At today’s Peel Police Services Board Meeting, Mayor Brown was enthusiastically supportive of Peel Police’s decision to double the number of officers in the Auto-Theft Unit, saying that “doubling is a great start in year one.”
Auto theft is at crisis levels in Canada where we’ve become a source country for stolen vehicles. Every major city in Canada is struggling with this public safety issue. Following up from the first of it’s kind Auto Summit earlier this month, Mayor Brown says that all levels of government and community partners, including automakers need to be part of the solution, adding that “we’re not taken seriously when we’re asking for other levels of government to make investment and that 70 new officers that were we’re adding in 2023 is a commitment that we’re taking this seriously. “
Mayor Brown and Deputy Chief Nick Milinovich met recently with The Hon. Marco Mendicion, Federal Minister of Public Safety. They made a powerful argument that it is great the federal government is focused on guns, however, funding for guns comes from the revenue generated through auto theft and directly enables more guns to be on our street.
Peel Region is leading the conversation in Canada. In addition to 7 GTA Police Chiefs attending the recent Auto Summit, Canada Border Services Agence (CBSA) and a representative of the auto manufacturers also participated in the summit where it was shared that 99% of containers shipped out from our ports are not physically inspected. Further, it was revealing that in some vehicle categories, the number of stolen cars in the U.S., despite having ten times the population, is the same as the number in Canada.
Mayor Brown is confident that the work being done in Peel Region under the leadership of Police Chief Nishan Duraiappah is going to be one of the reasons that Canada solves this problem.
