Update on City Partnership to Advance Community Safety and Wellbeing on the Transit System

On March 30, 2023, City Council directed the TTC and City of Toronto staff to strengthen the partnerships by collaborating on the following: 1. Investigate other jurisdiction's transit safety approaches; 2. Engage other orders of government to support municipal efforts 3. Increase the use of Streets to Homes and their outreach partners as an effective means to support vulnerable people in the transit system. 4. Enhance integrated data monitoring and reporting to guide decision-making. 5. Enhance equity and inclusion efforts on the transit system. In January 2023, the City of Toronto and the TTC launched a partnership with the Toronto Police Service and community service providers to improve community safety and wellbeing on the transit system. This multi-disciplinary approach combined security measures using community safety ambassadors, security guards and temporarily redeployed police officers along with community-focused interventions consisting of shelter and housing outreach and referrals and mental health and addictions services to support individuals with complex needs using the transit system. The collection and integration of data across all three organizations is integral to this work to effectively deploy resources as the hot spots requiring greater support are identified within the transit system. Data integration will also allow for the identification of trends to understand if positive impacts are being achieved. Based on the data collected since January 2023, there are positive indicators that show that community safety and wellbeing is improving. While riders' perceptions of safety remain low, the rate of actual offences against employees and customers has declined since January. Additionally, for those individuals in the transit system with complex needs, almost 2,100 site visits from Streets-to-Homes teams have occurred since January resulting in individuals being referred to shelters and being connected with mental health supports. These interventions have been put in place as rapidly as possible to address the immediate and acute need to support people with complex needs in the transit system. However, as Toronto continues to experience the long-term social and economic impacts of COVID-19, the transit system continues to be a site where people with complex needs need to be supported. This creates unsustainable financial pressures and shortfalls on the TTC and the City of Toronto's operating budgets, requiring long term commitments from all orders of government to fund the shortfall.