Hess Village bar owners will pay for policing after all just not as much

Hess Village bar owners will continue paying extra policing costs after Hamilton police warned the area is too busy and has too much crime to scrap the program altogether.

Police Chief Eric Girt warned city council Wednesday that Hess Village still has too much drunkenness, assaults and problem behaviour to scrap paid duty policing altogether.

So instead of eliminating it, council voted for a "compromise" that would see police and bar owners shoulder the costmore evenly.

Jason Farr, Ward 2 councillor, moved the motion, which he says meets both parties in the middle.

Under the new plan, there will be fewer regular officers on duty on weekends from 10 down to three. Hamilton Police Service and six Hess Village bar owners will share the cost of the sergeant, so the bar owners will pay $48,000 combined.

Still, it wasn't what the bar owners had hoped.

Most have bristled against paid duty since the city implemented it in 2010 for the often rowdy entertainment district. In 2013, one of them took the city to court. Several have refused to pay and ended up before the city's licensing tribunal.

City council's planning committeevoted 7-2 last week to get rid of the program altogether. Those in favour, including Farr, said it was unfair to Hess Village. Night life is busy everywhere downtown now, he said, and Hess Village attendance is declining.

Terry Whitehead, Ward 8 councillor, also questioned Wednesday whether the paid duty systemshould exist there. Hess Village bar owners pay taxes for police, and no other business areas have this regularextra expense.

Hess Village is still a special case, Girt said.

Police responded to 675 calls to Hess Village from Jan. 1 to Sept. 20, he said. By comparison, police responded to 341 calls at Augusta and John Streets.

There were 1,236 calls to the downtown core altogether, Girt said. So Hess Village accounted for 54 per cent of them.

There are medical calls, disturbances and assaults, Girt said. "Officer presence alone prevents untold issues which are impossible to measure."

The city will review this again in spring 2018.