Candidate’s Ledger – Volker Kromm – Candidate for Mayor on Public Safety

By Volker Kromm – Candidate for Mayor:

1. Thunder Bay requires a shift in priority towards safety: greater police presence, more foot / bicycle / cruiser patrols in key areas (parks, waterfront, at events, business sectors, targeted neighbourhoods). Presence should include remote neighbourhood police stations.  Redeployment of police to 6 new fully-staffed targeted neighbourhood zones, which should be funded from the existing budget.
2. Neighbourhood safety is a collaborative responsibility.  Without public involvement, policing is not enough.  Police partnerships with neighbourhood safety alliances can target issues, prioritize enforcement requirements, and speed up deployment.  Safety alliances will be involved in risk assessment, remedial action evaluation, and ongoing monitoring. Communication protocols are required, including defined roles & responsibilities. Give people a way to connect to surveillance and enforcement.  Social media is littered with people posting in-progress or post offences in their back-yards. And please clean up our laneways and alleyways.
3. Waiting until violent crimes are committed or lives are lost is purely reactionary.  The shift requires that social agencies, mental health professionals, hospitals, are given a role.  It will require funding from the province.  As opposed to having police stationed at hospitals or other safety hotspots, we require specialists that can identify and defuse the hazards before situations degenerate. We need provincial funding for crisis workers.  We also need Federal funding for liaisons that target interprovincial crime reduction.  At least 8 full time professional positions are required to identify hotspots, advise authorities, but more importantly recommend programs / treatment before they become problems.
4. Build upon the current inter-police force collaboration.  The O.P.P have incredible specialized teams and systems that should be utilized.  Give the O.P.P. a more visible role in crime reduction as part of their regional and provincial strategy.  The RCMP requires a greater footprint in the city.  They should bring national intelligence, surveillance, and enforcement, that crosses all borders.  Some crime comes to us from distant places.
5. Break the cycle of generational addictions and the mental health epidemic through a wholistic treatment and recovery regime.  Currently individual agencies are struggling to cope individually.  We need a team approach to build at least a 150 person treatment centre, that will carry individuals through their three stages of recovery, over a prolonged period, but them also carry them back into a career and a home upon successful recovery.  This is a design challenge for our professionals, funded by the Federal and Provincial government for at least $150M.  At the end of someone’s recovery journey they are allowed life and job training.  A local firm has already designed appropriate housing for a variety of family and individual needs.  The journey back into society requires consistent support.  Teach people to build their own homes.  Give people the tools to become productive neighbours. 
6. My research team is collecting information on housing and shelter alternatives that are being used in other places, south of the border, and even offshore.  Homelessness is not unique to Thunder Bay.  The root causes have many common threads: poverty, domestic violence, mental health, employment instability, and educational disparity.  Our current small home shelter project will just scratch the surface, and will probably not address any of the root causes.
7. Monitoring and assessment of safety / wellness / economic improvement measures is a key component.  Using continuous improvement techniques, employed by the Neighbourhood / Policing Task force requires funding, or at least acknowledgement and authority to conduct independent studies annually.  I suspect cost saving will come from crime reduction, business losses reduction, and a reduction in the vulnerable population that needs our care.
8. And there is nothing that cannot be achieved through community involvement- encouraging community led policing- and asking people to look out for each other. There are so many examples across the country where police worked with the community to mitigate crime challenges through coordinated intervention. One of them is the SVOR program in Saskatchewan. Through a coordinated strategy to identify high-risk offenders, using prevention strategies and case-by-case management, the program saw a 37% reduction in incarceration amongst high-risk offenders. 
9. Creating a safer environment with high resolution supervised cameras with alarms for surveillance, including improved lighting in neighborhoods, at risk, could help discourage potential offenders.
10. Having the province build more near-luxury jails is not the answer.  Reduce poverty, tackle affordability, create meaningful jobs for youth, …… and work together for community wellness.  Be proactive!

Volker Kromm

Mayoral Candidate

Public safety remains one of the most serious concerns facing Thunder Bay residents. A 2026 Thunder Bay Police Service citizen survey found only 51 per cent of respondents said they felt safe in the city. Disorder and substance use were each identified as concerns by 87 per cent of respondents, while homelessness and encampments were cited by 77 per cent. Residents ranked solving violent crime and illegal-firearms offences, neighbourhood patrols and reliable response to 911 calls among their highest policing priorities.

Over the past year, Thunder Bay has experienced a series of serious incidents, including a February shooting investigation in the Vale Crescent area that resulted in an attempted-murder charge against a youth; a June investigation in which police seized more than 1.5 kilograms of suspected fentanyl and a handgun; a July homicide investigation on Cumming Street that resulted in second-degree murder charges; an August Dawson Road assault in which the victim later died and two people were charged with manslaughter; and several reported stabbings and weapons-related incidents.

At the same time, police themselves acknowledge that enforcement alone cannot resolve the conditions affecting public safety. Residents have identified addiction treatment, mental-health services, affordable housing and homelessness supports as essential parts of the solution. Thunder Bay Police have also expanded downtown patrols through Project Support in response to concerns about open drug use, aggressive behaviour, vandalism, trespassing and public disorder.

Question:
If you are elected mayor, what specific actions will you take during your four-year term to make Thunder Bay measurably safer for residents, businesses, visitors and vulnerable people?