Mayor defends Hamilton police budget while experts weigh in on board's power to change it

Watch CBC Hamilton's full interview with Mayor Andrea Horwath below.

Requesting Hamilton police trim their spending on office supplies, the mounted unit or cable TV interferes with their operations and runs afoul of provincial legislation, says Mayor Andrea Horwath. 

In a sit-down interview with CBC Hamilton Tuesday, Horwath explained why she opposed asking the police service to cut specific items from their $214.8 million budget. 

Council sent the 2024 police budget back for further review during its annual budget process, which prompted a special police services board meeting last week. Horwath voted in support of the review at the council meeting in late January. 

"Everybody knew that it was not likely to change," Horwath said of the police budget. "But as the mayor I felt like I needed to be responsive to the vast majority of the council and not simply say 'no, I'm not doing it.'"

Watch: Hamilton mayor explains her vote on police budget

At the special board meeting, members Cameron Kroetsch, who is also a city councillor, and Dr. Anjali Menezes put forward a series of motions directing police to find savings in a number of specific ways, including deferring the hiring of 22 new staff members and cutting retiree events and website design. 

They were not successful with Horwath and other board members voting the motions down.

Horwath told CBC Hamilton the proposed "line by line" cuts would change police operations. 

"The legislation is very clear: the board cannot direct the operations of the police service," she said, referring to the Police Services Act. "That's solely the responsibility of the chief."

Two policing experts who spoke to CBC Hamilton offered insight into what power the police board has when it comes to the budget.

They both pointed to the Police Services Act, sections 31 through 39, as detailing where the board can have some say in the budget, with some limitations.

Alok Mukherjee, former chair of the Toronto Police Services Board from 2005 to 2015, said board members do have the power to suggest specific savings to the police service the way Kroetsch and Menezes tried to do.

"The board has the power to go through the police budget with a fine tooth comb," he said.