7 Reporting on Progress

The essence of our approach in this area is that what gets measured gets changed. Stakeholders need to be able to clearly follow the advance of implementation and determine whether those plans are leading to tangible outcomes and real change. We also want this reporting to be radically different from anything in the past and readily accessible to everyone.

Quarterly Reporting to the Toronto Police Services Board

Active accountability for modernization begins with the Toronto Police Services Board. Overseeing modernization will be the Board’s most important priority over the next several years. The Board will need to support the Service with resources, advocacy, advice, and priority setting. At the same time it will need to monitor, probe, and challenge where necessary. This commitment is reflected in the decision made on July 21, 2016 to accept the Task Force’s final report as the Board’s three-year 2017-2019 Business Plan.

We are recommending that the Service report on progress quarterly to the Board and share these updates with the public. These reports will be framed by the Strategy Map, encompass all modernization activities and initiatives underway, and include both outcome and process measures.

Outcome measures will tell us as a city whether the intended outcomes of modernization are being achieved. They will answer questions of fundamental importance, including:

• Is the police service trusted?
• Are communities safe?
• Are the police where people need them to be?
• Do residents and Service members feel they have meaningful opportunities to participate in the change process?
• Do people and Service members believe the culture of the Service is changing?

Process information will include things such as the status of work on individual recommendations, including analyses completed, actions taken, milestones reached and deliverables. This information will allow the Board, the public and Service members to measure whether the work is proceeding on time and on budget. Information about ongoing community and Service member engagement processes will also be included.

Opening up the Conversation

Working with the Service, we have developed and are recommending an initial Modernization Scorecard. When fully realized, it will be comprehensive, transparent, accessible to all and an example of culture change in action.

In presentation and content, this Scorecard will be profoundly different from any current and past approaches. We intend it to radically change the conversation between the public, the Board, and the Service by providing the public and Service members at all levels with the information they need to hold the Board and the Service’s leadership accountable for change.

It will include comprehensive information about the status of modernization – including all key outcome and process measures. Some of the information is not new but has never been made available to the extent and in the ways we are recommending. Other information, such as the status of action plans, will be new. But new or existing, information has never been brought together in this way before. This transparency will be invaluable in strengthening internal accountability and identifying opportunities to enhance performance.

We anticipate that the first version of the Scorecard will be available online within 90 days of our action plan being submitted to the Board. It will be a live reporting tool, meaning that the information will continue to change and be updated regularly. It will also be a work-in-progress as the Service will be inviting public and Service member input on the tool so that it can be refined further.

The Scorecard will have Three Sections

1. Modernization Outcomes

The information in this first section will allow the public and Service members to assess progress on the outcomes of modernization as reflected in the Strategy Map. For example, is the Service:

• Where the public needs it to be?
• Embracing partnerships to create safe communities?
• Focusing on the complex needs of Toronto?

It will include scoring of the Service’s performance by the public, including measuring confidence in police officers, satisfaction with service levels, perceptions of safety, as well as whether the Service is fulfilling its promise to be accountable, transparent, inclusive, and affordable.

It will also include scoring by Service members on a range of fronts including job satisfaction, adequacy of training and the extent to which members believe the Service is fulfilling its promise to be accountable, transparent, inclusive, and affordable.

The public and Service members will be able to connect these ratings to the results of comprehensive employee surveys that are conducted annually by the Service, as well as the results of surveys of the public and community organizations that are conducted for the Service by an independent third party.

Culture Change Indicators

This section is also where key measures of culture change will be reported on, based on regular surveys of the public and Service members. Measures related to culture change will include public and Service member perceptions of:

• Trust and confidence in police officers and the Service as a whole.
• The extent of inclusiveness and absence of bias, discrimination and racism.
• Police officers as collaborative partners who are focused on solutions and outcomes.
• Whether people are developing more familiar relationships with their neighbourhood officers, and if these relationships are contributing to community safety.

Measures related to culture change internal to the Service will include Service members’ perceptions of:

• Whether the Service is supporting, valuing and rewarding innovation.
• Collaboration, inclusiveness, and engagement.
• Empowerment of front-line staff to achieve outcomes.
• The support they receive from supervisors and other leaders.

2. Service Excellence

This second section will focus on measures of the Service’s operational excellence. It will include successive levels of detail on key policing metrics such as:

• Crime rates, including reported violent crimes and property crimes.
• Response times.
• Number of priority calls attended to.
• Injuries to officers arising from their duties.
• Number of people reporting incidents online, by phone or through the TPS app.

This performance information will be presented for the city overall and by division. It will also include key administrative and financial metrics such as:

• Operating and capital budget performance and variances.
• The results of financial management strategies.
• Human resources information such as staff counts, turnover rates, diversity, absenteeism, retirements, and departures.
• Employee awareness and recognition.

3. Modernization Process

This third section will provide the public and Service members with comprehensive, multi-year progress updates on the implementation of our action plan. It will be updated regularly to reflect the status of each project, including timelines, milestones, deliverables and budgets. This information presented will inform the public and Service members about what’s been done, what to expect and when, and whether modernization is on-time and on-budget.