Addressing ‘social determinants’ reduces crime — not amping up sheriffs transition, NDP asserts

Originally published on Mar 04, 2026 at 13:54

By George Lee, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

The UCP has prioritized a provincial police service over making communities safer and addressing the root causes of crime, the Opposition charged in the first week of the legislature’s spring sitting.

Irfan Sabir, the NDP’s deputy house leader, said the government needs to address “social determinants” including homelessness and inadequate education, justice and physical and mental health care.

Characterizing the UCP as “stuck in this ideological program that they want to create this force,” Sabir said the governing party is ignoring community safety needs in rural and urban Alberta alike.

His comments are part of the second-reading debate of Bill 15, the Public Safety and Emergency Services Statutes Amendment Act 2026. If passed, the bill paves the way for a staff shift from the existing sheriffs branch to a fledgling Crown corporation called the Alberta Sheriffs Police Service.

Mike Ellis, the minister of public safety and emergency services, said addressing community safety is exactly what the bill is about. Under its amendments, a contingent of about 600 sheriffs already doing policelike work will be able to get the training they need to become police officers.

 Bill 15 “creates a practical, common-sense pathway” for all 1,200 or so positions to shift to the ASPS, Ellis said. The act will accomplish that without disrupting law enforcement or compromising public safety, he said.

The ASPS is a Crown corporation replacing a government branch. Sheriffs are today classified as peace officers, providing services that include courthouse security and prisoner transport, security details for senior provincial government officials, traffic and commercial vehicle enforcement on provincial highways, and conservation law enforcement for Fish and Wildlife Services.

Sheriffs complement police by offering support that includes investigations, surveillance of criminal targets, and generating legal sanctions and court orders to hold landowners responsible for criminal operations based on their properties. One program helps police find and arrest wanted criminals.

‘Crisis in Confidence’

The new service will allow sheriffs to do more work by augmenting and supporting all law enforcement as “boots on the ground,” Ellis said. When someone in Alberta calls 9-1-1, the minister said, he expects people in uniform to show up.

“I do not care what the uniform is,” said Ellis, Alberta’s deputy premier and the member for Calgary-West. “I just want someone to show up for Albertans in their time of need.”

The province has so far stopped short of committing to the full replacement of the RCMP, which is under contract with Alberta to serve most municipalities and the province generally.

Calling the RCMP “the current contract service provider,” Ellis said that the storied national service is leaving “rural Albertans vulnerable and unsafe” because of vacancies.

“I have travelled from Coaldale to Peace River, listening to mayors, listening to reeves, families who are worried, and their message is the same. They’re tired of being told to wait by the contract service provider. This is unacceptable and is creating a crisis of confidence in public safety,” said Ellis.

On Crime and Vacancies

According to Statistics Canada, the police-reported, per-capita crime rate in rural Alberta was 54 per cent higher than it was in urban Alberta in 2023.

The Crime Severity Index was also 54 per cent higher. It aims to make overall, violent and non-violent crime more widely comparable by meshing seriousness with volume.

In late 2024, Alberta RCMP said there were 1,772 police officer positions under the provincial contract. The vacancy rate was 17.3 per cent or 306 positions.

But nearly 60 per cent or 182 of the vacancies were from officers on leave of some kind, meaning that most of them would presumably return.

Sabir, the member for Calgary-Bhullar-McCall and the NDP’s justice critic, implied that the province is dehumanizing the RCMP. 

“These are not just people in uniform, they are our neighbours. They live in these communities. They work in these communities. Their kids go to school in these communities,” he said.

“They are Albertan. They are part of this province,” not people flown back and forth from Ottawa.

Ellis said he means no disrespect to officers themselves. The vacancy issue and service shortage are “not because of a lack of will from the great men and women who are on the frontlines … doing the best that they can.”

But the RCMP aren’t meeting service demands in many Canadian provinces, he said.

“Across this country we’re hearing the same laundry list of complaints,” with vacancy rates sometimes hitting 30 per cent.

“In Alberta alone we have hundreds of authorized positions — those are boots on the ground — that we are paying for that just simply do not exist,” said Ellis.

“They are empty chairs. They are unanswered calls.” 

‘No Business Plan’

David Shepherd, the NDP’s public safety and emergency services critic, said Ellis has “left Albertans in an information vacuum.”

The public has got “grand political announcements” from the government but little detail, said Shepherd, the member for Edmonton-City Centre.

“Everybody who has been involved in this has been waiting with bated breath for this minister to tell them how this is actually going to function,” Shepherd said. “There has been no business plan. There’s been no budget. There has been no costing.”

The budget tabled last Thursday put an additional $36.9 million into implementing ASPS, bringing its total operating budget to almost $201 million. If passed, the budget will foresee the line item increasing to $215 million in 2027-2028 and $228 million in 2029-30.