Category Archives: Ontario Provincial Police

Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Mental Health Strategy, Ect.

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I don’t often advocate for the police. They have unions and each other so I don’t view them as disadvantaged or marginalized. They are not on my radar so to speak 🙂 I usually defend those who are unable to stand up for themselves or who do not have the opportunities and advantages that I do.

In my recent encounter with Ontario Provincial Police officers I have softened and expanded some of my views. Few of us have the honour or opportunity to share a meal with the police and their humanity is nourishment itself. I don’t want to disappoint those who find me a refreshing prick with a pen but I have a few points for us all to consider.

Most people do not know that since I was a child, I dreamed of being employed in law enforcement. I know of few better examples of irony. I also have several friends from my youth who are police officers. I can name at least seven who I played high school football with. I am fairly outspoken regarding tragedies that involve mental health but do not think I would not be as upset to hear of an officer falling in the line of duty.

Many of us have an uninformed sense of what the police are like. They are the brutes who give us speeding tickets. I agree that it is an annoying pastime of theirs but they are attempting to keep their families safe as well as yours. We do not blame the baker for making us fat.

Like everyone I am influenced by the media. With the media preoccupation with the sensational we are force fed and filled with any and many officer mistakes. To make an analogy it is no different than hearing that the Toronto Maple Leafs have actually won a game and concluding that they are having a great season.

I tried digging up some real numbers to provide some perspective and fairness. There are over 26 thousand police officers in Ontario. The few we hear about as having fallen short in their duties would be statistically minute and invisible on almost any graph.

I was aware that police officers are trained and informed that a person with a knife can be lethal at a range of 15 to 20 feet. I might be spatially disabled under such conditions. Officers are trained to use lethal force in these instances. I will still argue that a greater distance should be maintained where possible and appropriate but it is comprehensible that such situations do not always work out. I would imagine that any officer who had to make a lethal decision would be haunted by such and it is understandable why officers also suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

I have argued against the use of Tasers on mentally ill individuals as they are often disabled and it is a health condition. We need to guard against Tasers being used too often but in speaking with an officer I see their value. An individual with a knife who charges at a distance of 20 feet will still reach the officer even when shot with a gun. This is a no win situation. The Taser if successful will stop that same individual in their tracks. I would rather have to deal with psychological and temporary agony than find myself and or someone trying to help me in a coffin. I have a family as do they. The consequences of the lethal use of a firearm are far reaching.

We can point out that 92% of officer fatalities are committed with a firearm or that police homicides occur 23% of the time involving robberies and 3% occur apprehending psychiatric patients but I’m not sure those numbers would make me feel better if I was faced with a knife and I am unlikely to call on statistics or probabilities when I see that knife waved in my proximity. Any weapon is problematic.

I could only find numbers from Vancouver but they may still be relevant. One third of all police calls involve people with mental health issues. Let’s assume that the Ontario Provincial Police are dealing with similar numbers. I think the police have been put in a place and are being called on to remedy issues that are not theirs to own. Mental health is increasingly involving agencies that were never meant to be mental health service providers; police and corrections.

We can scream and shout at them both but the solution doesn’t entirely lay with altering what they do. We need a number other than 911 to call and we need to prevent and protect individuals from entering the justice system as a result of their addictions and mental health issues. Thirty percent of individuals come into contact with the police in their first experience trying to access mental health care. We don’t change the diaper when an infant needs to be burped.

There are agencies better suited to serve the mental health needs of Ontarians. These organizations and agencies need to be better coordinated, better funded and more accessible. To keep things as they are is monumentally more expensive fiscally and socially. We will have less need to call 911 if mental health care can be obtained prior to crisis. The police will always have a place and we need to be grateful for that. It is an unenviable position and a difficult duty. It is unfair to the police and Ontarians to make police an automatic selection for mental health issues.

I am showing my support to the Ontario Provincial Police not because I now know several more outstanding officers but because I deeply desire better outcomes for Ontarians. I will still point out problems and they may be the target of my often sharp and ill timed sense of humour but in the case of the Ontario Provincial Police and specifically the Elgin County Detachment I see compassion, promise and an active engagement in improving the mental health outcomes of Ontarians. Is the Ontario Provincial Police Mental Health Strategy perfect? Possibly not but I am inspired and I believe community stakeholders can co-operate and implement something of an improvement.

The quarterback doesn’t throw the ball because he is incompetent or incapable of making headway; he knows the receiver stands the best chance of the most advancement. Community stakeholders are the wide receivers. We have been calling the police for help with mental health matters for decades. Community stakeholders are now being called on. I believe they can handle the pass.

Elgin County Detachment of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) Strategy Meeting with Community Stakeholders

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Like most people many days are the same for me. We all endure a degree of drudgery and duplicity. I had a slight vacation from the mediocre today. I was the keynote speaker at the Elgin County Detachment of the Ontario Provincial Police Mental Health Strategy Meeting with Community Stakeholders. It seems logical that someone with experience in mental illness and the justice system would be invited to address individuals who are involved in these areas but the whole scenario was for me surreal.

I showed up a little early today as I believe dreams should not be ignored. When I arrived I was invited to sit with 6 Ontario Provincial Police officers at a table. Part of me wanted to run and part of me wanted to text all my friends and post pictures on twitter. The officers were in full uniform and most of them had the white shirts of command. I was cognizant of the fact that they could handcuff me before I said Mississippi. I considered losing my shirt and tie to fit in as my undershirt was white as well. I was a little self conscious about displaying “Fruit of the Loom” next to the more glamorous crest of the OPP. Besides it wasn’t pressed and was barely clean so I clung to the dignity of my cheap suit.

I was explaining to the officers that my cat disliked my car because it was part of the process of going to the veterinarian. Police officers are exposed to a degree of animosity because they are the vehicles that deliver us to jails and hospitals which can be painful experiences. It is unfair but it is also a human association and reaction.

I’m always a little nervous when I do a presentation but sitting next to six pistols added to my anxiety. I was hoping someone from the audience would scream out “don’t shoot the messenger.” I shared with the room my childhood dream of being a Conservation Officer. My adolescence and young adulthood was spent working for the Ministry of Natural Resources. I volunteered most of my weekends assisting Conservation Officers with their patrols. I left the school of natural resources following my father’s death and the depression that seeped from his grave into my mind and heart.

One of the Ontario Provincial Police officers approached me following my speech and relayed that roughly the year before me he too was a student at the same school in the same Fisheries and Wildlife program with the same dream. We may have passed each other in the hallways on our identical journeys. I’m not sure which of us was more taken aback by the situation. We were nearly step by step in unison but I ended up in jails and hospitals as a prisoner and he as a police officer delivered people quite like me to the same places. We had each applied to police forces but he found a paycheck and I found pain.

I have always respected the police on some level but this evening it is something deeper. I doubt the officer with a similar journey resents me and I surely do not resent him. I am pleased that he has fulfilled his calling and I believe in some small way I am doing the same. He seemed like someone I might like to go fishing with. Possibly he would out fish me as luck seems to have paved his path more than mine but when you eat a shore lunch it matters not who caught the fish. Just enjoy the meal. Today I did just that. I am unlikely to ever forget my egg salad sandwich and carrot cake. Flavour is found in the company.

I was dressed up today as were the officers but I hope my words and story illustrated the fact that we are all flesh and bone with degree’s of dignity dancing among the molecules. Had that officer’s and my dreams and desires duplicated we would likely never have met or spoken. I don’t know what he thinks of me but if I had to endure what I have to facilitate meeting him and his colleagues I don’t have much of a problem with that. We seldom thank the police but to the Elgin Ontario Provincial Police I say just that for just this. Take care and be careful out there.