Governance of policing in Ontario

In Ontario, policing is governed by the Community Safety and Policing Act, 2019 (CSPA), which came into effect on April 1, 2024, replacing the Police Services Act, 1990 (PSA). Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 11(1) requires that "adequate and effective policing" be provided throughout Ontario. In jurisdictions with their own police force, this is the responsibility of a police service board (municipal board or First Nations board); in the rest of the province, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), it's the Commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police who bears this responsibility.

This page explains the roles of the different bodies involved in governance of policing in Ontario, with a focus on Ottawa. For information about how these bodies handle complaints about policing, see How to file a complaint about police in Ontario.

The Ottawa Police Service Board

The Ottawa Police Service Board (OPSB) is a municipal board under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 31, which allows for police service boards with five, seven, or nine members. Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB has seven members, so the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA requires that it consist of:

the head of Ottawa city council (the mayor), or another member of city council selected as a replacement by city council;
two other members of city council selected by city council;
one person, who is neither a member of city council nor a municipal employee, selected by city council; and
three people selected by the provincial government.

As of June 2026, the composition of Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB is:

Councillors Steve Desroches, Marty Carr (co-chair), and Cathy Curry (Mayor Mark Sutcliffe gave up his position on Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB in January 2025 and was therefore replaced by another councillor)
Dave Donaldson as member of the public appointed by city council
Provincial appointees Salim Fakirani (chair), Peter Henschel, and Michael Polowin.

Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB is responsible, under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 37, for hiring the chief of the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) and monitoring their performance, and is legally the employer of all Ottawa Police ServiceOPS officers, though the only individual hiring decisions that Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB makes are those relating to the chief. It sets general policies for Ottawa Police ServiceOPS, but is prohibited under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 38(5) from giving directions "with respect to specific investigations, the conduct of specific operations, the management or discipline of specific police officers or other prescribed matters." It's also prohibited under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 40(2) from giving directions to individual officers other than the chief.

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Although it might seem that police service boards would provide oversight of the police they employ, in practice it's the board that serves the police force rather than the other way around. Police service board members are largely unwilling to ask any questions whose answers might prove embarrassing or to express any criticisms or even concerns about police activities. The prohibition on giving specific directions is very useful here, as it allows board members to feign impotence whenever calls are made for a particularly harmful police activity to be stopped. One Hamilton Police Service Board member bucked that trend and paid the price.

Provincial bodies

The Special Investigations Unit (SIU)

The Special Investigations Unit (SIU) was established in 1990, following recommendations set out in "The report of the Race Relations and Policing Task Force" (Clare Lewis Report), published in 1989. As of December 1, 2020, the Special Investigations UnitSIU is governed by the Special Investigations Unit Act (SIUA). Under Special Investigations Unit ActSIUA s. 15(1), the Special Investigations UnitSIU is responsible for investigating incidents in which death, serious injury, discharge of a firearm, or sexual assault "may have resulted from criminal conduct by" a police officer.

The Law Enforcement Complaints Agency (LECA)

Part VIII of the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA replaced the Office of the Independent Police Review Director (OIPRD), established under the Police Services ActPSA, with a Law Enforcement Complaints Agency (LECA). Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA handles complaints about the conduct of specific police officers, as opposed to general policies and procedures of a police force, which are handled by the Inspectorate of Policing (discussed in the next section). Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA continues to act as the OIPRD in handling complaints submitted before the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA came into effect in 2024.

When Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA receives a complaint about the conduct of a police officer, it can screen the complaint out for a number of reasons, including a determination that "the complaint is frivolous, vexatious or made in bad faith" or simply that "dealing with the complaint is not in the public interest" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 158(1)(d)). If they do screen the complaint in, they usually direct the chief of that officer's police force to investigate the complaint, as set out in Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 159(1)). Within Ottawa Police ServiceOPS, the chief delegates the handling of Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA complaints to the Professional Standards Unit.

The most recent year for which Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA has published statistics is 2024. Due to inconsistencies in the way these statistics are reported, it's not possible to trace complaints through each phase of the process to determine what proportion make it all the way to a finding of misconduct, but the numbers do give a general picture. Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA indicate that they screened 5,873 complaints in 2024 to determine whether they should be investigated, of which they screened in 1,834 (31.2%) and screened out the remaining 4,039 (68.8%). Of the 2,321 complaints that were either referred to a police force for investigation or retained by Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA, only 9 (0.4%) were retained by Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA. And of the 1,764 referred complaints that were completed in 2024, only 75 (4.3%) were ultimately found to be "substantiated," meaning that the officer was found to have engaged in misconduct.

Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 165(1) calls on the body conducting the investigation of a complaint to "endeavour to ensure that the investigation is concluded within 120 days of its commencement," but there's no firm timeline for completing an investigation or enforcement mechanism if the investigation exceeds the 120-day target. The Complaints Director (head of Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA) also has the power under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 164(1) to "cause an investigation to be discontinued if he or she determines that [...] continuing the investigation is not in the public interest."

At the conclusion of an investigation into a complaint, the body conducting it prepares a written report indicating whether there are "reasonable grounds to believe that the conduct of the person who was the subject of the investigation constitutes misconduct" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 167(1)), which must be shared with the complainant. If the outcome is no finding of misconduct, the complainant can request a review by the Complaints Director under Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 167(3). According to Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA's statistics, of the 296 requests for review that they "managed" in 2024, they confirmed the police force's decision in 188 cases (63.5%), ordered that a new investigation be conducted in 27 cases (9.1%), and only in 3 cases (1.0%) took over the investigation themselves. (9 further cases are listed as "panel varied decision," and another 71 were carried over into the next year.)

If, on the other hand, the outcome is a finding of misconduct, the "designated authority" (the chief of police, in the case of an individual police officer) decides whether to impose disciplinary measures, and if so, what those measures should be (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 168(2)(a)).

The Inspectorate of Policing (IoP)

Part VII of the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA established a new body, the Inspectorate of Policing (IoP), headed by an Inspector General of Policing, to handle complaints about the conduct of a member of a police service board, such as Ottawa Police Service BoardOPSB (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 106) or about general policies or procedures of a police service (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 107). As in the case of Law Enforcement Complaints AgencyLECA, discussed in the previous section, the Inspectorate of PolicingIoP can "refuse to investigate a complaint" if they decide that the complaint is "frivolous, vexatious or made in bad faith" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 106(2)) or that "dealing with the complaint is not in the public interest" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 107(2)).

Complaints regarding "the policies, by-laws, rules or procedures of a police service board" or "the procedures established by a chief of police" are forwarded to the board in question, which must then review the complaint and report to the Inspectorate of PolicingIoP "about any steps taken in response to the complaint" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 106(7)). The Inspectorate of PolicingIoP has no obligation to share the report with the complainant or to make it public, or in fact to take any further action at all.

In complaints that don't fall under the previous category, the Inspectorate of PolicingIoP can conduct an inspection, for instance, into whether a member of a board committed misconduct, or whether a board "is complying with or has complied with this Act and the regulations" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 111(2)). The Inspectorate of PolicingIoP must then prepare a report about their findings and publish it online (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 123(3)). The Inspector General can reprimand, suspend, or remove a member of a board (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 124), if the inspection finds evidence of misconduct, or, if the inspection finds evidence of non-compliance with the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA, "issue any directions [...] that he or she considers advisable to remedy or prevent the non-compliance" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 125(1)). If the police service fails to comply with these directions, the Inspector General can impose measures ranging from suspension of the police chief or members of the board all the way to dissolution of the board and disbandment of the police service (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 126(1)).

The Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication Commission (OPAAC)

Part IX of the Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA established the Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication Commission (OPAAC). Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication CommissionOPAAC consists of a chair and vice-chair, as well as two committees, the Adjudication and Arbitration Committees. These committees handle adjudication relating to disciplinary processes against police officers and arbitration relating to labour disputes, respectively.

Both committees include representatives of police associations from various police forces, together with chiefs of police on the Adjudication Committee and representatives of police boards on the Arbitration Committee.

When a police officer is found to have engaged in misconduct, disciplinary measures may be handled by the Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication CommissionOPAAC Adjudication Committee, depending on their degree of severity, or reach Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication CommissionOPAAC on appeal.

One notable power of Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication CommissionOPAAC is its role in disputes about a police force's budget. If a municipal board "is not satisfied that the budget established for it by the municipality is sufficient" (Community Safety and Policing ActCSPA s. 50(6)), they can ask the Ontario Police Arbitration and Adjudication CommissionOPAAC chair to appoint an arbitrator, who then makes a binding decision on the budget.

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As is clear from the explanation above, governance of policing in Ontario is complicated and confusing. This is undoubtedly by design: the harder it is to understand what police are doing and who is making decisions, the fewer people will bother even trying to make sense of and potentially trying to oppose those actions and decisions.
COPOUT 613 intends to make this information more accessible and to provide the scrutiny of policing in Ottawa that the "oversight" bodies are unwilling to provide.