The Sarnia Police Service Board approved the draft 2026-2027 police budget.
During the Thursday, June 26 board meeting the police service originally proposed a 6.9 per cent increase, which is the lowest proposed budget increase in a couple of years.
The budget for 2026 will now be a 6.5 per cent increase. Staff were able to move $150,000 from reserves to the 2027 budget.
In 2025, the budget was a proposed 10.36 per cent increase and in 2024 it was 9.9 per cent.
Inflationary pressures, $200,000 for reserves to fund the police vehicle replacement and collective agreements take up the majority of the increase, which accounts for 5.78 per cent.
Police Chief Derek Davis said in 2026 the Sarnia Police Service (SPS) is asking for three new positions.
He said in 2025 two civilian Special Constables were piloted as part of the Forensics team.
"That program has been a tremendous success, that pilot, so this is formalizing the placement of two Special Constables bringing up two officers to be redeployed in another location in the organization," Davis said.
Meanwhile, the last position would be a second human resources position.
Davis said in the draft budget it is looking at new technology.
SPS will look into in-car cameras that will have audio and less redaction because the cost of body cameras would be high.
He said it's not the cameras themselves but the data storage.
"It would not be sustainable for us. We fiscally could not do that at the moment but we can find a middle ground, reasonably in some of the in-car camera options, which we are in the process of testing," he said.
This is the first year the police service has introduced a two year budget.
Davis said the SPS has a lower budget for crisis management than normal.
He understands there are some risks.
"We're confident in the two-year given where we are that this is a reasonable risk in terms of what we are projecting and we are looking at the benefits that come from that," Davis said. "It helps the city, it helps us for a long-term planning, it communicates with the organization where the future is coming make sure it isn't a surprise and gives us much more stable options in terms of resource allocation."
In 2027 the draft budget is set to be an increase of 5.28 per cent.
This budget does not feature any additional staffing requests.
On Friday, June 27 SPS will be hosting media for a budget question period.