Police-Encounters-With-People-In-Crisis

2. Size and demographics
36. The TPS is the third-largest police service in Canada after the Royal Canadian
Mounted Police and the Ontario Provincial Police. It is the largest municipal police
service in Canada, and one of the largest in North America. The TPS’s size and
professional experience position it well to play a leadership role at the provincial,
national and international levels.
37. According to statistics provided to me by the TPS in connection with this Review,
as of March 2014, the TPS employed over 7,900 people, including 5,388 full-time police
officers and cadets, as well as 2,339 full-time and 244 part-time civilian members. In
this Report, when I refer to an officer, this refers to a sworn police officer rather than a
civilian member of the TPS. When I refer to a member of the TPS, or to TPS personnel,
this may refer to either an officer or a civilian member.
38. Among the 5,388 police officers, approximately 19% are women and
approximately 23% are from a racial minority.
39. The officer ranks can be divided into four groups by level of seniority: cadets in
training, police constables, supervisory officers (sergeants and staff sergeants, detectives
and detective sergeants) and senior ranks (from the rank of inspector to Chief of Police).
40. Police constables make up by far the largest group, consisting of 4,060 officers as
of March 2014. The supervisory officers (sergeants and staff sergeants, detectives and
detective sergeants) numbered 1,185 as of the same date and there were 84 in the senior
management ranks, as well as 59 cadets.
41. The average age of a TPS police officer is currently 41.8 years. In the case of
officers who serve as front line officers and as members of a primary response unit
(PRU), the average age is 40 years. Less than 7% of TPS officers are younger than 30.
Among front line officers who are members of PRUs, the proportion that is younger
than 30 is 11.6%. The average age of new recruits to the TPS is currently approximately
28 years. I address the effect of the age of police officers in the context of the discussion
of supervision in Chapter 8.
3. Corporate structure
42. The governance structure of the TPS is dictated in large part by the Ontario Police
Services Act. 2 An organizational chart for the Toronto Police Service is set out in Figure
2.
2
R.S.O. 1990, c. P.15.
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