Three levels of government partner to fight violence in Toronto

TORONTO – The federal, provincial and Toronto governments are partnering to combat violence in Canada’s most populous city, which has seen a recent spike in gun crime.

Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale and Ontario Attorney General Yasir Naqvi met with Toronto Mayor John Tory on Thursday before announcing three initiatives aimed at increasing community safety.

A new intervention fund is being set up to provide counselling and crisis teams in neighbourhoods that have experienced violence, a program to identify those at a high risk of criminal behaviour is being expanded and a program to direct youth charged with a criminal offence to community service instead of jail will be piloted in the city this fall.

“Toronto is a very large city, the largest in the country, and it remains, notwithstanding some trends that are concerning to us, a very safe city,” said Tory. “The objective of us sitting down is to make sure it stay safe and to make sure we arrest some of these trends that are setting in.”

Tory had reached out to the federal and Ontario governments a few weeks earlier, after a string of shootings that rattled city residents.

He noted that public safety was a shared responsibility and said he hoped residents would “take heart” from the fact that three levels of government were working together to address violence in the city.

“There’s no magic wand or magic position that we can unveil to say, ‘We have found a solution to this problem,’” said Tory. “But we can just keep working and working and working to add measures and assist law enforcement.”

The “flow of guns” into Toronto was also among the issues discussed at Thursday’s meeting, with Goodale saying it is a matter that affects Canadians in many parts of the country.

“The issue of weapons coming across the border is one that (Canada Border Services Agency) and the RCMP take very seriously,” he said. “One of the things that is happening more is making sure all of our security and law enforcement agencies are communicating well with each other.”

As of early June, 21 people had been shot dead in Toronto, up from the nine recorded in the first five months of 2015.

Among the most recent incidents of gun violence, a 10-year-old boy was shot in the shoulder while sleeping in his home. Last month, a pregnant woman died after being shot while sitting in a vehicle with three others. Her baby, who was delivered prematurely by an emergency C-section at 24 weeks, died days later.

The new intervention fund announced on Thursday is to include counselling services, the provision of safe spaces outside the community and the creation of neighbourhood crisis response teams and youth engagement programs.

The expansion of the program to identify high-risk individuals involves a team with health providers, social, housing and youth workers who intervene with those who are more likely to be involved in criminal behaviour.

The pilot of the diversion program will allow some youth, aged 12 to 17, to attend a community program as an alternative to going to court.

Naqvi said the programs would help address the “root causes” of crime by giving the right supports to those who need them most.