THUNDER BAY -- Nishnawbe Aski Police Service officers now have a salary closer other police in the province.
An arbitrator recently awarded the roughly 135 officers an 11.5 per cent increase retroactive to Jan.1. 2014. That brings a NAPS First Class Constable salary to 86,905 compared to 90,600 for a member of the OPP.
"Our officers police right along side with them and there's a definite inequality present in the funding structure between First Nations policing and say the OPP," PSAC Local 401 president Jason Storkson said.
"So this decision goes a long way toward addressing that gap but we still have some way to go."
Storkson said NAPS officers work alone in many of the 37 communities they cover and can wait up to 14 hours for backup to arrive should something go wrong. Finding a place to live can also be difficult. In one community, officers live in the front entrance of the NAPS' detachment.
"They sleep in hammocks. You don't have that with other police services," Storkson said.
NAPS chief Terry Armstrong said he's not surprised by the arbitration decision, made last Thursday.
"I think I would've been more surprised if an arbitrator would say that our officers are worth anything less than the other officers out there in the field when you look at what our officers are being asked to do day in day out," Armstrong said.
The service is currently running around a $1 million deficit. Armstrong said the NAPS board will now have to find the money for the arbitration decision from the provincial and federal governments.
