginalized and racialized, we can fund social services to actually benefit communities in a constructive way, and reimagine law-enforcement to be truly local and community oriented. Our notoriously penny-pinching city council should see this as a grand opportunity to save a few dollars.

Ottawa deserves better. Defund the police. Abolish and replace with programs that serve communities rather than criminalize them.