With the city facing a potential 6.94 per cent tax hike in 2025, budget pressures from external service providers, like the OPP, will make up the majority of the increased tax hit in the new year.
The city’s policing bill has climbed to $11.65 million for 2025 – a $2.63 million, or 25.4 per cent increase – accounting for a full 3.24 per cent of the city’s projected 6.94 per cent tax hike.
The substantial increase for the new year is largely due to new OPP collective agreements with the province, explained OPP officials at city budget deliberations this week.
“Certainly, in 2024 we’ve seen some significant changes in policing,” said Robert Flindall, acting detachment commander of the Orillia OPP detachment. “Since the end of 2022, OPP uniform and civilian members have been without a contract. Our contract was recently ratified … in the spring of this year with the government, and that's principally why you've seen substantial changes in the OPP billing for 2025.”
As a result of that new contract, OPP wages are climbing beyond what was originally forecast prior to the police service reaching a contract with the provincial government, Flindall said.
“Ninety per cent of the billing from the OPP … comes from salary and from benefits,” he said. “Because we've been without a contract … the OPP had projected a 1 per cent increase for 2023 and 2024 for salary increases. Now the challenge, obviously, is in 2025, now (that) we've ratified the contract, those salary increases were larger than 1 per cent each year, and what we're seeing is, on average, a 10 per cent increase.”
According to the city’s draft 2025 budget package, the collective agreement includes rate increases of 4.75 per cent, 4.5 per cent, and 2.75 per cent from 2023 through 2025. As a result, the $11.65 million ask for 2025 includes a 2023 year-end adjustment of $665,000.
The city is not alone in these changes, city staff report, with communities across Simcoe County and beyond impacted by the new OPP collective agreement, as well.
Another change underway is the newly established Couchiching OPP Detachment Board, which includes representatives from Orillia, Oro-Medonte, Ramara, and Severn, as a replacement to the previous Orillia Police Services Board.
The new board includes elected officials and members of the public, which will help determine objectives and priorities for the Orillia OPP detachment – something board chair Ralph Cipolla said will begin at its Thursday meeting.
“We're going to recommend that we send out a letter to each council, to each municipality, asking them for their three priorities for your community,” Cipolla said. “If they let us know on board, then we will work with … the OPP to make it happen.”
During discussion, Cipolla also asked whether any improvements will be made to wait-times for non-emergency calls to the OPP.
“In Central Region, all of our calls are dispatched through Orillia, and the challenge with that is, depending on the staffing of the day, our non-emergency line, there may be some delays in answering,” Flindall responded.
However, the soon-to-be rolled out next generation 911 system should ease pressure on call volumes, Flindall said, as calls can be flipped to other detachments should one be experiencing high call volumes.
“If all of our call takers are tied up in Orillia, that call will automatically flip over to North Bay or Thunder Bay or London in order for somebody to pick that up. That's coming out in November,” he said. “We should see a drastic reduction in those wait times for the non-emergency (calls).”
