Mayor Jeromy Farkas is trying to change Calgary’s status as the only major municipality without a downtown police station, a proposal that some city councillors said ignores the root causes of crime while trampling the police and commission’s oversight.  

During an exclusive media availability on April 27, Mayor Farkas announced that he would be tabling a notice of motion calling for the development of a permanent downtown police district office.

Not including himself, the document is sponsored by 10 of the 14 city councillors, and, if passed, would direct the administration to consult with local and provincial law enforcement bodies to write a feasibility report in the fall.

The response would assess which city-owned properties would make the most sense to convert into a police station, along with the associated construction costs, possible partnership models, and overall impact. 

For the last nine years, the downtown area has been without a formal police station. Currently, the Calgary Police Service (CPS) operates a Community Counter at 115 – 6 Ave SW, which Farkas explained lacks patrol deployment, arrest processing, and ample hours of operation. 

“They don’t have the visibility that Calgarians are really expecting,” he told the media on Tuesday. 

“I’m continually hearing from commuters, from residents, from business owners, about the need for more prevention and proactive measures in our downtown.”

Drawing on the CPS’s year-end report to the Calgary Police Commission (CPC), his notice summarized that the report “confirms that violent crime and social disorder are disproportionately concentrated in the downtown core.”

According to police data, violent crime was four per cent higher last year than in 2024 — a figure 16 per cent higher than the five-year average. Although there was a slight decrease in the fourth quarter of 2025, the year ended with an upsurge in assaults and street robberies.

Second attempt in front of a fresh-faced council

Now is not the first time that Farkas has advocated for the construction of a downtown police station. During his time as the city councillor for Ward 11, he pushed for reopening the one that sat just north of Central Memorial Park along 11 Avenue SW.

Called the Victoria Park Police Station, the brick-and-mortar location closed in November 2017, following the CPS headquarters’ move from the downtown core to the northeast community of Castleridge in 2009.

Different from his 2019 attempt, Farkas emphasized that his pitch for the downtown station would tie in several resources, similar to what a community hub would do — including youth mentorship, gang prevention, and recreation amenities. 

“The downtown station, to be clear, is not a magic bullet,” he said. 

“It has to be in tandem with a broader strategy around prevention, around addictions, recovery, treatments, mental health, housing, and so on.”

Ward 8 Coun. Nathaniel Schmidt agreed with the community resource aspect of Farkas’s proposal, but said these should target the root cause of crime rather than focusing on preventing lawbreaking behaviour. 

“If we want to look at improving safety and proactive policing, I would rather see us put those resources towards more foot patrols, more bike patrols, and more collaboration with our social services,” he said. 

“Because the issues downtown are related to social problems.”

Additionally, Schmidt said the city already has ample police-sponsored community resource services and that working with existing organizations, such as the Alpha House and the Distress Centre, would be more beneficial than “going back in time” by building a new station. 

“Why don’t we have a multi-use hub where we can get them to actually work together on what they’re already doing?” he said.

Ward 7 Coun. Myke Atkinson sang to a similar tune, arguing that for a police station to be implemented, there is no need to build it from scratch. He named adjusting what already exists as a better solution. 

“We could be tackling this relatively quickly by making sure that the counter and the operations of that counter in the downtown core are funded and staffed appropriately,” he said. 

“It doesn’t require a new building. They’ve got a space within the downtown.”

Regardless of how the hypothetical station would be built or what it would look like, two of the four councillors opposing the mayor’s notice of motion are concerned that the decision to build a new police station is not the council’s to make.

Mayor’s proposal has political motivation: Wyness

Both Schmidt and Ward 2 Coun. Jennifer Wyness warned that the motion bypasses the police commission’s management. 

“This is an issue because it is undermining the authority of the Calgary Police Commission,” said Wyness. 

“We are now using the council notice of motion, or a directive, to spend money as well as create policy or incentivize operational decisions for the police by working in the grey area.”

Being a member of the commission herself, Wyness explained that the police service is in the process of planning its next four-year budget, which is expected to be released in the fall. She said that the motion could put a wrench in these plans. 

“To have council suddenly drop a notice of motion shakes them up off of what they have planned and what they will be presenting to council,” said Wyness. 

“This is very political. This is campaign promises made, trying to make campaign promises kept.”

Farkas’s notice of motion is scheduled to be reviewed for technical merit during the Executive Committee Meeting on May 5. If passed, the motion will come back to a full meeting of Calgary city council for debate.