Residents sound off about defunding Halifax police, committee gathers public input
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“We are committed to call and to work for defunding, disarming and dismantling the HRP and the RCMP,” said Martha Paynter, a member of the non-profit Wellness Within organization that advocates for health and justice.
“Policing in Canada is founded on colonialism, anti-Indigenous racism, control, and we believe that it cannot be reformed and that proposed reforms result in increases in funding to police forces.”
Paynter said policing in Halifax and across North America has gone beyond “what can ever be remedied” through restructuring.
“We see deaths at the hands of police, we just last year saw the conviction of staff of HRP for the death of Corey Rogers, we see violent arrests of women and children, of women in front of their little children, like what happened to Santina Rao, Serrece Winter.”
Paynter referred to a history of racial profiling in Halifax, dating back long before the 1998 police stop of Nova Scotia boxer Kirk Johnson’s vehicle.
“We see policing is not about community safety, it’s not about keeping people, the public safe, it is about the protection of property, the upholding of white supremacy and heteropatriarchy.”
Paynter said the scope of and investment in policing has increased dramatically over the years and an increasingly “militarized” police now responds to mental health distress, substance use disorders and gender-based violence, “adding violence into violent situations.”
Paynter and others said police are trained to use force, but Paynter said what the community needs is housing, spaces for safe use and supplies of substances, restorative and transformative justice approaches and “health-care pure support people responding to mental-health crises.”
“We want to address underlying issues."
Paynter said body cameras worn by police are not a solution and studies show they do not alter police behaviour.
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