Ottawa’s current council has invested most heavily in reactionary measures to improve safety, most specifically by increasing the funding to the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) at a significantly faster rate than social services. Last year specifically, 95 social services fought for municipal funding that is less than 10% ($25M) of the investment Council made into the police ($346M). However, during the Safer Cities for Trans Folks panel event we co-organized last year, we heard community members share how police are not trusted by queer residents. OPS’s 2019 LGBTQ survey tells a similar story. Community respondents said they would not report to OPS any hate crimes against themselves (28%), against others (33%) or other crimes against themselves (32%) or other LGBTQ residents (41%) due to various reasons including, fear of victim-blaming, biased treatment, and being dismissed. LGBTQ residents are not alone in this reality, OPS also have a pattern of racist and ableist treatment of racialized and mentally ill residents. For example, use of force data released by OPS this year, tells us that even though Black people are least likely to be in possession of a weapon or combative when confronted, the Ottawa Police use violence against these residents most frequently. It is also important to know that communities targeted by incarceration also become prohibited from voting in municipal elections. Notably, despite annual budget increases, OPS hate crime clearance rate is only 21%.

In CCGSD’s Action Plan survey, respondents confirm that prevention models are priorities for LGBTQ communities as they would reduce the need for crisis intervention in the first place. A report created by 613-819 Black Hub and Vivic Research illustrates how Ottawa could implement an alternative to police-based mental health crisis responses. Journalists at Leveller have published an extensive timeline on the violence OPS has inflicted on disproportionately racialized residents, many in a health crisis, displaying how reactionary and armed (read police) intervention actually reduces safety. When trans leaders in Ottawa came together to discuss what safer cities meant to them in September 2021, the panel spoke to how trans people’s safety is harmed by the negligence of municipal powers to reduce structural inequities that marginalize their residents. Moreover, the refusal of Council and other city governance bodies to officially denounce the anti-trans hate and take strong political action towards making space for their existences, voices, and agency, tells trans people that they do not belong in Ottawa. Our Council should be ashamed, and must act! So what does action look like?

Saying Yes to Equity and Supports (#YES) like trans inclusive budget commitments in schools to interrupt harmful ideologies early and support queer students, increasing funding for affordable housing and public transit to reduce hostility of public spaces, and ensuring adequate funding for violence prevention services that confronts precarity before it leads to crisis. It also means acknowledging hate when it happens and making intentional space within municipal governance structures to ensure 2SLGBTQIA+ residents are heard.