What now? 'Defund,' say some after Toronto police admit using more force against Black people

What now?

After damning numbers from Canada's largest police force proving what Black and other racialized communities have known for decades — that Toronto police have indeed used disproportionate force against them — the question now is what accountability might look like.

Ask Black Lives Matter Canada co-founder Sandy Hudson and the answer is one she and countless other community activists have been calling for for years: "Defund the police."

"It's the one solution that no one wants to talk about and it is the one solution that we know will be effective," she said.

Hudson spoke to CBC News in the wake of the force unveiling never-before-seen data, mandated by the province. Among the findings: police used force against Black people about two times more than their share of the population; and that compared to white people, Black people were 1.5 times more likely to have an officer's gun pointed at them.

"Defund" is a word that harkens back to what was seen as a moment of reckoning on police violence, sparked by the murder of George Floyd and Black Lives Matter protests in cities worldwide, fuelling questions from in this city about whether Regis Korchinski-Paquet, Andrew Loku, Sammy Yatim, and many more might still be alive if not for the colour of their skin.

In the time since, Toronto's police chief has moved on, an interim chief was brought in and a proposal to slash the police budget by 10 per cent — to redirect some $107 million to community services — was voted down by city council in favour of reforms proposed by Mayor John Tory, including the creation of a non-police response team for mental health calls and implementing body-worn cameras.

In Toronto, the police service is the single-biggest line item in the city's $13.5-billion operating budget. 

Asked for his reaction to the question of defunding at a Wednesday news conference, Chief James Ramer responded: "When we hear that discussion, I think what the community is talking about is reform and it's talking about modernization of the police service."

Ramer went on to cite the force's support for diverting certain 911 calls to a crisis centre, saying doing so has freed up officers to respond to where they may be needed most.

But for Hudson, "reform" is not a replacement for defunding.

"That is absolutely not true. That's not what we need. Reform has been attempted over the decade," she said. "What hasn't been done is taking the power away from police to harm us.... I want to see that action."

Exactly what defunding means can differ depending on who you ask. Some have called for an outright abolition of police forces, while others favour reducing police budgets so that their work focuses more squarely on violent crime.

Michael Thompson, deputy mayor and Toronto's only Black city councillor, says he believes the idea of defunding police is a non-starter.