Despite a surge in service demand, officer-public interactions, and violent crime, the use of force by the Calgary police was 14 per cent lower than the five-year average in 2025.

At the May 27 regular meeting of the Calgary Police Commission (CPS), the Calgary Police Service (CPS) presented its year-end report, which found that officers deployed force 750 times last year.

The number equates to approximately one in 788 interactions and represents an eight per cent decrease from the 2024 total, making it the second year in a row in which volumes fell, following the five-year high reported in 2023.

Declines in the use of force occurred during the same period in which officers experienced increased contact with the public and heightened calls for service, with 63 percent of all calls coming from residents.

Initiatives such as Operation Order, Safer Calgary, and those led by the Community Engagement Response Team were cited as having interrupted incidents that could have required the use of force, including arrests and other containment strategies. 

CPS Insp. Lon Brewster noted that the city saw a number of high-profile events last year, such as the G7 Summit and the Calgary Stampede. He said that their efforts to station more officers made a difference. 

“Our presence and having uniforms around, and with that, many members in and around the city throughout the entire year,” said Brewster. 

“I think it created a very high visibility presence within the city, which would likely speak to some of the decrease in our use of force stats.”

Additionally, he noted that the training and subsequent individual efforts of officers employing de-escalation techniques — whether personally or through equipment such as tire deflation devices — also led to the decreased rate.

Social disorder, erratic behaviour ranked high in force frequency

In 2025, violent crime grew to be 16 per cent higher than the five-year average, with assaults making up 68 per cent of all violent offences, not to mention the rise in domestic violence and personal robberies.

The report found that, while domestics placed second in the list of calls for service involving the use of force, incidents related to social disorder, including disturbance, suspicious people and vehicles, and mental health concerns, claimed three of the five spots.

CPS Chief Katie McLellan told reporters following the presentation that this is the direct result of the worsening state of social disorder, especially in the context of substance use, and how first responders act in situations like these.

“Social disorder is becoming more violent, and it’s becoming much more frequent,” she said. 

“It’s changing individuals’ behaviours, it’s changing how they react, it’s changing what the drug does to them, and ultimately, it’s changing how we need to respond, which ends up with those use-of-force incidents.”

Vehicle-based tactics (VBT) placed fourth, which Insp. Brewster described as being calls for service involving stolen or suspicious vehicles, especially those requiring a welfare check for impairment concerns.

The report emphasized that “a large portion of these calls” related to “vehicles being driven erratically and at dangerous speeds…presenting an elevated danger to the public.”

Brewster said that every patrol officer qualified for basic VBT-B training, defined as measures used to safely apprehend a driver without putting spectators at risk or escalating to a police pursuit. 

In light of the worsening vehicle offences, CPS is currently undergoing the re-certification process for VBT-A training, the advanced version of this, which must be updated every two years.