The Winnipeg Police Service has formed a new 32-officer “flex team,” using existing personnel, that will focus on public protests and parades, but can respond to incidents when calls surge.
Launching Sunday, the seven-day-a-week, but not 24-7, rapid response unit, is designed to ease pressure on front-line officers and improve response times.
“When our call volumes are high, we want to be able to respond to those lower priorities. Every call is important to everybody, and we do have to prioritize calls,” Chief Gene Bowers said Thursday.
MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES
“When our call volumes are high, we want to be able to respond to those lower priorities,” Police Chief Gene Bowers says.
“Sometimes in the past, we haven’t got to some of the lower-priority calls, in my opinion, fast enough. This is going to give us some ability to get to those calls sooner than later, as well.”
The unit will be the WPS’s primary response to parades, protests, rallies and other large public gatherings. An increase in demonstrations has strained police resources in recent years.
The RRU will make its public debut at Sunday’s WPS half-marathon, where members will direct traffic and oversee security.
Bowers said the officers’ duties will vary. When time allows, they can do proactive crime enforcement or help general patrol or speciality units to address specific concerns or safety issues in neighbourhoods.
Their assignments will be based on the number of calls for service waiting in the queue, crime trends or urgent concerns in the community, or requests for help from other WPS units.
“It’s about efficiency,” Bowers said, while noting the busiest time of year for the WPS is approaching as the weather warms up.
The RRU is staffed by two sergeants, four patrol sergeants and 26 constables.
While attending a retail crime prevention conference Monday, Bowers told attendees the WPS is planning to realign some of its resources to give low-priority calls “the attention they deserve.”
Winnipeg Free Press | Newsletter
Some business owners told Bowers and Justice Minister Matt Wiebe they felt discouraged from calling police to report crimes because they weren’t getting a satisfactory response.
A 2024 survey, commissioned by the Winnipeg Police Board, suggested Winnipeg residents were less satisfied with WPS response times than in years past.
Of the 600 people polled, 39 per cent said the WPS is excellent or good at promptly responding to calls, down from 45 per cent in 2022 and 51 per cent in 2019.
Prompt response times ranked first when respondents were asked to rate the importance of 12 police activities.
chris.kitching@freepress.mb.ca
Chris Kitching is a general assignment reporter at the Free Press. He began his newspaper career in 2001, with stops in Winnipeg, Toronto and London, England, along the way. After returning to Winnipeg, he joined the Free Press in 2021, and now covers a little bit of everything for the newspaper. Read more about Chris.
Every piece of reporting Chris produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.