On Tuesday, March 3, 2026 City Council discussed and voted on a number of budget issues. More to come soon, but here are some updates so far:

Wins to celebrate

• Council has voted to reduce VicPD’s proposed new hires for 2026 from 26 new officers to 24 (reduction of $200,000).
• Council also passed a motion to put an equivalent amount of money from the reduction of 2 officers to things like rent supplements.

This is exactly what they should be doing: taking money they previously would have thrown at policing, and reallocating it to real community supports.

We can point this win directly to the great work you all have been doing. At least 208 individuals and (at least) three Neighbourhood Associations submitted their feedback about the police budget during the Public Input Opportunity, and continue to write-in to push for council to put money towards things that will actually keep people safe.

VicPD is still proposing a massive budget increase, and we can push for councillors to do even more.

With a potential $200,000 reduction in VicPD’s budget increase, VicPD would still be getting a nearly $11 million budget increase, to $90 million (note how much money we’re really talking about when $200K barely makes a dent in the VicPD budget…).

To put it in context, right now the city’s draft budget includes a 7.28% property tax increase.

• 5.06% of the increase = what VicPD is demanding, and what the city is prepared to give them
• 2.22% of the increase = everything else in the city budget

Information about the appeal from 2025

While we already know about this appeal, we have not yet heard about it at this level of detail.

• Link to city summary
• Link to province’s letter
• Link to budget impacts

Esquimalt rejected $925,425 of VicPD’s proposed 2025 budget.

The province rejected $65,452 in costs for a staff “logistics coordinator.”

The province approved $598,128 in costs

The province asked for more information from the police board about $261,845 in “associated one-time hiring costs.”

In its letter, the province relied on caseload and crime stats, hate crime stats, and VicPD’s self-selected survey saying people wanted more police visibility, to say different positions were necessary.

In rejecting the logistics coordinator position, they said there wasn’t enough information to say the position was needed.

After the province decided to force Victoria and Esquimalt to spend on 4 new officers (2 “strike force” and 2 “community resource officers”) VicPD reduced its request for new traffic officers in 2026 by three, while also asking for a new $185,000 “in overtime funding to provide weekday support to Bylaw officers.”

Happenings at Council, March 3, 2026

(Source: BlueSky)

• Council passed motions to make lots of cuts to city spending, while also adding “-$100k to replenish the My Great Neighbourhood Grant and $100k for the rent bank” (link)

• Caradonna brought forward a motion to only hire 2 new patrol officers instead of 4 this year, a reduction of VicPD’s proposed budget increase by about $200,000 (link).
  • Again that’s in the context of 26 total new hires, 11 of which are patrol, and 4 of which are mandated by the province after overruling Esquimalt’s 2025 appeal

• Shoutout from Loughton to Neighbourhood Association letters about ‘too much $ on symptoms of problem and not on the solutions’ (link)
  • Incredible job to have the boards of these neighbourhood associations!

• Thompson appears to be digging in that this is it (re: cuts from VicPD budget increase) that they’re still getting a ton of officers so no one can say it’s ‘defunding’ (link).
  • Seems to be some fear around community calls to “defund the police”. Wonder where they’re getting that from…
  • But seriously, when the police department that costs the most per capita in BC is getting an $200,000 reduction of their nearly $11 million budget increase, we can hardly call that “defunding”.

• Alto opposed because she said it was contrary to their Community Safety and Wellbeing Plan (link).

• Alto, Hammond, Coleman, and Gardiner voted against cutting 2 new patrol officers (link)

• Loughton explicitly makes connection between reduced VicPD budget increase from that motion and putting $200,000 to “upstream services” (link)

• Calls motion to allocate $200,000 to “a ‘Positive Flow’ housing initiative, including rent supplements, to transition individuals from supportive housing to market rentals”
  • Only Hammond and Gardiner voted against (link)