Bell: Gondek, Calgary city council — suck it up and find the $28 million​on February 12, 2025 at 1:23 pm

You can hear the howling from Calgary city hall right across the city. 

There is a shortfall in the Calgary police budget. Millions. $28 million. 

We want the cash cow back! Give us back the cash cow! 

Of course, no one at city hall calls it a cash cow.  

Mayor Jyoti Gondek is pissed off.

“The province has defunded our police service to the tune of $28 million,” says the mayor, calling it “mind-boggling.”

Defunding the police? The mayor is accusing someone else of defunding the police? Really?

Four Calgary city council members want the whole matter of fewer photo radar dollars discussed as a matter of urgent business next month. 

You see, the Calgary Police Service is short of money because the provincial government and its roads boss Devin Dreeshen went after the photo radar cash cow with a butcher’s knife. 

City council knew this day was coming.

They knew about it in 2023. They knew about it well before their 2024 budget gabfest last fall. 

Headlines yelled out the news in big bold print. The provincial government was cutting back on photo radar. 

Not eliminating it but cutting it back, keeping photo radar in school zones, playground zones, construction sites and high-collision areas where photo radar can be justified. 

Now Alberta will have the same amount of photo radar as Ontario and still more than other provinces. 

Knowing photo radar was being pulled back, city council did nothing. 

They took the easy way out. They took the ticket money and put it into the police budget. 

But Calgary city council should have never, ever, ever depended on dough from tickets to help pay for the Calgary Police Service. 

For years, widespread photo radar has had its critics precisely because, in many cases, it is seen as a cash cow, a way to make some extra bucks. 

FACT. If you use ticket money for the police budget, people will say photo radar is a cash cow.

The provincial government, both under the NDP and UCP, talked about reining in the widespread use of photo radar. 

Every time photo radar has been discussed the amount of money it rakes in can’t help but worm its way into the conversation. 

If it looks like a cash cow and moos like a cash cow, it probably is a cash cow. 

The money was so easy.

It was so much easier on budgeting at city hall where there is a terrible fear of using scissors on the bottom line. 

I know, I know. Some of you will insist photo radar is all about public safety, nothing but about public safety.