For more than a decade, John has been actively involved in the Toronto Police Accountability Coalition.
TPAC is a group of about a dozen individuals with different interests who meet at least monthly to talk about policing issues and think about what actions can be taken to change police policy. TPAC generally restricts itself to issues with the Toronto police service. The group does not deal with individual complaints about the police although John is often asked to give advice to those with issues. The group holds a public meeting to discuss some large police issue about once a year.
TPAC has kept a good record of its activities and other Toronto police issues, in its bi-monthly electronic bulletin which can be found on the TPAC web site, http://www.tpac.ca . TPAC has pushed for a number of important changes including: reducing the number of strip searches carried out by Toronto police; better policies resulting in fewer deaths by police for dealing with those in mental crisis; an improved complaints system; a stronger governing structure; better approaches to police spending; carding and racial discrimination by police; the use of tasers; video cameras; police presence in schools.
Many of these issues can be traced through Bulletins stretching back many years. John has written many of the TPAC Bulletins. John has also written two books on policing.
It is not easy to change policing institutions in Canada – they are very conservative and very insular – or to keep together a group interested in policing issues. Emotions run high when people talk about policing matters, and police organizations are not shy about throwing around their weight when they sense they are being criticized. TPAC is one of the few groups in Canada that has maintained its presence as a critic suggesting positive changes which need to me made. One reason for that is our decision to maintain TPAC as a small group of individuals who share their ideas, and who agree that getting along with each other is critical to our continued cohesion. We believe that we have created a strong reputation of being reasonable, and working from solid information.