Police Services plan and budget
As the third largest municipal police service in Canada, the Calgary Police Service strives to create a community that is safe, diverse, inclusive, and inspired.
Police officers and civilian staff support public safety every hour of every day by responding to emergencies, enforcing laws, investigating crimes and traffic collisions, providing support to victims of crime and trauma, ensuring large events and protests remain peaceful, and promoting safe driving.
We also work closely with various partners to prevent crime and help people in crisis due to challenges with homelessness, mental health and addictions.
Our customers
- All of Calgary’s 1.3 million residents
- 8.6 million annual visitors
- Calgarians call the police for help
- Victims of crime
- Youth
Our partners
- City of Calgary business units (like Calgary Transit and 9-1-1)
- Community organizations (like the Centre for Newcomers and Action Dignity),
- Social service organizations (like the Distress Centre, Luna, and the Youth Advocacy Centre)
- School boards
- The Calgary Airport Authority
- Government departments (like Alberta Health Services and Public Safety Canada)
- Other law enforcement agencies.
Value to Calgarians
- maintains peace and order to protect the safety of Calgarians
- contributes to a socially and economically resilient city
- connect people with the supports they need when they are affected by violence, crime, addiction or a mental health crisis
- works to prevent crime
- provides youth education and intervention to prevent future violence and crime
What we deliver
- Emergency and non-emergency call response
- Crime investigation and stolen property recovery
- Safety patrol
- Traffic safety through education, enforcement, and collision investigations
- Public safety during protests and events
- Criminal history background checks
- Support for victims of crime and trauma
- Crime prevention, education, and early intervention initiatives
Budget breakdown
Operating and capital budgets explained
The budgets you see here are expenditures net of recoveries.
The City develops two budgets to create impact aligned with Council’s Strategic Direction:
- The four-year (2023-2026) operating plans and budgets
- The five-year (2023-2027+) capital plans and budgets
The operating budget includes revenues, recoveries and spending related to ongoing operations. These include:
- Salaries, wages and benefits.
- Day to day programs, maintenance and services.
- Administration costs (e.g., insurance).
- Fuel
- Utilities
- Capital financing costs.
The City's total net operating budget is zero. This means we budget to collect the revenue needed to deliver services to Calgarians — no more, no less. We collect this revenue through property taxes and other sources.
The capital budget pays for long-lived assets. These provide the foundation for the services Calgarians rely on. They include:
- Maintenance of current infrastructure (e.g., bridges, buildings and playgrounds).
- Upgrades to existing community infrastructure.
- New infrastructure to provide services in areas that are underserved (e.g., Green Line).
- New infrastructure for growing areas of the city.
Learn more about our 2023-2026 Service Plans and Budgets.
See how the budget has been adjusted since November 2022
Measuring performance
We are measuring our performance in five areas. Each value is the goal we expect to reach by 2026.
What we've heard
The 2022 City of Calgary Spring Pulse Survey showed Calgarians rank crime, safety and policing as their second most important issue. Ninety-seven per cent of citizens surveyed rated policing as important and 52 per cent believe that more should be invested in it.
During the 2022 Calgary Police Commission Citizen Satisfaction Survey, 10 per cent fewer Calgarians believed Calgary is a safe place to live than in 2020 and both satisfaction with and confidence in the police showed declines. Calgarians ranked drug activity, violence, gang activity, theft and break and enters as their top policing concerns, with social disorder and transit safety being growing concerns. Fifty-six per cent of respondents did not agree that the police were adequately staffed.
Calgarians also expressed that they want the police to focus on reforming how misconduct is addressed, developing an alternative call response model, implementing EDI (equity, diversity and inclusion) into the organizational culture, and diversifying the police service’s workforce. Much of this work is already underway in the Service.
Participate and view results of City researchWhat we're watching
- Violence in our city has intensified and there was a 106 per cent increase in shootings in the first six months of 2022 as compared to the same period in 2021.
- Public concerns around safety in the downtown core and on public transit are negatively impacting Calgarians and require a coordinated response from various municipal agencies, including the police.
- Increasing expectations placed on officers by legislation, case law and policy have increased the time officers spend resolving many call types. Certain calls also require more officers now to contain situations where a weapon is suspected or time for de-escalation is needed.
- Staffing challenges have resulted in the Service meeting the target response time of seven minutes for emergency calls around 50 per cent of the time and patrol officers only spend around eight per cent of their time doing proactive policing. This is well below the Service’s targets.
- Public trust and confidence in the police are declining and need to be earned back.
- Low morale and unmanageable workplace stress are impacting employee wellness and resulting in higher mental healthcare needs and medical leaves.
- Expected changes to Alberta’s Police Act could drastically impact police conduct investigations, police governance and funding models. Resources have been allocated to support needed change management.
Our initiatives
What we plan to do
Our vision is to ensure that Calgary is among the safest major cities in Canada. We will connect with, equitably serve and represent all aspects of our community, and be police leaders in equity, diversity and inclusion. We will be the police employer of choice in Canada. We will do this as one team working together to build community safety and well-being through engagement, education, prevention, investigation, and enforcement.
We will be a resilient organization. We will transform crisis response, create efficiencies through technology, and build trust with our partners, stakeholders and employees. We will measure our success by increasing community safety and wellbeing, increasing public trust and confidence, increasing effectiveness and efficiency, increasing employee satisfaction and engagement, and increasing equity, diversity, and inclusion within our organization.
How we're going to get there
The Service organized all the directions from Council and the Commission into four strategic pillars: ensuring a resilient organization, transforming crisis response, efficiency through technology, and building trust. The Service will:
- Address the recruiting and staffing issues impacting the services we provide
- Continue pursuing the Community Safety Investment Framework and other alternative call response models
- Develop a Joint Safety Traffic Plan with The City of Calgary
- Implement recommendations from the review of the body-worn and in-car camera programs
- Apply an equity, diversity and inclusion lens to our organization and its programs