Downtown Windsor crime rates down

The Paul Martin federal building in downtown Windsor, Ont.

Windsor Police Service is reporting a decrease of 20.1 per cent in criminal code offences downtown such as offences against people and various levels of assault.

Crimes against people in the downtown core has gone down 16.2 per cent. “It’s a continued fight but it’s nice to see that the numbers are making a difference,” said Coun. Renaldo Agostino. “Having the police on the beat, walking downtown has been the biggest thing.”

Windsor Police Service Insp. Rob Wilson agrees. “Yup, I would totally agree with him. I can tell you right now, the downtown core, since May of 2024, we’ve allocated 13,640 hours of officers presence in the downtown core.

LaSalle resident Loretta Giacomin, who visits Windsor’s downtown up to three times a week, has noticed the increase in police presence. “I have seen the police walking the beat almost every time that I’m here,” Giacomin said while having breakfast. “I feel comfortable during the day. I don’t come at night very often unless I’m with people and I feel safe down here during the day.”

According to Downtown BIA Chair Chris McLeod, the impact of an increased police presence downtown has been noticed by business owners as well.

“Just having that visual presence and we hear regularly from our businesses and how happy they are with the presence downtown and I can say here, the officers stop in couple times a month.”

There was one business that questioned why police presence seems to have dwindled during the colder months.

“We have a lot of initiatives in the downtown core, so maybe they’re not all standing on one corner, but they’re spread out across the downtown and I can assure you they are there because you can tell that there’s 13,000 hours of officers in the downtown core,” Wilson told CTV News.

McLeod says a plan is in the works to implement a camera program, he suspects in the next 3 to 6 months, as part of the Strengthen the Core initiative to help lower crime even more. “Another move forward in strengthening our downtown,” said McLeod.