Esquimalt, a municipality that has no police force of its own, is looking for someone with at least 10 years of policing experience to better manage policing within its borders.
“It’s not meant to be a police chief,” said Laurie Hurst, Esquimalt’s chief administrative officer, when contacted by the Times Colonist about the posting for the new position of director of community safety services.
“It’s more of a liaison person. Once we ink a new agreement, we want to maintain those good lines of communication.”
Esquimalt’s police department was forced into an amalgamation with Victoria a decade ago, and the municipality and the department have had a love-hate relationship ever since.
After years of complaining about rising costs, slow response times and poor service by Victoria police, Esquimalt put out a call for new police service in March 2011.
The municipality chose a new contract with the RCMP, but that decision was overturned by the province, forcing the town to work out a new deal with Victoria police. The parties are still in mediation, trying to broker that agreement.
The municipality now is looking for someone with a policing background because the responsibilities of the job will include monitoring and managing the agreement when it is reached, Hurst said. The salary will be in the range of $106,000 to $120,000 a year.
According to the duties listed in the posting, the new hire will “liaise between the township and the police agency of jurisdiction on policing services rendered in the township. Plan, organize, develop and manage policing and law enforcement liaison, community policing and crime prevention initiatives, bylaw enforcement, security, investigation and inspection activities.”
The new director will also serve as the municipality’s representative to committees and community organizations concerned with improvements in policing and law enforcement issues, bylaw enforcement, investigation and inspection services, while maintaining awareness of new trends and developments in these fields.
Hurst said that the new director will have no position in the police chain of command but there will be close contact with the police administration.
“There should be very close communication with whoever provides our police services anyway, whether it’s going to be on my desk or whether it’s delegated to this director’s position,” Hurst said.
“I have that now with the [Victoria Police Department] inspector that’s out here. We talk almost on a daily basis. He attends all my management meetings. He knows what’s going on in th municipality. We’re co-workers. So there’s going to be that expectation.”
Hurst is hoping there will be an opportunity to both find efficiencies and to generate some new revenue through the new position.
“There may be functions where we can work with our policing agency where we don’t need to have uniformed officers. We can work using other resources,” Hurst said. “We want to do that with the approval of our police agency, obviously.”
She said the new director will also be in charge of bylaw enforcement.
“We haven’t had a good revenue return on our bylaw enforcement and I’m counting on some offsetting revenue for the cost of the new position.”
Mayor Barb Desjardins said if a new policing agreement is reached, the district will need someone to connect and implement it.
“It’s just really putting those community safety aspects all under the auspices of one person. Right now, we have bylaw under our corporate director and that’s just not working,” Desjardins said.
