Patrick Brown, Brampton councillors make wildly misleading claims to approve 23.3%—$144M—increase for Peel police

“Taking those dollars and parking them into a bank account does nothing to help crime. It does nothing at all. It's also not honest.”

Those were the words of Mississauga and Regional Councillor Joe Horneck, laying out one of his concerns about a 23.3 percent ($144 million) increase for Peel Police this year during a testy Peel council meeting Thursday where basic questions about the use of taxpayer dollars for policing went unanswered.

Despite his frustration and wide-ranging issues raised by other members, the demand brought forward by Chief Nishan Duraiappah (described as reckless and alarmingly unsubstantiated), passed in a 15-9 vote.

The $144 million request, about the same amount Peel Police received over an entire decade up to 2023, has left police experts, residents and councillors struggling to understand how the Chief and his friend, Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown who helped get Duraiappah hired, could justify such a crippling increase, without presenting any financial analysis, business plan, patrolling or investigative strategy, or external audit to show taxpayers why such a massive increase is needed. 

The failure by the police force’s senior leaders to provide detailed, line-by-line budget reports to show exactly where each dollar needs to be spent, and how the money will be used specifically to reduce crime and improve public safety has raised numerous red flags.

A disturbing letter received by The Pointer and mentioned by delegates at Thursday’s meeting, whose authors describe themselves as concerned veteran Peel Police officers working for the force, raised even more questions about Chief Duraiappah’s leadership, irresponsible spending on lavish international trips, vehicles for personal use and a number of other wide-ranging problems alleged in the anonymously written communication.  

His financial blueprint, which includes a 21.3 percent increase to the service’s operational budget for 2025, much of it to hire 300 new officers, does not explain how the Chief and his senior officers reached the $144 million figure, or what studies were done that concluded the need for 300 new officers.

Councillor Brad Butt had brought forward a motion late last year asking the Peel Police Services Board to review the budget request, after a slim majority of Peel councillors passed his resolution and asked for a detailed analysis to explain the jaw-dropping $144 million request. A response from the board by its finance committee chair Al Boughton was sent back to regional council the same day. 

“Within two hours of that vote being taken, Mr. Boughton sent us a nasty letter saying, go jump in the lake, and I thought that was very disrespectful of this council,” Butt said Thursday. 

Mississauga Councillor Joe Horneck requested a breakdown of where the 300 officers to be hired in 2025 are to be deployed, but Peel Regional Police refused to provide it.

(Alexis Wright/The Pointer files)

The 2025 budget passed with Mayors Patrick Brown and Annette Groves, along with Councillors Paul Vicente, Michael Palleschi, Martin Medeiros, Pat Fortini, Gurpartap Singh Toor, Rowena Santos, Navjit Kaur Brar, Dennis Keenan, Christina Early, Mario Russo, Alvin Tedjo, Martin Reid, and Sue McFadden in favour and Mayor Carolyn Parrish and Councillors Stephen Dasko, Chris Fonseca, John Kovac, Natalie Hart, Joe Horneck, Dipika Damerla, Matt Mahoney and Brad Butt against. 

With the Region’s 2025 budget now approved, Peel property owners will have to pay one of the largest tax increases in the municipality’s history. The approved 12.5 percent increase at the Region translates to an average property tax increase of 5.5 percent for homeowners across Peel ($321 to a residential home assessed at $581,200) before their local lower-tier municipal tax is added, according to a report presented to council Thursday. Almost 80 percent of the Peel increase is due to the $144 million extra for the police budget. In Brampton, property tax payers will see their bill rise by 8.4 percent this year, 2.9 percent for the Brampton tax hike and 5.5 percent for Peel’s. Mississauga property owners will pay 8.8 percent extra in total, including a 3.3 percent increase for the City’s share of the overall bill.

At regional council on Thursday there was a clear divide between elected officials in Brampton and Mississauga, with Brampton councillors ready to approve the budget as presented and the majority of Mississauga councillors appearing frustrated by what Mayor Carolyn Parrish described as possibly the largest police budget increase in Canadian history. 

Some Brampton members claimed any reduction to the $144 million increase would jeopardize public safety. Councillor Palleschi referred to a town hall meeting of his residents, claiming, “nobody asked for defunding of the police”, one of the many misleading comments he has made since the Peel Police Services Board approved the Chief’s request for a $144 million increase in November, suggesting that opponents have called for the base budget to be cut, when what they have actually called for is a reduction to the 23.3 percent increase. 

When Mayor Parrish attempted to push back against Palleschi’s mischaracterization he aggressively cut her off. 

“I’ll make you a deal right here, right now. When you speak I won’t chirp you, okay? When you speak I won’t chirp you,” he repeated. “If you in Mississauga don’t feel that you want more police officers in your area, that’s fine, that’s your house. Stay out of my house, because my house needs more police officers.”

Palleschi did not request any audit of the PRP’s budget proposal, or ask for any further information about where or how the 300 new officers would be deployed. 

Despite strongly supporting the budget increase for Peel police, Brampton Councillor Michael Palleschi and his fellow councillors in the city did not request an audit of the spending for the additional $144 million to understand where it is actually being used.

(Region of Peel) 

During a regional meeting last year when the police budget was discussed he suggested one of the reasons his “house” (Brampton) needs more police officers is so children at school could be protected from other children in the playground. He said his daughter had been bullied and it might not have happened had police officers been on the school grounds, leaving some residents at a loss for words, trying to understand what Palleschi thinks the role of police officers should be.

Mayor Parrish introduced numbers from City of Mississauga finance staff, shared with Peel Police officials, showing that reducing the increase to just 14 percent, would still allow the force to hire 150 new officers while limiting the burden on ratepayers. 

“These numbers are as accurate as you’re going to get,” Parrish said, before pointing out that Brown, who has been widely criticized throughout his political career for lying to officials and misleading the public, was laughing in his seat across the council chambers.

“I see Patrick Brown laughing, but it’s actually not a laughing matter.”

Brown then introduced his own set of numbers, claiming to have figures that specifically addressed the 14 percent scenario put together by Mississauga staff which Parrish had just presented (it’s unclear how he would have known she was going to use that number in her proposed reduction). 

Brown’s math did not add up, claiming a 14 percent budget increase would only allow the force to hire 30 additional officers. He failed to explain how a 23.3 percent increase ($144 million) equated to 300 officers plus all the additional costs in the Chief’s budget, while all those additional costs would only leave room for 30 new officers under a 14 percent scenario. 

He failed to ask for any details of the breakdowns as a police board member when he approved the budget in November without bringing up any of the analysis he claimed to have with him Thursday. It’s unclear how the $144 million extra is broken down, dollar by dollar, and Brown, despite aggressively pushing for the increase (even calling for 600 new officers this year) has not asked for or presented a business case or detailed patrolling and investigative model to show exactly why these new officers are needed and how they will be used.   

He has claimed to have financial reports and analysis in the past without proof of it, including alleged work by an external consultant he used to justify keeping Peel Region intact a little over a year ago, despite refusing to make what was described as a “phantom” report public.   

It was another line of justification, however, by Brown and his Brampton allies that drew the most skepticism. He repeated misleading claims he made earlier in the meeting and late last year that there are 911 calls not being answered.

“Are we prepared to have more Priority 1 911 calls that don’t go responded?” he said.

This is blatantly false. According to data from Peel Regional Police, the average Priority 1 call—those that require immediate action by police—results in an officer on site within less than 15 minutes. His false claim is also contradicted by a press release by Peel Regional Police in November, after the budget was passed by Brown and the rest of the police board, which noted that implementation of Next Gen 911 (a system that modernized the call-taking process for 911 dispatchers) had reduced wait times by 80 percent in 2024 and a 92 percent increase in the number of calls answered within 15 seconds. 

“We do need more officers, but I don't like scaremongering either,” Horneck said. 

Brampton Mayor Patrick Brown made a number of false and misleading claims during his push to approve a 23.3 percent increase to the budget for Peel Regional Police.

(The Pointer files)

Brown made more claims of children in serious danger and guns being involved in incidents when police did not even respond. He provided no further information about his claims and has never brought them up at a police board meeting, where Brown would be negligent for failing to address such dangerous, potentially life-threatening inaction. The Pointer is not aware of any public police reports or board reports where the type of abject failure he claimed Thursday is addressed. 

To the contrary, outside the highly politicized police budget season, when politicians like Brown commonly try to justify money for “community safety”, he and the Chief have characterized Peel Police as one of the best forces in the country, policing one of the “safest communities” in Canada. An August press release by Peel Police stated: “Peel Region continues to be one of the safest communities in Canada,” Chief Duraiappah proclaimed.

In a report on a 2023 community survey, Peel Police published that only 12 percent of respondents said calls to police were not responded to quickly, and that a much higher percentage of residents felt Peel police did an excellent job compared to forces across the country as a whole. 

A concern of critics and council members raised since November is if 300 new officers can be onboarded in one year without the infrastructure to do so, including patrol cars, weapons and other uniform equipment, lockers and other required space at divisions, and a wide range of other needs to train and accommodate about five times the number of officers typically onboarded in one year, on average. Brown, without any reports to back up his claims, said the increase will allow staffing at new divisions that are slated to open — Division 23 and an Operational Support facility, both on Mississauga Road in Brampton — but likely will not be operational until 2027 or later.

Councillor Horneck shared with council that he asked for a breakdown to show new officer deployments, but PRP refused to provide one. He was also critical of what he described as obvious “accounting flaws” and “logic flaws” in the existing police budget. He took issue with requesting millions of dollars required for the 300 new officers as if they need to start on January 1. 

“When we know they will not start until April or May or September or November. Taking those dollars and parking them into a bank account does nothing to help crime, it does nothing at all. It’s also not honest, to be frank,” Horneck said. “We gave the police a chance to address it and they have not taken that chance.”

While some Mississauga councillors called for external audits, a breakdown of how the officers will be deployed and a line-by-line review of all the spending, Brampton officials wanted to pass the budget with no questions asked. Councillor Santos said, “I'm going to 100 percent trust the police finance numbers,” adding “far more so than Mississauga.”

Under Ontario’s Community Safety and Policing Act (CSPA), the overarching legislation that governs police forces and the boards that oversee them, boards are supposed to create a strategic plan that ensures a force’s policies and budget provide adequate policing for the population it patrols, with clear “quantitative and qualitative” performance objectives. There has been no explanation of how the Chief’s request for a 23.3 percent increase was supported by a detailed strategic plan, required as part of the board’s legal obligation, to align priorities and justify spending.

When the board, led by Brown’s aggressive push, approved the budget request in November, there was hardly any questioning about how the figure was reached, the absence of detailed financial analysis and auditing to show what was needed and how the money would be spent. 

Increasing Peel’s police force by 300 officers in a single year “without any plan, without any justification” is “huge”, Alok Mukherjee, Toronto’s former police board chair, told The Pointer previously. The direct lack of accountability by the board to ensure these reports are presented and are done through a transparent process “says something about the political culture of the Region,” he added. “This budget and the fact that the board approved a huge increase, which the Chief then said is the largest increase ever called for, raises serious questions about the board’s competence.”

“It seems to be an utter failure of governance.”

He expressed concern that the reckless apathy of Peel’s board might influence other police forces around the province to circumvent proper governance.

“Aside from what it says about the police service, it raises serious questions about how effective the governance provided by the police services board is,” Mukherjee said. “It is absolutely unheard of that in two years, the police budget should increase by nearly 40 percent. There's no other program that I can think of that receives even 1/10 of an increase of this magnitude, and it is astounding for me that there's no scrutiny of the budget, no critique or questioning of the budget request by the board.” 

He questioned how police board members such as Brown could have been so careless as to ignore the claimed needs for so long, then suddenly demand an increase almost a quarter the size of the overall budget. 

Residents and other critics have raised doubts about the need for an extra $144 million, especially with no financial analysis or detailed reporting to justify it.

“This is like a BAND-AID fix, and it's not okay,” Sue Shanly, chair of the Mississauga Residents’ Association Network, said Thursday at the meeting. “The public is entitled to understand the empirical justification for this decision. Where are the statistics for this justification?”

Councillor Horneck said he was “shaken” by Peel Police’s failure to address concerns raised by councillors in the letter sent late last year to have the budget reviewed. He told his council colleagues he asked for a breakdown of what departments the new hires would be going to, but his request went unanswered. 

As encampments continue to pop up across Peel, supports for upstream services to address social issues have not been prioritized, while stiff increases for policing eat up taxpayer-funded budgets.

(ST/Google)

“I hope whoever the reps are on the police board will look to move to that more, higher level of transparency. You look at the Region of Peel, we're not yet at the place where we have that level of transparency,” he said. “I would like to see increased transparency in the future. But I also would like to see when we point out accounting flaws and logic flaws that they're addressed. It would add more to my confidence.”

Councillor Butt addressed the police board’s refusal to review the budget. “I wish we didn't have to do that, because I think it could have been resolved, but unfortunately, we didn't have a willing partner on the other side.”

Santos talked about needing to do more to address gender-based violence and intimate partner violence, which police usually only deal with after a crime has been committed. “We're doing everything we can, from a regional perspective, to increase awareness to increase shelter and housing for women and families,” she claimed. Santos has never brought forward any motions to increase funding for intimate partner violence (IPV), either at Brampton or regional council, and has not asked Peel Police for a breakdown around whether the money or officers the Region has now approved as part of the $144 million increase will go toward addressing crimes against women. Brown, who also raised concerns around the gap in resources to address IPV and still stands accused of sexually assaulting two young women (he denies the allegations) has also never brought forward a motion for funding. 

“This budget increase is not just unsustainable, it is unjustifiable and could set a dangerous precedent. It reflects a failure of governance, a lack of transparency and misplaced priorities,” Nina D’Souza, a Mississauga resident for more than two decades, said during her delegation to council Thursday. “If this increase proceeds, an independent audit must be conducted to restore public trust. Otherwise, I can almost guarantee that Peel Police will never have a positive public image no matter how much money they spend on marketing.”

D’Souza referred to the same anonymous letter that was also received by The Pointer and Mayor Parrish’s office, written by a group of veteran Peel Police officers, according to the letter. 

It describes “all-time low morale” across the force, exacerbated by an effort by executive management to force out senior leaders “who would not support their management policies”. 

It points the finger at a top-heavy organization that refuses to use resources effectively, including assigning 60 officers to the Divisional Mobilization Unit responsible for “charitable work, community functions, charity barbecues, and photo-ops” instead of working to address crime.

“The executive management budgetary spending has remained out-of-hand for the last several years,” the letter alleges. “The entire top management has been sent to police conferences in the far reaches of the globe individually and in groups. This level of travel, hotel stays, and alcohol consumption on the taxpayer’s dime in these tough times is unconscionable.” 

The letter recommends an audit of travel and credit card spending. 

It also claims Police Service’s Board executive director Robert Serpe has been provided with an SUV paid for by Peel police, and Chief Duraiappah has “3 SUVs and 2 dedicated uniform officers to chauffeur him to events”. 

Led by Mississauga councillors, several attempts were made to reduce the proposed increase to the Peel Police budget. 

A motion from Mayor Parrish to reduce the increase to 14 percent was voted down.

When Peel Police Association President, Adrian Woolley,  urged council to approve the request, the union head claimed councillors have failed to adequately fund the force in the past, forcing stiff increases now, after a 14 percent hike last year, approximately 40 percent more money for policing in just two years. 

“I think my people, ever since I’ve been here, have been asked to do more with less,” he said. “There was no forward thinking years ago about anything, unfortunately.”

Councillor Kovac and Mayor Parrish immediately challenged him, reminding Woolley that regional council has approved every budget request by the force for well over a decade, with hardly any questions asked.

“We’re pretty much approving the budgets that they were putting forward,” Kovac said. 

“We have always granted the number of officers that we’ve been asked to grant,” Parrish replied, noting that 60 new officers were approved in 2019; 35 in 2020; 27 in 2021; 26 in 2022; 70 in 2023 and 135 last year. 

But the “giant leap” to 300 officers is just too much, Parrish said. 

“We’re here to worry about people that are going to lose their houses because they can’t afford the taxes”.

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Email: [email protected]

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