Where most police street checks happen in Saskatoon

(File photo)

Saskatoon Police Service (SPS) says all of the 189 contact interviews conducted by its officers last year complied with policy.

"With the policy now firmly established, ongoing contact interview activities can be expected to continue at the new moderate levels but with very high policy compliance," SPS said in a report to the Board of Police Commissioners to be received as information at Thursday's meeting.

The SPS report, completed annually, comes after the Saskatchewan Police Commission introduced a new provincial policy on contact interviews in 2018. In a contact interview, commonly known as a street check or carding, officers approach members of the public for identifying information. The approach has been criticized for being implemented unjustly. In Ontario in 2019, a judge found that officers there have disproportionately stopped black and Indigenous people.

Under the Saskatchewan policy, the information officers aim to obtain must be more than general information common to the community and not related to a specific incident or offence. A member of the public's participation in a street check is voluntary and all street checks must be noted and submitted to the police database.

Authorized reasons for conducting street checks include:

• The lack of any apparent reason for the person to be in a particular area, such as a commercial or industrial area late at night when those premises are closed
• The person's actions, behaviour or demeanour raise a concern regarding their purpose or safety
• The person appears lost, confused, frightened or in need of help.

Under the policy, police cannot conduct a street check just because a person's location is in an area known to experience high levels of criminal activity and/or victimization. Police also cannot conduct street checks on the basis of race, ethnicity, age, gender or other grounds protected under human rights legislation.

Street checks in Saskatoon appear to have been concentrated downtown and along 20th Street last year, according to a heat map in the report. Smaller hotspots include 115th Street in Sutherland, the Idylwyld and 33rd Street area, and around Warman Road and 51st Street.

A heat map of street checks conducted by Saskatoon police in 2021. (Saskatoon Police Service)

The report says the number of street checks being conducted by Saskatoon police has declined following the implementation of the policy. In 2020, police conducted 239 street checks.