City councillors in both Victoria and Esquimalt have been telling people they have limited control over VicPD’s requested $11 million, 14% budget increase, but it’s not true.
Last summer, Victoria city councillors asked for nine more police officers, at a permanent annual cost of $1.4 million (the average VicPD officer made $156,000 in 2024). That was outside of the city’s regular budget process, and it came at the expense of other planned city projects.
Those nine officers are now nine of 25 that VicPD is asking for in its draft 2026 budget. Far from having a limited impact on the police budget, the costs for nine of those officers were a direct request from Victoria city councillors.
As with any VicPD budget item, city council could still reverse course and choose not to fund any of those positions in the 2026 budget.
What city councillors mean when they say they have limited control over the police budget is that if they reject something, the police board can appeal to the province, who can overturn the city’s decision. That’s true. But it’s also true that VicPD has lost half of its appeals under the current city council, when the province found VicPD couldn’t justify the costs.
Unfortunately, the current city council has mostly chosen to fund police at the expense of other services, and to largely support runaway police budget increases without meaningful intervention.
Here’s what police budget increases looked like under the previous council:
And here’s what they look like under the current council:
Mayor Alto said VicPD has “modeled much of its budget ask [for 2026] to complement the [city’s] Community Safety and Wellbeing Plan, and I would argue, lifted pieces right out of it.”
At this point, only Victoria and Esquimalt city councillors can officially reject items from VicPD’s draft 2026 budget. If they don’t, it should be clear it’s because they don’t want to.
If you think community safety should mean things like housing and community supports instead of millions more spent on police, you can submit feedback on VicPD’s draft budget to Victoria City Council until January 23 at 11:59 pm. See our blog post for more details.