Steve Bell
Steve Bell spoke 839 times across 1 day of testimony.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I'll swear, please.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The Bible, please. Thank you very much.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Steven Bell, B-E-L-L.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If -- I believe so. If we could scroll through the document, please.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. Yes, this is correct. From what I've seen so far, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Almost 27 now.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. I've been involved in several different places within the organisation?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
For sure. So I was obviously a patrol officer for a number of years. I was a neighbourhood officer. I spent time in our Professional Standards Section, our Human Resources Section, our Drug Enforcement Section. I've had the ability as an executive within the organisation to work within all the directorates, and now currently have the Interim Chief position.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So my responsibilities in terms of overseeing that section would have been to make sure that our Intelligence Unit was gathering, collecting, analysing, and sharing information, and I would do that through what was an established chain of command.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So yeah, I think it's important to note the superintendent in charge at that point was Superintendent Patterson. And there had been a large movement of superintendents and leaders within the Directorate. So Superintendent Patterson was in charge, and he had two inspectors that reported to him. And that entire Command Team had just been placed in that area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Superintendent Patterson would've taken that position on on January 1st.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. Towards the end of December, I was assigned into that area once I was -- before that I was temporarily in the CAO or Chief Administrative Officer role for a year due to a vacancy, and then in late December, I took over this portfolio and began to establish it with a new team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, he did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So Inspector Cartwright was in the Information Services Branch.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Inspector Bryden was in the Intelligence Service Branch, and both of them started on January 1st as well.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So that was something that we had identified and that Chief Sloly had identified as a need for us moving ahead was how Intelligence and Information work together. So we had a large project underway at that time which was around intelligence-led policing to look at how we most effectively gather, analyse, and share information through the organisation. So they work together very effectively, but the goal of the ILP project, as we named it, was actually to identify how we can refine that sharing of information even more to make sure the information we're bringing into the organisation is shared as broadly and effectively as it could be. We had been involved in that project for probably over a year, and I can say that there were steps and there were efficiencies and improvements that had been found in terms of information-sharing.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
He would be in the operational area, and I would say Inspector Bryden would be moving from the operational to the tactical level.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, he did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Specifically around the issue we’re here to talk about or overall generally?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we had regularly- scheduled biweekly meetings that we called “CTOM”, Crime, Traffic and Order Management meetings, that were run by the Information Branch and that were specifically designed to identify key areas of risk and our response to it within the organization. So that level and frequency of briefing to the entire Executive Command was on a biweekly basis as it related to -- as it related to overall issues. Specifically to the Freedom Convoy and the events around that, that was flagged, as you say, through a Hendon Report around January 13th. Superintendent Patterson and I began having discussions on it in and around the 20th and the briefings went to me in terms of the activities that they were taking, ensuring that the information was flowing would have been on a regular basis.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It would have been in and around that week. I can’t say which was the specific date through that week, but that’s what it would have been flagged and raised in prominence that we would have -- we did begin discussing it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So my recollection is that I did not start receiving the Hendon Reports until the 27th of January, and that was through discussion with Superintendent Patterson. So I don’t recall and I don’t have -- in searches, I don’t believe I received that report.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I didn’t. No, I don’t have any recollection. And we’ve searched to -- our database to identify when I did start receiving them, and it was on the 27th of January.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely. The -- Chief Sloly indicated when we began to discuss it. We also had morning command calls from 9:00 to 10:00 a.m., and during those calls we would discuss issues that had occurred and emerging issues. The issue of the Freedom Convoy came onto our radar in and around that week of the 20th. I’m not -- I can’t specifically identify the day. And we had discussions and there was clear discussion around intelligence responsibility to be involved and identify risks and threats and make sure that we were informing any sort of planning that was going to occur around our response.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, absolutely. One of the -- one of the things that Chief Sloly was very firm about was that intelligence -- and I absolutely agree with it. Intelligence needs to inform the planning cycle and it needs to be utilized to actually identify what our appropriate response is.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So again, I don’t have a specific date, but it would have been in and around the week of the 20th. I’m not sure the specific date of it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it was.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct. And it’s Version 4, so there’s been iterations of this as more intelligence has been received, gathered and analyzed.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry. I’m just reading the paragraph.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct. But I also believe there’s pieces in here as well as in other intelligence reports that are missing that are very germane to the discussion we’re having today. Large numbers. Yes, we did see large numbers. What there isn’t included in any of the intelligence that we received is the community impact that actually occurred. There’s nothing around the information that identifies the activities of the protestors when they actually arrive in the city. There’s nothing that indicates that the protestors are going to use the citizens of our community as the leverage point to have their voices heard. In Ottawa, we manage multiple protests on a yearly basis. We’ve managed protests similar to this on previous times. We’ve never experienced and had no intelligence to indicate that it was actually going to be the leverage of the community and the activities of the protestors to use our community members through their activities as the leverage point to be heard.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. And what I would say is what was known the day before was that a large number, and the day before, so if this is the 28th, the 27th is we were starting to receive numbers on what the size and scope would be, ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- and that the overall activity of the group moving across was extremely lawful and extremely law abiding.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct. And I would say the conclusion here is that large numbers could attend the city and we accepted that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That there could be traffic disruptions, absolutely. And that it could be a motions associated to it. But not anything that would relate to the activity that we ultimately saw on our streets.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I would absolutely agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well I would agree with that. And I would say that all of the intelligence and intelligence gathering that we’d had prior to that indicated a very similar fact. This group had only come on the intelligence radar in late summer of 2021 and never actually materialized. They -- as they moved across the country, they seemed to build support. But they seemed to build grass roots support and all the activities that we had seen them engage in prior to that had been very lawful, had been very pro-social. The amount of people that were supporting them, from my perspective, actually gave it more credibility that it was a grassroots initiative, not that we were going to see the violence that we saw in our streets.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct, but I don’t know that the numbers of people who attended, from a pedestrian, or from a protest perspective, were unmanageable or were had any sort of -- we had any sort of consideration about the activities that they would be involved in. Numbers on their own are something that we have managed in the past at different scales. This was large. This was unprecedented. Everyone realized it was unprecedented. But for us as a policing organization, what pushed it over the top was the activities that the people protesting were engaged in and the harm that they did to our community. A large protest that was lawful could have been managed, would have been managed. It was what was anticipated. The activities engaged in were never clearly identified. And from my perspective, that is exactly what made this unprecedented to any other demonstration that we’d ever seen.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So an oversight. He had a role as a Chief of Police. He was informed and briefed on the progression that was being made.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we would have discussions on this on a daily basis at our command team calls. And that’s where I would be briefed by Supt. Patterson, and that information would be shared on our command team calls. As we came into the week of the 24th, which I believe is a Monday, and we started to increase those briefings, and actually, there was in-person -- I don’t know the specific time, but there was in-person briefings by Supt. Patterson in terms of what we were seeing and how we were moving ahead to the command team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So one of my responsibilities as the Deputy Chief is to make sure that the information is shared. And Supt. Patterson and I had discussions around that. He -- we had discussions around Project Hendon. And one of my responsibilities was through him to ensure that the information that we were receiving was gathered by Intelligence, but also shared with our Planning Team. And he ensured me that that was happening, and then briefed me on the information that was occurring. He identified that there was regular on-going calls that picked up in tempo and intensity as the convoy moved across and came closer to Ottawa. And it wasn’t until some point during that week that he identified that Project Hendon actually had an output in a formal report. It was unknown to me before that. And that’s when I requested that he started sharing it with me, and he started to share it with me.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I would need to see the plan ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- you’re referencing, because there’s different plans.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I am.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Am I able to read it before we scroll through?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you. So we can scroll down, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, I'm good to move on.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If we can -- sorry. Can I just have you scroll up one there? Thank you very much. Okay, thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I would've -- I would have received the Threat Assessment as I was provided it, and I believe it was on the 28th the copy of the Operational Plan that was being put forward.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I received this prior to receiving the actual Threat Assessment that had been finalised, and what I did know is that there had been very good levels of intelligence-sharing amongst the Planning Team. The Planning Team had been ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, that's fine. Thank you, sir.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that's correct. I -- I'm going to ask you to repeat if there was a question in there. I believe I had an answer, but I want to make sure I'm answering the correct question.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I have.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So at the time, I think it's very important to identify how this assessment would have been created. We did create an overall Threat Assessment, which is extremely important, but this assessment would've also been influenced directly by the connection that existed between our Intelligence Unit and the Planning Team. So -- and much of that information would've been gathered through the ongoing Hendon reports. So the ongoing Hendon reports, and the analysis of that, and more, formulated the overall Threat Assessment, that would've helped to support this, but there was also on-the-ground regular dialogue about the incoming information that was contained or not contained, as we've had discussions about in -- to help formulate this threat assessment.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, that -- yes. And that was one of the big challenges that also made this unprecedented is that there was information -- there was intelligence through Hendon but there was information in an unprecedented and almost inundating way that was coming in, and as it was building through the week until this threat assessment was completed. Our members worked constantly with the members of the -- fellow members of the Intelligence Group, and by this time, on the 28th, there was already a Joint Intelligence Group that had been established that was embedded within the planning cell to try and take the -- all of this information that was coming in and assess it and then disseminate it to try and get a picture of what was going to occur, at this point within hours.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I -- at the time I wouldn’t have known this because I hadn’t had the opportunity to review and look through all the Hendon reports, but I think it is a very accurate assessment. I think there is one area that’s missing that we didn’t highlight enough because I don’t believe we had enough information to substantiate the level of risk that it created, and that’s specifically around the fact that there may be some members of the convoy who would stay on for a longer period of time around the 28th, 29th, and 30th that we were planning for. So in retrospect, having identified all of this, that should -- the potential that that could occur should have been something that was included in this.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I would have -- I would have -- I received and then would have read them on an ongoing basis, as well as receiving all -- like I said, we were inundated with other information. So we were receiving lots of information at that point and as I received it, I was trying to ensure, within my role, that we were funnelling it to the right area so it could be properly assessed. So if I got information, and I regularly did, whether it be from concerned community members, Councillors, all sorts of different sources, I would ensure that that information was funnelled through our Joint Intelligence Group for assessment and analysis and action.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the first Hendon report that I received and read was the 27th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I didn’t because at that point I knew that they had been shared between the Intelligence Unit, who had done the assessments necessary, and the Planning Unit, who needed to have that information in order to conduct their planning.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So just for clarification, ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- and I’m sorry, I have since reviewed all of the Hendon reports.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So while I do agree that the report states that, I think the subsequent action is very important to a context to this. We identified this’ this was one of the early areas that I identified as a concern. So as a result of that, through discussion with Supt. Patterson, Intelligence was -- worked with the operational branch to actually start to look at this, look at the existence. By this point, this is on the 27th, people are coming across and there are police resources -- specifically in this case, I believe, OPP -- who are with the convoy participants. The follow-up that we received from that was that the PLT, the Police Liaison Team, who we’ve heard about through these hearings as well, engaged with them and there was understanding that that heavy equipment would not be taken into the downtown core. There was also understanding through the information we received back that many of the pieces of equipment that were seen were fluid within the convoy. It appears, and as we understood, as it came across Canada, the numbers fluctuated up and down on a regular, daily, almost hourly basis. Some of the equipment that was seen in here was people that in different locations had joined in, I would imagine or speculate that it was, so that they could identify that they were part of this, and didn’t continue with the convoy as it came across. As result of this information, plans were put in place to make sure that we diverted heavy equipment like this from the downtown core. But discussions were had with the people who had this, and from my understanding -- and it will be a question better posed to Insp. Lucas, but from my understanding, all of the equipment identified in here or any other trailer-based equipment, never made it into the red zone footprint. So although this is concerning; it’s something that we identified, action followed up on and mitigated.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I do -- if we can scroll down to that area?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I do understand, and I know this is in black and white but there is bolding there around priority intelligence gaps. So I believe this area highlights some of the areas where we were concentrating on, and some of the reasons for the assumptions that were made. By this date, this is third or fourth, I can’t be sure until we pull the other ones up, where the intelligence and information had clearly identified a three-day event. All of the discussion was around the 28th, the 29th and the 30th. There had been, through the reports, a passing reference, regular, but passing reference to the notion that a small group of people, a group of people undetermined, could stay for longer periods of time. But predominately, the intelligence identified it as a three-day event. And the top five areas in here are identified in red as priority taskings.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The plans for departing Ottawa was something that was a concern and was identified, but based on the fact that it was believed to be a small group was obviously not identified as a priority tasking. And as part of our planning, the plans, the egress plans for the demonstration to leave Ottawa, based on the fact that there was the concern about how they would get out of Ottawa was built and developed into our plan. It just never materialized once the groups dug in and decided to stay in the city.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I have ultimate respect for Supt. Morris. I think he’s an incredible intelligence leader in his organization, in this country. But when I read these reports, the specifics around the three-day event are very clear as it moves ahead. There is references that some small numbers would stay beyond that, but all of the information being gathered, even in terms of the priorities for the intelligence gathering, is specifically around that three- day period.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, I think that’s an inference we would now make, but I think it’s important to identify that they did drive across the country. The numbers ebbed and flowed. As they moved across the country, there was police agencies engaged with them on an ongoing basis. Their behaviour, as it’s described within the intelligence reports, and reports we had back, was that they were extremely lawful, that they were engaged in -- there was no anti-social behaviour that they were engaged in. And that was the observations for a number of days. Beyond that, the organizers clearly stated on many occasions, and throughout the Hendon reports, that their intention was to be lawful and peaceful once they came to our city. So regardless of whether the number would have -- whether the number that would have remained would have been smaller, as we anticipated it could have been, it was -- again, it was the activities that occurred here that were the most problematic. We, in our police service, manage many, many protests a year. Some of them are prolonged. Some of them are protracted. We’ve had examples of occupations of parks, of occupations of intersections that have gone on for a longer period of time. But those didn’t engage in the unlawful activity that we saw here. That is what I believe makes this circumstance different. The scope of people, the size of the area that they overtook, and the activity and the trauma they put our communities through. There was nothing to identify that that would occur within the intelligence reports.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I think you identify the key point there. If the protests are lawful and they’re within a contained area that isn’t impacting the community, we would go through a regular process in order to ensure that we are managing that area, and that we’re negotiating with the people for them to be able to leave the area. That -- what you described though was not what occurred in our city. There was a larger -- a large geographical area overtaken and there was extreme harm done to our community through the activities of this protest that determined it to be unlawful. So those are very -- for me, those are very -- two very different circumstances we’re talking about.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I raised concerns about the threat assessment. We had discussions about it because my expectation was that it would have created more direct references to the Hendon Reports and to the intelligence information we were bringing in. The threat assessment, as it’s completed, is done on a standard template. There is actually a checklist to follow through as you create a threat assessment. We were trying to become more mature and advanced in our collection and dissemination of intelligence information. What wasn’t included on the checklist was direct references to actual intelligence information that existed. So I was looking to make sure that we had that included in that threat assessment, or least references to the mechanisms that we were drawing that intelligence from.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I'm sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can I finish reading the -- just the content that was at the bottom?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If you can just scroll down a little more, please. Okay, great. Thank you very much. Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, thank you. Sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, if you can just ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- there is one at the ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I didn't get to Number 3 yet. I'll try to read more quickly.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay, thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can we scroll up on the date? I'm just looking at the date on there. This is ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
-- the 26th. The 26th. No. So in answer to your question, absolutely we were all taking an active interest, and I think it's important to note here that the information received by the Chief was funnelled to our Intelligence Unit and our Joint Intelligence Unit for assessment. The Hendon reports on these days, on the 26th, would reflect that there was no anticipated violence to occur. So we were continually briefing on the violence picture and making sure that all of this information was funnelled in to our Intelligence Unit and then into our Planning Team. It makes specific reference to activities or actions that could occur at Rideau Hall. We did look into that. It raises a national security issue, and I can tell you that there was national security representatives, including CSIS and the RCMP, in our Joint Intelligence Group. So again, this was information that was taken in, assessed, evaluated, put towards our threat assessment, and ultimately this didn't bore -- bear out to be accurate. There was no threats made against Rideau Hall.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I -- I'm -- I don't know directly because this was directed to Deputy Chief Ferguson, who would have put it back through her chain of command to her Planning Team, and the planning -- the normal process would be the Planning Team and Intelligence would look to identify the areas of gap that the Chief felt existed.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would believe so.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, I can -- sorry, if I can -- I haven't ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- finished reading my notes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So if you can -- and I'm going to apologise, but if you can let me know what date that these notes are taken?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Friday, the 28th. So I think it would be... If we can go back down to the notations so I can see what I'm speaking to. Just a little farther down. So I'm not -- I'm not sure that is in a meeting that I am involved in, so I'm not sure specifically what he would be speaking to specifically there, and I would say that we would need to cross-reference with the Hendon reports and whether there was any reinforcement around heightening our concern that the convoy could be longer than the three days.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I'm not -- I'm not in that meeting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So do I agree with the assessment that it made ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- that they made on that day?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, I ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That there is a low threat of violence? Then yes, I would agree there is a low threat of violence at that point, as has been identified within the Hendon reports.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That specifically, the threat index, I believe the Hendon reports were giving on that day.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I don't believe that they were speaking to a prolonged occupation because as I indicated, based on our experience, which was limited, and our assessment, there was a low risk of the convoy in large numbers staying beyond the weekend. But I think that's another area that's very important to highlight. Superintendent Morris identified that this group grew and tried to mobilise over the fall, and actually never did mobilise. They galvanised for the ultimate convoy that occurred. In normal circumstances with Intelligence, one of the things that you rely on in your assessment of it is experience. This group had not existed before. Nobody had any experience in terms of what they were going to do and how they were going to position themselves. And I'll give you an example of where experience is important to us. We have a yearly demonstration at one of our embassies that has gone on for a number of years. We infrequently have high levels of intelligence around any activity in that area, yet we continually create a large deployment footprint between ourselves and the RCMP because we have the experience that it -- that violence has occurred there and there is the potential for violence occurring. The same could be said about the Panda Game Homecoming. There is little intelligence that comes out, yet we create deployment plans around experience. Nobody had ever experienced this group coming into an area. Ottawa on the 28th of January was the first experience in that. So I do know that following this there was -- there has been extensive changes internally, and people have seen a definitive change in our response based on our experience, but across the country, police leaders identified that they now had a scope of what their experience could anticipate it to be with this group. Before they arrived on the 28th, we had no experience, and all of the experience as they moved across was that they were lawful, and that they indicated they were coming to lawfully protest in Ottawa. That experience package changed for us on the 28th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do. He's one letter off of my name, but he is the CEO or the Executive Director of the Ottawa Hotel Association.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, Mathieu Gravel is a member of the mayor's office staff.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, can I read the bottom first?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If we could go to the bottom?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It won't take me very long.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay. We can scroll up. Thank you. You can scroll up. Okay. Good to move up. Okay. Okay. Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it's an extremely good example of that. And I can tell you we did receive this information from Mr. Ball through Mr. Gravel. I believe it went into our Emergency Operations Centre, where it was put into the Intelligence Group to follow up. As a result, a member of our Police Liaison Team contacted Mr. Ball, and what initially was identified as a large tract of people who were going to be in the city for many, many days was narrowed down to being, no, it's a smaller group of people who have booked a three-day stay. So one of the -- the challenging thing for us is this was information that helped contribute to our view that it was going to be a -- largely a three-day protest.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think Intelligence would have played an important role, and to try and highlight the risks that they knew at the time. And I believe that that was done. It became more possible, as was identified, that a small group of people could continue beyond the weekend, but then mainly it was being planned around a weekend protest. All of the activities that we took, including this one with the Hotel Association, led us to believe that that's what it was. The intelligence, as we read it, talks about a large protest, but the numbers that are necessary for planning didn't start to come in until the day before and that -- please don't hear that as a fault of anyone. It was just very difficult because of how fluid and dynamic the situation was for us to be able to gather, through our partners, real-time intelligence. So Intelligence continually stayed on, continually fed the planning team of what they knew at the time with the best information. As you described it though, it was a fluid week. It was a rollercoaster that week in terms of information coming out and refining down. And ultimately, the numbers, the size of it weren't fully refined until the 29th and the 30th when it was already upon us. And I'll go back to it again because I don't think it can be understated. The real impact of this protest was the community harm that was created. That was what the problem and the consequence to our community was through the activities of these protesters. There wasn't any information that identified that. And that, for me, is what created the need, the emerging need for us to make sure that we have the action plans in place as we saw that emerge. Our community were dramatically exposed to violent activity over that period of time.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So and I think that goes to exactly what I talked about, about experience. The other piece you need to add in there is experience with the group that you're gathering the intelligence on to actually assess it and then to see how they are engaging in activities. The experience we had until this point was they were -- we were exactly right. They were people moving across the country determined to be heard, but they were peaceful, and they indicated that their intention was to be peaceful when they got here. That isn't what materialized and that isn't what caused the consequence to our city. People protesting in an area lawfully is something we can manage and handle. People creating an occupation that traumatizes our community was something that no community had ever seen, is -- was unprecedented, and was the situation we're facing when we began to get the experience of these people.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I'm -- I would need to know exactly when he's -- at what point he's speaking of. Because what I do know is as the Planning Team was doing their assessments and as the Planning Team was building their plans, that the Intelligence and the Planning Team were very tightly connected. I've seen and observed several emails over my preparation for this that indicate that at every point that one of the planners is looking to develop a plan, they're referencing intelligence. And that's -- as a leader in this organization, is exactly what I would expect to happen.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So those issues were never highlighted to me. I don't know what would form Superintendent Bernier's opinion on this, but those issues were never raised. And I would hope at that point they would have been raised if somebody felt that there was such a disconnect.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I didn't, because I think what you could observe, and it'll be very important to flush out through our Planning Team, is that the information was fluid, that we continued to develop more, receive more information that became more refined as we moved ahead. That information was shared with planning. I believe that's why the planning process was as fluid as it was as well. This was a circumstance that was changing by the day, by the hour, with information coming in. And Intelligence was bringing it in and assessing it and Planning was trying to respond to it. And then it wasn't finalized until the convoy actually arrived in our city.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So first I'd like to start with thank you very much. I'm very happy that that's one of the areas the Commission's looking at, because I think there are many lessons for us to all learn through this. Some of those lessons, I can tell you, we've already learned and put into practice. In terms of Intelligence, I know that one of the things that we've developed is better capacity and capability around open-source information. What was borne out of this situation was a unit that's been created within our organization specifically dedicated at collecting open-source information and sharing it into Intelligence. I think their -- you know, opportunity around Intelligence is to ensure that Intelligence, Open-source and Police Liaison Team information is more readily shared, so that it can be cross-referenced. We've seen that develop within our organization. I also think, and one of the things we've been able to do is we read the intelligence differently now. We've had multiple subsequent events in this city where we've used our experience to leverage our operational planning. One of those was Rolling Thunder. And when you look at the intelligence, there was the identification that it may not have been a large risk event for us, but we used our experience to apply it towards that intelligence and created a deployment model that actually ultimately did, I believe, prevent a subsequent occupation to our streets. So I think from an Intelligence perspective, the coordination and cooperation and it has always been good between ourselves and our partners, I think this identified that we need to expand that and that we need to broaden the sources of information that we're bringing in and properly leverage them in our operational planning with the experience we have.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. I requested that legal opinion following one of our morning calls, or a Command Team meeting, as one of the requests that was going to be -- we needed to fulfil in order to make sure we understood our legal grounds.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don't remember the specific date.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it does.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I believe I received a legal opinion on the 28th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The next day.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can we scroll down on my notes just to make sure I'm not missing anything? That's it. Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it is.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes -- sorry, yes, I did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe I did. We - - I collected it on behalf of the executive team, so I would've shared it with the executive team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it would have been -- so anyone who was present. So it would've been with legal counsel who would've done this; Deputy Chief Ferguson; CAO Dunker; Chief Sloly; Chief Executive Officer, Kevin Malloney; and others. I just don't have recollection of who I forwarded it to.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think that would've been done by an ongoing assessment that was being conducted by the Planning Team and Intelligence moving ahead. Those areas were specifically impacted, as I indicated, and we only realised that once the convoy arrived. The anticipation of the community trauma and violence to our community that was going -- did occur, wasn't anticipated because nobody saw that coming. Nobody knew that that was going to be the tactic that the mob that got here was going to actually engage in. So that is something that we look at. We look at public safety, we look at Charter of rights and freedoms, and all of these index, but we had never taken the view of making sure that the community and the surrounding areas we were as responsive to their needs. We take that into account more than ever now, and that's what you've seen as we have responded to Rolling Thunder, responded to Canada Day, to make sure that we interpret our intelligence with our experience, but also make sure that we identify potential hazards or concerns that could occur within the community and put that absolutely front and centre in our planning. The reason I highlight that is the one thing that I hear consistently after the removal of the occupation, and very rightfully, is that we didn't put enough emphasis as a police service on our community and the impact that it caused to them in the very early days, that they felt that we didn't focus on the harm that was being done to them. While we have always had that in the planning, I think we need to be overt in it and say, "Community, these are -- this is your city, these are your streets. We will conduct ourselves in order to protect you within this community and protect you within those streets." So I think the emphasis that I am playing is that we need to always have Charter rights and freedoms on our mind, we always need to have community safety, but we need to make sure that we bring the community impact to the front of everything we do because it was the area that was most violated during this event.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe that we do have the ability, and I believe we've exercised it several times since then, to prevent the vehicles from going down. A truck isn't a protected entity under the Charter of rights and freedoms, people are. That is something we had not exercised prior as an organisation. When we had vehicle born demonstrations, protests, or events in what is the downtown core we had always allowed them because our experience was they had come and they had left and we had managed them. And that was a regular occurrence for us, and that happened many, many times, usually many, many times a year. So although the Charter doesn't protect the vehicles, I do know that our experience had been that we would allow those type of vehicles. I think there's another side to it as well that's very important. Particularly as we became closer to the date, we saw the volume of vehicles that were going. They were coming to Ottawa. They were very clear about that, they were coming to Ottawa. So the ability for us to protect and preserve public safety would mean that we would want them to go into a designated area so that we could better control it. We didn't, again, didn't anticipate the activities. We didn't anticipate the size or scope or number of people who stayed because do have to remember most people did leave on Sunday night. So the ability for us to manage the protest and demonstration in a core, as opposed to people coming and have a blocked off downtown core and leaving their trucks on the 417, or trucks dispersed around many different areas, it was going to be more manageable for us in a centralised area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I'm -- I think it’s important -- there’s a lot packed in there. So I think it’s important that ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- we go through it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I would say -- I would absolutely agree, based on the intelligence we had, we didn’t have legal authority to deny the protestors from the protest. All of the activity had been lawful and peaceful and there was no indication of anything contrary to that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. We had experience. We had experience in exactly what had occurred. We had seen and learned from what had occurred during the Freedom Convoy and we had worked with our City partners and policing partners to identify different mechanisms to actually restrict access to an area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely. And I think that that experience that I talk about is something that you saw across the country as people planned and responded to similar incidents. Toronto Police Service and the City of Toronto had a much more successful intervention in a protest in subsequent weekends to what we had initially. And Chief Ramer was being clear in identifying it. Part of that was because of the experience that they saw occur in Ottawa, that they identified different threats in different ways and built a plan around the experience that they’ve seen us -- they saw us endure.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I don’t think that that’s accurate. I think what’s changed is we have an understanding of what these groups are capable of when they come together. We have an understanding of what could occur as these groups coalesce around a cause in an area. And that’s -- Rolling Thunder, I would propose that had we not had the experience we had, we wouldn’t have planned in the way we did. We wouldn’t have had the public order deployment. We wouldn’t have had the exclusionary zone. And in that case, the Friday evening that it occurred, we would have had a truck that attempted to occupy an intersection, that was followed quickly by other vehicles, set up and be successful for a period of time in, again, taking over an area of our city. That’s the appreciation that we have of what is possible when these groups come together. That’s the experience that I’m talking about that we are now applying to all of the intelligence.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, those are my words.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Your words are probably just more eloquent than mine.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it was.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, and I think this goes back to how we have and how we had addressed these types of protests in the past. We live in Ottawa. We’re at the seat of Parliament. Protesting is something that -- lawful protesting is something that our community accepts, and I believe our community appreciates. And they have an expectation on us to be able to appropriately manage and facilitate those protests. So for a large demonstration to come into the downtown core, in and around the seat of Parliament, and protest for a number of days would not be abnormal in this city, even with the traffic disruptions that would occur. What was abnormal in this situation was the volume of vehicles that came and the area that they actually occupied. What was particularly -- and I’ve said it and I will say it again. What was particularly different in this event was the interactions of the protestors between themselves and the community. We had never seen that before. That was unprecedented.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good morning.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
For sure.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what we found during the course of the occupation was the week -- during the week time, it was the people that were here. We would see those numbers swell Friday night, usually Saturday during the day, into Sunday, and then disperse into Sunday and we would go into another week allotment. The people that travelled to Ottawa, not in trucks, but people travelled on foot attended the area during the weekends really seemed to swell and rise. And the week was more a stagnant -- stagnant is probably not the right word, a period where it was the people that were dug in, and sitting there, and remaining.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So during that period, several key things occur. So on the 28th, the convoy arrives. We are anticipating a three-day event with the potential of a smaller group of people staying. And there’s massive numbers. So through the weekend, and I wouldn’t be the one to best speak about it, but through the weekend, the event is managed. Sunday night, so I believe that’s the 30th, we then anticipate most people leaving. Many people left, but we still had a very large red zone, that we identified it, with lots of trucks, with anti-social behaviours that are targeting our community. So we start to then move into the Monday, where we’re seeing an entrenched group who are actively demonstrating, protesting, and targeting our community. During that phase -- so on the 30th, as we’re looking at going into Monday, demobilization planning, as it’s called, is being identified by Deputy Chief Ferguson. So there’s direction that’s being put out by Deputy Ferguson. So always a potential of them -- some staying. We have a very large footprint now. What is our -- what are our potentials to actually remove people from this area if we need to go there? So that’s tasked out on the 30th. So during that week, we’re starting to orient ourselves. So I wasn’t present at it, but on the 1st of February, so 31st is Monday, 1st of February is Tuesday, there’s a meeting that occurs between Deputy Chief Ferguson, Chief Sloly, and the large Public Order Unit commander table to start looking at options for a tactical resolution to this. So that group then is tasked out with coming up with options that could be used. That Public Order team then brings back options to Chief Sloly, myself, Deputy Chief Ferguson, and other senior leaders to identify the three options that they had identified on the 4th of -- on the 4th of February. So that would be -- I believe that’s the Friday. From that optioning -- optioning solutions that have come out, there’s three that are identified. The command team has the discussion with them as we go through, weigh all the benefits of each of them. and ultimately, an approach is then identified on the 4th. So that takes us through the first week. So the orientation is figuring out what’s going on within the environment, making sure, trying to get the resources that we require, or assign the resources that we require to hold the red zone in a safe manner, try and manage public safety issues in the way that we can with the limited capacity we have, as well as then start to develop planning, or at least identify strategic concepts around how we’re going to approach this moving ahead.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I’m sorry, I don’t know. This is a block of time to me, the days. I’m not sure of what that day is.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe the 7th, if the 4th is ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Then the 11th would be ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- a Friday. Yes. So during that period is the time that we’re looking at doing -- it was -- the strategic concept that was developed and approved was to look at taking off bite sized or chunk sized pieces of the demonstration to decrease its footprint to ultimately resolve it. Keep taking bites out of it until it’s actually fully resolved. That week was orientation around developing targeting risks, for lack of a better word, identifying of how it would be approached in developing smaller operational plans to do operations to try and limit or shrink the footprint.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. So because we’ve only counted weeks, I think I would move that date of when the long-term planning started back a bit. I think it was the 11th or the 12th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, I believe that we were unprepared for what transpired.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So as we transitioned from the Sunday night of the 30th into the Monday morning of the 31st, the reality of what we were facing was much more clear. Although there continued to be dates through Intelligence that we'd received that identified there might be an actual date where the group would pick up and leave, we identified that that may or may not come to fruition, and we needed to start to engage in our planning, engage in the planning to ultimately remove the occupation. So one of the things that we did at the very early outset in a Command Team meeting, I think it was actually at our morning call or at a specific briefing around the convoy, I can't remember which one it was, but we established for the purposes of planning what would be a long window of what we could potentially be looking at for a sustainability perspective. It's an important premise for us in order to look at the window that we are going to need to plan for. This is mainly not to identify when it's going to end, to identify what is the potential that we may need from a staffing perspective from a resource perspective so that we can actually look at planning how we manage our members and other resources coming in. So although we had -- we didn't know what the length of it would be at that time, we identified on the long end a four-week planning period for sustainability so that we know -- we would know we had the resources in place that we needed when we needed them.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. So one of the things that we agreed to, because there was so many tasks at that time, there was a lot going on, that I would support Deputy Ferguson by being the conduit to the OPP to either ask questions at a strategic level or get input or questions from them. And that's the role that I played, and that's the context that I had my conversations with Superintendent Abrams.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
M'hm.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So there was different areas where work was being generated out of or coordinated, but the NCRCC, the National Capital Region Command Centre, was the dedicated command centre for this event. The Major Incident Commander, Superintendent Patterson, did originate -- did originally work out of his office at 245, but I believe he regularly attended the NCRCC. I'm not sure, we'd have to verify that through Inspector Lucas. There also was -- was there another one there?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Based out of 474.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
474 was where the executive command was. So the NCRCC was our command centre. That's where all Operations were resourced out of that. That's where our Joint Intelligence Group was, that's where our Incident Commander was. There was meetings that occurred in different areas. There was different locations that did need to feed information into the NCRCC, but ultimately, the NCRCC was the area where Operations were controlled from. From -- established from before the convoy arrived, and only demobilized many days after it had been dismantled.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I can't comment on that. I don't know.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we had -- we would've had a command structure that was based out of -- a unified command that was based out of the NCRCC. The Ontario Provincial Police, the Ottawa Police Service, the RCMP, PPS, Parliamentary Protective Services were all co-located in that area, so there was the unification of all of those resources there. From a strategic level of command, no I would absolutely agree with Superintendent Abrams's assessment that we needed a better more integrated strategic level of command. One of the learnings for me from this is even though it was assigned to me I don't -- it wasn't necessarily more helpful for Superintendent Abrams, from a strategic command within the Operation perspective, to come to me instead of managing directly through Deputy Chief Ferguson. So those are some of the issues we identified and continued to rectify, particularly as we moved towards our Integrated Planning Team and our unified command.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So Superintendent Abrams identified several different issues that were relayed to the Incident Command, and I know one of the issues in the early days was the tasking of a number of Ontario Provincial Police officers who -- actually the lack of tasking of a number of Ontario Provincial Police officers who had attended to assist. That was relayed to Deputy Chief Ferguson, and my understanding, it would have been my expectation, that she would've moved that down to the Incident Commander, Inspector Lucas, who would've rectified it with his partner at that time, the OPP Incident Commander, who he was sitting across the table from at the NCRCC.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I do understand that there was an occurrence of that that was -- that did happen that was raised to me, and it is my understanding that it was immediately rectified and it didn't occur again.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don’t believe that was a concern that Supt. Abrams raises to me.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it does. Thank you very much.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So -- and this highlights where some of the challenges. I wasn’t involved in any of the tasking that was going on around, as not the Major Incident Commander. So my understanding of what occurred here is -- and I do recall Supt. Abrams calling me and saying that Insp. Marin had come in and given a direction that was contrary to what we had expected to come out of this planning table. That’s why it then directed him to Supt. Dunlop, who was assisting in that area and would be the person who would be able to provide direction as being involved directly in our morning briefings, in terms of how we were moving ahead. I don’t know what occurred to have Insp. Marin engage in that way with that direction, but I did highlight to Supt. Abrams that if there was any questions in that planning area or in that public order area, that it was Supt. Dunlop who was best equipped to answer them, and he would be the only one that could give directions in that area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what was announced during that press conference was that the Ottawa Police Service would take into account all options, including consideration of closing of the off-ramps and of the interprovincial bridges. So there wasn’t a definitive statement saying, “We are closing the bridges”; it was a statement by Chief Sloly indicating, “We could -- we can, and will consider it if it’s appropriate.”
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it is.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the ability to close off-ramps is normally attributed to the OPP, the Ontario Provincial Police, because they are the police of jurisdiction responsible -- the police responsible for the 400-Series highways through Ottawa. So Ottawa police would not normally engage in -- in exigent circumstances it could occur, but we would not normally engage in closing off-ramps at the top of the ramp because it was an OPP responsibility. We do have the ability to close ramps on the street side, but that creates traffic problems and issues. So we could close them but not normally. Interprovincial bridges are a different circumstance. Interprovincial bridges are much more challenging to close, particularly in a preventative way. In exigent circumstances, as things are occurring, they may be closed; and the first weekend, the second weekend, and even in the third weekend, you saw that happen when the threshold for us to do that was met by the operational commanders. But to pre- emptively close an interprovincial bridge would take the intervention of the -- I believe it’s the Minister of Transportation to be able to allow us, on a preventative measure, to close those bridges.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
But they’re -- so on the 5th, and I think it’s an important context to set, the 5th is a Saturday. The 5th is where we’re starting to see large number of ingress of people into our community. The intelligence and the information we have around convoys is starting to come in again. So this is, I believe -- I believe that this is the Chief responding to the increased threat that we feel we may be under as we move ahead.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, they were very different periods of time from an operational perspective.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I did on the 4th -- no, I believe the statements that were made were very appropriate. We will consider everything as we move ahead. On the 5th, my only concern would be to -- as the Chief of Police to provide direction like that on an operational matter as the Chief of Police. That's something that I believe should be considered, contemplated at an operational level, not a strategic level, and that would have been my concern in that area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The Incident Command System has levels within it for very distinct reasons. That's so that you can actually accomplish the operation that you want to with the most clarity, the most understanding, and the most safely way possible. The strategic level needs to actually identify what is the approach that's going to be used, what is the general outcomes that we are looking for. The operational needs to then look at how -- what are the resources, how are we actually going to make that happen. The tactical level then needs to execute on those plans. When somebody engaged at a strategic level began -- begins to give tactical or operational level commands, it creates a lack of clarity in terms of everyone's role within the structure. That lack of clarity then creates questions around what do I do, what is my responsibility within this, do I have to escalate and ask a question of. So the necessity to have that role clarity through it, I believe, is very important, and you have to play your roles through it, because when you don't, you create a lack of understanding, which can impact the operations.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, can you re ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So this is one of the key areas that I believe that we needed to look at when I became Interim Chief in terms of how we continue to progress around this area. In this case, a strategic-level decision could be I don't want the convoys in the downtown area. Go and work how we actually keep those trucks out of the downtown area. An operational-level decision, in my perspective, is close the ramp so convoys don't come into the downtown area. But I think it's also important to note, there is no rigorous system that identifies exactly where each of those thresholds land. And if there is a rigorous system, there is four different accepted systems within Canada that could be used in this area. So it's an area that I believe is something that probably hampered us somewhat in this with the lack of clarity. No fault attributed to anyone, just there was not clear clarity across the services, across ourselves in terms of what constituted each of those decisions. So I believe that that clarity needs to be struck and needs to exist, and that's one of the things that, in the early days of me taking over the operation as Interim Chief, that I spent a considerable amount of time doing. So the people that I was working with, Deputy Chief Ferguson, Superintendent Bernier had a really clear understanding of what I felt was a strategic role and what I felt was an operational level decision.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So if the announcement was we will be closing ramps, I would say, yes, it would be extremely important. If the announcement was we will consider that, I would say not as much, and only because the OPP at this point is integrated within our NCRCC, our Command Centre, and those would be operational-level decisions that would be made. There would be tactical responses developed within that area to be able to respond to the issues.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So -- I'm sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, what I think -- what I know was occurring, not what I think, what I know was occurring here was, there was intelligence and tracking of a convoy that existed I believe within Quebec that was being followed towards Ottawa. That's -- that is what -- that would have been the early morning intelligence briefing in terms of what was to occur. This is the Saturday as well. This is the final -- well, the second final Saturday. So we are continuing to build, monitor, maintain the area, but we are tracking a convoy at this point.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I hadn't added the weekend.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. This would have been under Deputy Chief Ferguson's purview.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it is not typical in incident command structures. The strategic-level doesn’t approve operational-level demands.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don’t know, but he did indicate to me that I would be held accountable for the success of that plan. I don’t know specifically what that would mean, but those were the words used by Chief Sloly.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I think there’s -- sorry, I believe there’s a level of accountability in every level within the organization. I actually believe I would be accountable for delivery of that. And I was confident in the plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well we -- ultimately the Chief is accountable for everything.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s part of the responsibilities of being a chief of police. The delivery of this day and the diversion of this convoy would have, from a strategic level, come to me, and from an operational level, come to Supt. Bernier, who developed a very effective plan and had teams that executed those plans very well, that kept them out of our downtown core.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. I would believe yes, because I strongly believe in the autonomy of the operational commander.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I can tell you about my perspective.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know that I know what the other perspective is, but from my perspective, PLT is an essentially important part in the development of plans, the pre-engagement with demonstrators, and then ultimately with the engagement of them as you move ahead. PLT, the Police Liaison Team, does an amazing job of trying to build rapport with demonstrators and protestors. And it goes -- we utilize it now beyond that, in order to be able to have clear lines of communication, but even more so, have a good set of understanding of expectations of the protestors and expectations of what the protestors are anticipating to do when they’re in their area. So they’re very effective in the pre-planning phase and in the early development phase. They’re also extremely effective in the demobilization portion, because effective PLT utilization can actually result in -- usually through small sets of concessions, through finding common ground with demonstrators and protestors in order for them to be able to successfully and peacefully negotiate an end to a demonstration. This specific demonstration posed exceptionally challenging for our PLT members from the perspective that there was so many different people, so many different organizers, so many different groups. Those leaders, organizers, and groups changed on a regular basis, and many of them had very different agendas. There probably could not have been a more complex and challenging environment for our PLT members to work in. And I can tell you they came into work every single day with the absolute best intention to get this resolved peacefully.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. In relation to utilization of PLT.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do recall on that occasion having discussions with Supt. Abrams about ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think you’ve summarized it very well. The Ontario Provincial Police has an extremely well developed, well used, well balanced Police Liaison Team. We model our program around them. And they, in a much earlier way, in a much more active way, would have liked -- I believe would have liked to see engagement of PLT throughout this. And I think what you’re seeing there is some of Supt. Abrams’ concern over what he perceived to be a lack of utilization of our PLT resources.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it does.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don't know what the reasons would be. I don't know what Chief Sloly's experience would've been with the OPP or the RCMP. It was surprising to me because up to that point, all during through this and continuing on, I've had the ability to work with both the Ontario Provincial Police and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and they have been exceptional partners and they were exceptional partners to us through this.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So through this there was many motions. I think you're specifically speaking about a motion on February 7th that was forwarded by Councillor McKenney in relation to asking the RCMP to engage in -- take over policing of the Parliamentary Precinct. So I am aware of that motion.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So again, as I indicated, I don't know what motivated these comments by Chief Sloly. What I do know is that in relation to that motion we had identified that it actually wasn't grounded in law. The Ottawa Police Service is the police of jurisdiction in the City of Ottawa, so in all of the City of Ottawa, including the Parliamentary Precinct. So we had provided a letter to the City to indicate that, and -- so it wasn't grounded in law that motion. I don't know whether it contributed to these comments, that's a question better suited for Chief Sloly, but I do know that the motion as it was put forward wasn't grounded in law.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So can I just ask for a point of reference on where these notes are from and who was taking them?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Mr. Au, is it possible to reference the date that we're speaking of from the notes?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe you said it was the 8th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can I ask you to move up so I can refresh my memory more fully?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, can I just read that portion? Can you move back up a little please, thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I recall this meeting, yeah.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
What I understood him to mean is that we would maintain command and control of the situation, and that any plans that would be developed would be developed by us or with us at the head of the table.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I did not.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I wouldn’t share that concern.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe you’re talking about a different meeting. The meeting we were just last talking about was on -- in the morning. This is a different meeting, I believe.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we had three ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I’m sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So there was a pre- meeting ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- before we went down and met with the Integrated Planning Team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The notes that you had just taken me to were notes that referenced that meeting that Deputy Chief Ferguson, myself -- I don’t recall who else was there -- from the notes, had with Chief Sloly prior ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- to all of us attending the Integrated Planning meeting -- Integrated Planning Team meeting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That was the comments.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, the -- Chief Sloly, as this meeting went on, expressed reservations about the reasons for which the OPP were present. He identified that he had concerns with them that -- on a -- about a couple of things. One of them was about the recording of numbers of OPP members that had been provided to us, and another one was whether they were here to help or to assess and potentially overtake us, was my impression. It was -- it was a contentious meeting that did not, I don’t believe, form a good-start first meeting in what I believe needed to be a strong partnership.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If you can bring a set of notes up, I believe I would be able ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
At 18:40?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Do we have -- can we scroll up, please, because I just want to ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I’m -- I don’t believe that I’m at this meeting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t believe that I’m at this meeting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t -- I don’t believe so. I don’t recall it, and I don’t believe that it’s in my notes, so I don’t believe that I did attend this meeting. This is on the 9th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, so I don’t believe that I was at the debrief meeting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Is there any notations that indicates I was there?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Is there any notations that indicates I was there?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I just don’t ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
My apologies, I don’t believe I was there.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I was involved in facilitating contact ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- so that the negotiations could occur.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe that I first became involved in the process on February the 8th, I believe. And I’m not 100 percent. I don’t know if you have a document that references the specific date. I do under -- I do recall the sequence of events but I’m not sure of the specific date. I believe it’s the 8th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I was contact by Supt. Patterson who identified that he was looking for a contact between the Police Liaison Team and someone in the City to have discussion with a group of protestors. So I questioned him as to what -- “What level are you looking for? Is it -- are you looking for somebody to help arrange getting Porta-potties or are you looking for somebody at a higher level?” So we got some clarification around exactly what the request was and it was determined that it was somebody in a senior-level position, either from the City or -- politically from the City or from the City bureaucracy, i.e., the mayor or Steve Kanellakos, and that they were asking me to make bridge contact with them. I contacted Mr. Kanellakos and arranged for members of our PLT to attend and have a discussion with him. And then, ultimately, I created that bridge and I believe they directly contacted after that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
John Ferguson is a Staff Sergeant within our organization, and during this period, he was assigned to be responsible and head up our police liaison team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, can I take an opportunity to read that? Thank you. Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, absolutely, February 7th. My apologies. I said the 8th. It is actually the 7th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can we keep going up? Go down a bit, please? Sorry, can I see the rest of that? Go down. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah. So it does explain. It does.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So my contact with the City happened on the 8th. I'm -- I don’t recall what date the meeting actually occurred.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So you'll need to be more specific. I had involvement every day in this.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So can you move up please, just so I can see the date that we're discussing?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sure. Okay. February 13th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
M'hm.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If you can go down so that I can refresh my memory, I'll -- if you can go down more, please? Go down, please. Okay. Keep going. Keep going, please. Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it wasn’t crowd filling, it was concerns that if we displaced a truck from Kent Street, say, and put it in -- down into -- onto Wellington, that another truck would then occupy behind them on Kent Street. Those were some of the early concerns that were identified.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I was there listening. I was just -- we were just being briefed as part of the executive command. This is on the 13th, so I believe Deputy Chief Ferguson is again -- has responsibility of convoy operations, so I'm just one of the executive team who's listening and receiving this information to identify what actions we need to take.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe if we go up, it was an overall command level briefing. So if you can go up and I'll identify the people there. Yes. So a little higher, please? Yeah. So Chief wasn’t -- he called the meeting; that’s why he's not identified. John Steinbachs, Christiane Huneault, Kathy Burns and Vicky Nelson's are scribes, Steve Box, who's the Chief of Staff for Mr. Kanellakos, Mr. Kanellakos. So it's a command level briefing for us. I would have -- I didn’t identify Deputy Chief Ferguson, but I do believe she was present at this meeting as well.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Superintendent.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So Superintendent Drummond was assigned to be the liaison back to the police, because we would need to facilitate the movement of those vehicles. So he was assigned by -- well, I believe it was Deputy Chief Ferguson who assigned him to do that, so that was my understanding of his responsibility.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I didn’t -- I was continually briefed. I didn’t have a specific role. At this point, we had ensured that -- the chief had ensured that Deputy Chief Ferguson was the single point of contact for the convoy operations and I was responsible for things that included our enterprise project management change projects so I wouldn’t have had any direct role in it other than being present and helping to support whatever was needed of me.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. Is it possible to get the notes up? The notes are up. The page reference is not there yet.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you. That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. What I indicated and what I would recall is I was there as a member of the Executive Command Team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The primary responsibility was with Deputy Chief Ferguson, but myself, I would have been there to help support in any way that was necessary.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I’m not aware of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely I’m aware of that, but you identified that they had -- were about to finalize a plan, and I’m -- I was not aware of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall that because I don’t actually recall myself specifically being aware that by this point they were almost completed the integrated plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I’m sorry. I don’t understand. Did I share them with who?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, did I share -- sorry. I misunderstood your question. My apologies. Can we move down in the notes a bit, please? So I believe they are thinking -- I believe they're legitimate concerns that needed to be identified and raised in terms of how we would move ahead.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think one of the discussion points that we were having at this meeting is that the federal government was coming to the point -- somebody had made the comment, not myself, but that the federal government was coming to a point that they were looking to engage in what was happening in Ottawa.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the logistics specifically would be how do you organize ourselves to move the trucks? Which trucks are going to move? Where are they going? Just the overall logistics of the movement of the vehicles from one place to another.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely, in terms of how the work that -- I understood that the work was coalescing between the Integrated Planning Team, but I didn't have any indication of how far along they were with establishing a unified command and a unified Planning Team, or how far along they were in actually completing the plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
And I would agree with Chief Superintendent Pardy that it is important that these two activities mesh together.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I don't.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely. And I think we did cover off the content of that meeting earlier on the 12th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe that -- I don't believe that I was the one that notified him. At the meeting on the 12th, as I indicated, we were told through the City and through the Chief that these negotiations were highly confidential and that they shouldn't be shared. So I don't believe it was shared until the 13th with Superintendent Bernier.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would absolutely agree that we could have handled that notification better and it should have been done earlier.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, I would agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Not directly from Superintendent Bernier, I don't believe, but I believe that Superintendent Drummond did indicate that to me in conversations we would have had.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It's the Integrate Command Team. It's the Integrated -- I -- so, apparently, I don't know. I know what it represents. It's a combined table of many different disciplines that come together to do collaborative and comprehensive planning around ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- Integrated Event Command Table.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely, yes, they do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The concern of Superintendent Bernier?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I don't.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This is because -- as we talked about, everyone has a role to play within the Command Structure. There's strategic-level decisions, there's operational and tactical-level decisions. I think this, in my perspective, is clearly a strategic-level decision that needs to be implemented. There's a superintendent who's been asked to go to a meeting. That is by the Chief. I think it's very appropriate that that person attended. The strategic-level decision here for me is whether we support or not the negotiations, and that was made by Chief Sloly, so I believe it's Superintendent Bernier's responsibility to identify his concerns, raise those concerns, but then when this level of decision is made, look how we operationally and tactically implement that plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So this was a strategic decision to be involved in this negotiation. And I think it's more clear as you play it out. So the strategic- level decision here is to be involved in this negotiation to create the logistical circumstances for the trucks to be able to move. It then moves to operations. As this unfolded, operational commanders identified challenges in it and it's my understanding that based on their decision-making at the operational level, it stopped. That is the appropriate mechanism to follow through a properly integrated command team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I do not.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Not at the time but I am aware of them now.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe this is in relation to -- this is in relation to conversations Supt. Drummond and I would have had, or had been having, during the day for him to arrange the logistical movement of this agreement that had been reached. He had raised -- he had identified with me that there was concerns from Supt. Bernier specifically around, as I recall it, the political nature of this negotiation. So this is the point at which I advised Supt. Drummond, “You know, I understand there are concerns. Continue to operationally move ahead with it.” And I think there’s important context to this agreement that we lose the story if we don’t actually talk about it. So this is on the 14th that these notes are, correct?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This is the 15th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the 12th and the 13th are the weekend. The 11th, 12th, and 13th are the weekend. I remember that weekend having extreme concerns for the safety of our members, for the safety of our community based on the volatility and escalation in violence in direct confrontational interactions with our members as it relates to them trying to manage the area or conduct any enforcement in it. It was concerning. The situation at this point was becoming exceptionally more volatile and you could see it escalate almost on an hour-by-hour basis. One of the components that, for me, contributed to wanting to be involved in something like this is negotiations tend to take the temperature of the situation down. That is exactly, in my opinion, what occurred in this circumstance. I will absolutely concede we didn’t notify Supt. Bernier early enough, will absolutely say that when it operationally became, you know, unfeasible to do it, Supt. Bernier made the call and that this stopped. But I -- you have to remember the time and place were in and this was becoming -- what was a dangerous city before, this was compounding it. So the fact that we were able to be engaged in a level of negotiation to take the temperature down, I believe, gave us breathing room through the next week for us to be able to successfully mount and execute our operation.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So those concerns weren’t shared with me so I don’t know the specifics of the context of what Chief Supt. Pardy would have indicated.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So as I indicated earlier, yes, I agree with you at. There’s many lessons we’ve learned through them. How we integrate with the incident commander around something like this is one of those lessons. Supt. Bernier and the Integrated Planning Team should have been made aware more early of this decision -- as soon as practical or possible of this decision. That didn’t occur and I believe that was an error.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall but what I can say is yes, I would have. We would have had a conversation with it because it’s important that I hear their perspective. So I don’t recall that discussion but it would have occurred.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So is this on the 15th or on the ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This is on the 15th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
On this day?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall. If you have a notation on it, maybe you can help refresh my memory.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
And I think it’s important to note Supt. Drummond, at that point, would be speaking directly with the City as he was the logistical liaison involved with the City.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So because that was on the planning and operations side, I wouldn’t have been in any direction that would have been provided to Bylaw. That would have come through the incident command -- sorry, the NCRCC, so would probably be a question better directed to Insp. Lucas.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So, more broadly thank ticketing, I can tell you that there was officer-safety concerns due to the number of resources we had in many of the different enforcement strategies that we were looking to engage in. I would put the ticketing in with that as well. So there was -- we were very clear with out members, due to the volatility of the situation within the occupation, "Make sure you take into account your officer safety if you are engaging in any proactive enforcement efforts."
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely. So if you go to the Hendon Reports, I believe beginning on the 22nd or 23rd all the way through to the 29th or -- 29th, I believe, there is references to, in the intelligence gaps, the 28th, 29th, and 30th as key dates that they're referencing in relation to the demonstration.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I would read intelligence gaps to mean we don’t know and we need to put some effort here to collect this information.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So can you be -- sorry, can you ask the question again?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think in your question that you hit the crux of one of the challenges we faced, impression. So there was a lot of opportunity to have subjective interpretation on it. I think we've done a much better job as an intelligence community to come together and be more clear through conversations in terms of what we feel these different statements mean. For me, it's important, as we move ahead, that we -- you and I don’t need to formulate an impression on what it is, that we actually have a clear common understanding of what - - how and what that intelligence means so that we can actually have a clear common understanding of how we're moving ahead with it. As I read those reports, my impression was that they were largely scaled to around a three-day event with the potential and possibility that there could be people, a small group of people stay longer than that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So again, that’s going to be a -- that would be a question better suited for Deputy Chief Ferguson in terms of how Superintendent Bernier was utilized. It is my understanding is that he was -- he did play a role in early days and played an increasing role as the convoy went through, because as I recall, when we did -- when he was finally assigned as Event Commander and Incident Commander -- Major Incident Commander, my apologies -- he had to take some time off because he had been working so hard in his other responsibilities. I just don’t recall what they are, so that would indicate to me that he was being utilized.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So did it have any direct -- the declaration of the emergency -- declaration of the state of emergency for Ottawa had no direct operational impact. But I do believe that it did, is it actually escalated the understanding or demonstrated the escalated understanding to the community that we understood -- the City understood the circumstances that we were in. We couldn't -- as the state of emergency is structured within the City, there are very few powers that would assist us in our police operations, because we didn’t have any large procurement needs.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would say absolutely that -- and when I talk about the benefits of it, I talk about it from a unified command perspective, because I know that the EMCPA was mainly utilized around traffic and mainly utilized by our OPP partners as they developed their part of the -- as they developed the highway part of the plan, moving ahead.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah. I believe there's probably four key areas that benefitted us. The first one is around allowing us to streamline the swearing in of members coming in to the City from other provinces. It is -- it's a challenging, sometimes cumbersome process that has multiple stages to it, so the ability to not go through that process with many different checkpoints in it allowed us to more streamline and effectively create operational bodies with members coming in. Second area would be around tow trucks. So the tow trucks, real or perceived, was always a challenge for us. I do understand that in the planning, the integrated planning team had identified a number of tow trucks to come, but they hadn’t yet begun. I think the Emergency Act took away any of those barriers. The third area would be around the financial investigations, mainly conducted by the RCMP. And for me, the main benefit that it provided to us was it created a very stable, solid, logistic -- a legal framework for us to be able to operate within to ultimately carry out our takedown. It allowed for us to very clearly articulate to our frontline officers what their powers were and what the legislative framework that those were based around so that they could understand what to do and how to execute it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That was four.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much, Mr. Au.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon, Mr. Curry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Most definitely. I think it's -- it was very real for us that through 2021, we hadn’t had any new hires come in for attrition or for years of past growth that we hadn’t achieved. So we -- as we came in to 2022, we were in a deficit position in terms of resources. So even before we had something that was taxing and overwhelming, we were deficit in terms of resources.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So absolutely. We had -- I’ve heard testimony as the Commission has gone on around the excellence that Ottawa Police have had in planning. And I truly believe that. We managed large demonstrations, large protests, over a number of years with our partners and we were seen as one of the best at it in the country. There was a lot of expertise built within our organization. Most of that expertise had been lost to retirement, but beyond that, we had a two-year -- we had a two- and-a-half-year window of pandemic where there was no major planning that was occurring. And beyond no major planning, there was no major exercise of planning by our members to be able to practice what we do. So we had a less experienced team and a less experienced organization as this unprecedented massive event came at us.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that’s correct. So there was an industrial area in Merivale, which is in southwest end of our city, where there had been a large explosion. A number of people had died through it. And as a result of that, we’d been involved with our partners in the fire department to be involved in incident management of that event.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. I would also add to the senior command, CAO Blair Dunker. She’s also part of our ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe that’s fair.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
We’ve had a professional relationship. Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. Those meetings came into effect -- they would have been in effect for probably two years at that point.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is absolutely not an understatement.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, but I think so the way the question is based is around the command team, and I think it’s very important to extend it well beyond that. We had members of our organization working long hours in very extreme weather and doing an exceptionally professional job. So I would never want to leave the perception that it was an exclusive hardship for any one group like the command team. Our membership was out there every day trying to resolve this.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, we reached an agreement to lengthen the shifts and reduce the number of platoons that we had in order to be able to make more resources available throughout the day.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well absolutely. And that’s what I was trying to articulate this morning. Absolutely it was a paradigm shift that we saw in terms of protesting in our city and across the country.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t think I’m in a position to identify whether it’s a national security threat or not. I can absolutely say it was a paradigm shift in how protests were conducted, how members in those illegal occupations engaged with our community. But there’s specific intelligence that would be brought in that would be identified as national security threat or not. And that was monitored and managed throughout the protest.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, absolutely. Right from the first Hendon Report that was integrated and sent to our intelligence Unit and our Planning Team. So the information that was contained in there was known to our organization and I believe disseminated properly.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well it was actually, as we look at the tracking, it was simultaneously sent into both areas.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So yes, I believe that’s accurate. We had the intelligence and information to form out that this would happen over a weekend and there was the possibility that a small group of people beyond -- may stay in the city beyond that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
M'hm.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So yes, that's accurate that the -- how the plan was developed.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that's fair, based on this section.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, there was no -- well. So I think he raised a couple of concerns as it went along, concerns about deployment of OPP members, concerns -- a number of concerns that we went through this morning. But in terms of -- are you speaking specifically in terms of the plan?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I didn't receive any concerns from him.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I don't think he asked. I think we identified between the Command Team that I would play that role, so that Superintendent Abrams would contact me, and then I would then have either -- try and resolve the issue or have conversations with Deputy Chief Ferguson.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. And like I said this morning, and I would want to reiterate it, what we didn't see in any of the intelligence, what was never brought to our attention, was the actual activity that the protesters were going to become engaged in. All the way across Canada, through almost every policing jurisdiction in Canada, they were monitored, travelled with, and always lawful and always acting in pro social behaviour, so there was no indications to us about the activity that was going to happen.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what I would -- and I've contemplated this. I believe that it would have taken the scale of operation that we would've had with the number of resources and the detailed planning to remove the protesters that we did over the weekend of the -- late February to divert them ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- from coming into the area. So it would've been a massive undertaking, it would've been on scale with what we had to execute at the end of February.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would fully agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's difficult to say because that's not a plan we ever contemplated. So we didn't actually get to the planning perspective of that, but it would've been a massive undertaking with massive planning requirements and massive resource requirements to undertake keeping them out of the downtown core.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I would say that there is probably -- there is always time to do planning. We would've been under tight restraints. It would've have been very challenging, and I don't believe we would've had the level of detail or specificity. I think the big challenge would've been trying to access resources without having the level of plans that we know we should have to be able to bring resources.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think there's a balance to that question. I think you absolutely need the plans to be able to drive the specific resourcing requests that you're going to have, the type of specific skills that you're going to require. But the other side of it is you also have a responsibility as a leader in an organisation to make other organisations aware that this request may or is coming, regardless of the specific skills you need. So I think it is actually a parallel track that you can travel down.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think it was reasonable for Chief Sloly to place all of the other chiefs, and ultimately at the end of the day chiefs across Canada, on notice that we were going to need a large number of resources.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So absolutely. I think we made the best faith effort we could. What we lacked at that point was the detailed level of planning to actually indicate the type of resources we needed. So we were putting best efforts forward while we were building -- or starting to build plans that ultimately were taken over by the Integrated -- or developed by the Integrated Planning Team.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I can’t comment on that because I wasn’t involved in that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t have a recollection of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the Ottawa Police Service is the police of jurisdiction in the City of Ottawa, so short of security details that are done within the Parliamentary precinct, which the Parliamentary Protective Services is responsible for, so security primary response, the police is still the police of jurisdiction within that area and all of the City of Ottawa. So if there’s a major incident, we will assist in response. If there’s a criminal investigation, the Ottawa Police Service will be the ones that conduct that investigation. So as part of the responsibilities that we as the police of jurisdiction in the City of Ottawa undertake, which isn’t just response in Parliamentary Protective Services, which is demonstrations that would impact us directly because we’re Canada’s -- the nation’s capital. The need for us to be engaged with Embassies and have a different level of response or different level of training as it relates to diplomats in and around our area is something that we’ve come to an agreement with the federal government to compensate us $3 million a year for extraneous costs such as Canada Day or other events.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it is.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the -- within the City of Ottawa, they would use the provincial standard of the Incident Management System. Policing traditionally uses the Incident Command System. There is also another gold, silver, bronze for major events that has been adopted by the RCMP and been utilized in some circumstances by the OPP. So there is a hodgepodge. There is a bunch of different doctrines. They basically fall down to -- they basically boil down to a very similar set of circumstances. We have strategic level control, operational level control and tactical level control.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. It’s something that I believe is really important within every area to have those discussions with the Commander up and down to make sure that everyone’s clear on where the decision-making’s made. It’s something that I believe is worth undertaking to make sure that we can create better lines between those and better understanding of the different areas.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what I -- what I would say is Chief Sloly was regularly involved in reviews and revisions on operational plans. I can’t recall him ever giving directions around it, but he was very engaged in those lower -- what could be seen as lower level responsibilities.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think that’s fair.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That was a major demonstration that we managed and I have no recollection of any challenges within our command structure.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. So unprecedented circumstances, immense levels of stress, very clear expectations on outcomes. And all of those together did strain the ICS system and, actually, for me, identified that there needs to be much better clarity, at least within the Ottawa Police Service, around how that system manages. That’s exactly why when I took over as Interim Chief I spent time making sure that everyone understood their role within the ICS system.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think that’s difficult for me to say because I don’t know how other police services would have handled it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don’t -- I don’t know about those numbers specifically.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So that’s the CACP National Framework?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that’s -- I had reviewed it, but to be -- to call myself familiar with it or knowledge -- extremely knowledgeable in all the content of it would be no correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I’m generally familiar with what occurred there. Actually, I’m quite familiar with what occurred there. But in terms of the specifics about what the agreements were, it would be unfair for me to comment because I don’t have any direct knowledge in that area.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Is there a notation that can reference that that I can familiarize myself.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do, sir.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sir, if I can just -- if I can just read the first paragraphs?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I see that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
M’hm.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do recall. Yes, I do recall this conversation.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do believe that’s fair. So -- but I also do believe -- so I do believe this is the right in this circumstance but I also think that, as we went through, and as we managed through this incident, we needed to ensure that we gave PLT better direction, better guidance, better structure so that they could be more effective in their work. We can’t create public safety hazards with it, and I would assume, in this case, that PLT would not have known where it was going, would not have known that it was going to be -- create a safety hazard like this, but we have to find a way that we balance the use of PLT with enforcement efforts and this is an example of where we probably weren’t that effective.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think what this highlights to me is that one of the areas that we failed was -- or one of the areas we were not as effective as we could be -- I think “failed” too strong of a word -- is in our alignment with -- of PLT within our overall operating context. This -- this type of -- “confrontation” is probably too strong a word but this type of disagreement around what is occurring wouldn’t happen, likely, I don’t believe, if we had better common understanding of what we were achieving and we were moving ahead. So, for me, this is one of the things, in terms of lesson learned, that we have to take very, very seriously, and I can tell you we have taken seriously. PLT needs to be aligned and integrated and help to drive the operations because they are a hugely important component.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There has to be good communication so that a circumstance like this doesn’t actually ever exist.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I do remember that and I do remember advocating for that. And I do understand that it was going to be about bringing Porta-potties in where there wasn’t anything immediately in return but, for me, it was about part of those small gains that you could actually make so that you could build relationships and, in those relationships, you could look how to lower the temperature and also look for a resolution. So absolutely, I do recall that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I wouldn’t describe them as “angry residents”. I think we were dealing with residents who were hurt, who were harmed, who were victimized, and who wanted this to end. They were angry but that wasn’t the emotion that I would explain first off when we describe our community during this period.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
They were suffering.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t believe so.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So if we’re referencing -- and I believe it’s the February 4th statement ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- that was -- caused concern to Supt. Abrams. No, it’s not my recollection or upon my review that those were the statements. The statement was that it was something that we could use if needed.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Not specifically. If we could have some reference pulled up to it?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Do you have a date, sir?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The 2nd.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I'm going to apologize, but, no, we had many -- between Board meetings and Council meetings, we had many, many meetings during the period, so to be able to recall specifically what occurred during one of the meeting, I would need some sort of reference point.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon, Ms. Tomkins.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the general dynamics of what our community and ourselves were experiencing in that location. It included honking of horns excessively, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week; the idling of the vehicles; the -- much of the engagements that we saw between our community members and members of the protest, whether it be intimidating, hate or biased crime, behaviour, assaultive behaviours; the feeling that people were trapped within their residence, within the place that they live and couldn't move around unfettered. It was almost constant conflict between the members of this community and people that were occupying our streets.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So you'll have to help me because we sought many legal opinions through this and we have sought many legal opinions since specifically around Wellington Street. Are you speaking of the January 28th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it -- and I think it's an important point of clarification. The police alone don't close the streets as it relates to protests. That's a cooperative -- it's actually under the City Manager's delegated authority to be able to close those streets. We give recommendations and help assist them. So it's unfair to characterize it that it's the police that closed the streets. But it was a practice that we hadn't largely engaged in prior to that, so we wanted to make sure that we were getting the best legal advice around what potential steps could be as we have this group come in and then as we moved forward.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Not to my recollection.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Are you able to provide me a date and a reference document?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you. Scroll down ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, can I -- was there more points on there? Can ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- am I able to read it?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay. Could -- you can scroll down. Okay.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's a concern that was raised by Mr. White, absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Another concern he raised, for sure.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If you can go to the bottom, please, I'll be able to tell you. If you go -- if you scroll right to the bottom, I think there should be a notation there.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, you can go back to the top. So I'm not sure whose notes they are.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Can you scroll down, please?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah. Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is me, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you. That's what I was looking for.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I believe so.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do recall that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe that’s Commissioner Carrique.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t recall her specifically saying that, but if it's in the notation, I would imagine she did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. That’s on -- sorry, this is the -- can you tell me what date this is?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Potentially. Scroll to the bottom? If you go right to the bottom, I could probably have -- there should be a name on them. No, I'm unfamiliar whose notes these are.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So just for my clarification, these are notes of the 9th?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The 8th, yes, I'm sorry. I messed that up as far as well. Yes, that’s accurate.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t believe we assigned him to work with -- I believe that he indicated he ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s accurate.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would assume that’s accurate. I'd need to see my notes in order to verify that it was on the 12th. I don’t recall the date.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, that would be appreciated.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This isn't the same day, I don’t believe.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This is the 13th.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t have recollection of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It's coming from the chief. I don’t -- there would have been other people involved in this, but I don’t -- didn’t note who they were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s -- into some of the activities that need to occur in order to be able to make this happen.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Looking -- looked at or attempted an at symbol.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, that’s -- I've -- we've been unsuccessful on another one. I believe they are scribe notes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
This is the 13th now?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, so one of the concerns as this unfolded was, as I indicated earlier today, there were many pockets and different groups within the overall occupation. One of the concerns was that if a number of people move, there could potentially be backlashes from others that didn’t want that to occur. And again, I’ll go back to this is a time, from a context perspective, that there’s much higher -- there’s an escalation in tensions within the group. There’s more violence that we’re seeing on the street, particularly relating to our members. So it is a much more volatile time. So we were looking to make sure that something like this, or trying to anticipate whether something like this could spark something internally.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That would be Supt. Bernier.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do see that, but I think there’s clarification that needs to happen around this. We had our first briefing on this potential deal on the 12th later in the day. This is on the 13th at the point at which we would have informed Supt. Bernier. So this is later. There is a lag and a gap between the time that we knew and the time that we brought the incident commander up to speed.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that’s -- absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It did not reduce the footprint as was intended, but did lower the temperature.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s going to be a question better asked to Supt. Bernier.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t believe it had it, but ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- the actual impact on operational planning would better be quantified by Supt. Bernier.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, absolutely. We were a partner and a very engaged partner in Project Hendon and did receive all the reports widely within our organization.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know the specific numbers, but beyond the numbers, what I can say is that they did go -- from my review, they did go to the Chief of Police, they did go to Intelligence, and they did go to our event planning. So they were widely distributed and disseminated in the organization.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. I was -- from the 27th moving forward, I did daily review them. I’ve had the opportunity since then to go back and review the entirety from the 13th on.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. I think that could have been beneficial. But I think it’s also very important to realize that is an analytical document that one of my responsibilities would be to make sure that it was properly brought into the organization, properly reflected and analysed, and then put into the operational planning people. So it would -- it’s always a benefit the more as you get on something like that, but it wasn’t absolutely necessary for that to happen to ensure that the information was brought in and shared within the organization.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That was one of the areas within my command. Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe my evidence was that it wasn’t reflected within the Hendon Reports the activity that the protestors would engage in that caused the community harm or community violence that existed when they got here. There was no reference to that within the Hendon Reports.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I’m sorry. I missed - - there was ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, but I think it’s important to put that in the context of it’s -- it does reference those statements within the Hendon Reports, but there are many, many statements within the Hendon Reports. Was that there? Absolutely it was there.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Is it possible to pull that Hendon Report up so we can review it specifically so I can see the reference to make sure I’m getting it correctly?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would prefer to see the reports, Your Honour.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct. Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is one of the things the report says, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So again, I go back, yes, it does -- it does indicate all of these, but as we’ve had the discussion, there are other statements in there as well and it’s the balance of the interpretation of the entire report that is important. It’s the growth of the report. And please, sir, don’t hear me say that I don’t absolutely appreciate all of the intelligence and information that was provided through the Hendon Report, but to take individualized statements through it, I think, doesn’t really reflect the flavour of the intelligence that we were receiving. There was also statements in there that said they would be completely lawful in all ways. There was statements in there that said there was going to be a million people arrive in the hill. There was other statements as well. So I think it’s the entire context of the Hendon Report that’s very important to evaluate.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would disagree with that. There is no reference throughout the documents that look to identify the specific activity that occurs. I think the closest thing that the Hendon Report would be -- would have within it to identify what could occur is the fact that the groups coming together could be very unpredictable. I think that mob mentality and the actions that occurred out of that is exactly what we saw. But in terms of specifically predicting -- and I wouldn’t expect it to, but specifically predicting --
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I wouldn’t, but there wasn’t any, any information included in the Hendon Reports that specifically or generally talked about the activities that we’re going to be -- that were going to occur in our city. And I think one of those is, there was no reference to any intention that the community would be used as a leverage point within these protests.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely. In varying numbers as it went along, 100 percent. It did -- it did indicate a range of numbers that as the collection of intelligence came and moved along, was able to be refined up to what would have been the 27th where numbers were starting to be reported and they were more accurately reflected on the 28th. Now, I understand that is a very difficult task for an intelligence-gathering group. This was an extremely fluid and dynamic situation and I truly believe the intelligence gatherers and collectors did an amazing job in building the system as it went along and refining it, up to and including putting a reliability index as we continued through and having numbers put into those reports as we got closer to the date. An extremely difficult task, and I don’t want you to hear me being critical of the Hendon Reports.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The intelligence didn’t identify that there would be the type of behaviours that we saw demonstrated in our streets. It didn’t bear it out.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The intelligence reports as we identified them specifically spoke on a regular basis and an increasing basis about the activities that would occur on January 28th, 29th and 30th. As we read them and as we saw them, we identified that to mean that there would be specific incidents, specific demonstrations and activities around that weekend and that, beyond that, there could be a small number of people that remained, but that was the main focus. Actually, that is what bore out within our streets. Most -- many people left on the night of the 30th that decreased a number of -- a number of people within our city, so that was accurate. What we didn’t have was an accurate prediction of the footprint that would remain or the activities that those people were engaged in.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the Hendon Reports regularly discussed weekend activities planning and, in fact, on several points you can identify in intelligence gaps activities for the 28th, 29th and 30th. There is several different examples where that specifically is what is referenced.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it -- as you’ve indicated around the behaviours that occurred, it was not that specific that those were going to be the only demonstration days. That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So if you’re talking around about intelligence, I think the experience that I was talking about was the experience in engaging and dealing with the groups. Nobody had any experience in dealing with the patriot movement in terms of a large-scale demonstration. We were the first and, from that experience, we’ve seen other jurisdictions adapt and interpret the intelligence somewhat differently.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think it was -- I would -- I would submit to you that it was both. We do have a plan around experience that we did execute in terms of allowing vehicles into that footprint, in terms of managing how we would look to manage what would be a small number of people that would remain in a localized area in the downtown core. That was the experience package that we brought into this. That wasn’t what bore out. And that’s why I say in terms of interpreting intelligence, it’s always extremely important to be able to balance the experience you have around that. Nobody had experience in it at that time.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If we can pull it up.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct, yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe -- I would agree with you that this plan was intelligence led, that the intelligence provided was actually shared with the planners, was properly brought into the organization, assessed, analyzed and adequately shared to be assessed and developed into the plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Deputy Chief Ferguson.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do believe, and through all the review that I've done, I on several points and frequently identify where there's references between the planners and the Intelligence group to actually look to access intelligence that exists. So I do know that that existed. I do know the planners were very conscious and cognizant of intelligence and making sure that it was put into this plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, that's not correct. I was the Deputy Chief in Charge of Intelligence Information and Investigations from mid-December 2021 to up and to the point that I was assigned as Interim Chief of the Ottawa Police Service. Prior to that, I was the Chief Administrative Officer for a year, then prior to that, I was in the Community Policing Command.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So my experience is in -- within -- at the lower levels within drug investigations and intelligence, where I had a number years of experience. Then as I've gone through, I've had different command positions within the Intelligence -- that would oversee the Intelligence Directorate.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So, no. As I indicated in my evidence, I started to receive the specific Hendon reports on the 27th of January.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would be briefed on intelligence reports from my command.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There was a wide range of reporting on who would be coming to the city for sure.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, I would agree with that.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that. I don't think they were captured in any intelligence reports.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct. As it drew closer.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The organizational structure was extremely challenging because it was non-existent. There was pockets of different groups. I think as the convoy and as the occupation moved through the weeks, it began to coalesce a bit, there was some leaders that could have been identified as we move along, but that's part of the negotiation challenges that we had was there was many different pockets of leaders with many different perspectives and many different ideologies.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That would be accurate as an estimate.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's accurate.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is accurate.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's accurate.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
M'hm.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Open-source information.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There was some notations here that raised concerns that we should be looking for.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So it -- I wouldn’t characterize it as a huge crane, and I’m not trying to minimize what it was. It was actually a boom truck that had what would be a much shorter boom than what a crane would have, and a flatbed back on it. It was extended and had a flag hang from it and was used as a stage.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don’t think I used the terminology, “Instrumental”; I don’t believe that’s the words I used, but they were absolutely of a benefit to allow us to end this occupation, and were widely leveraged.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It created a very clear legislative framework that was clearly articulable to our members as to their powers to create the exclusion from that zone.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is absolutely true. Had we not been able to limit or stop the flow of pedestrians into the area, it would not have created the stability that we would need to launch the operation. And I think part of that stability is what led to the safety that we were able to use while we did it that resulted in a very low small number of injuries.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don’t have any direct examples or knowledge of that, but it seems to be that it could have provided a deterrence factor for people attending.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I think you’re specifically referring to a letter that our Police Liaison Team members handed out that specifically referenced the authorities and powers under the Emergency Act, so yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is. I don’t have specific examples but that’s my knowledge, that’s my general knowledge that that occurred.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
They removed barriers or any -- seemed to remove hesitation for people to actually be cooperative with us because they were directed to under the Act.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe so, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. We wanted to have as many people voluntarily leave, knowing that there was going to be an imminent police action so we could shrink the footprint as much as we have, and have less people to remove.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, sir, am I able to reference -- what document is this?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, but the only clarity I would provide is around point number 1, you indicated that the criminal offences would be provincial. That would be -- because the Criminal Code is a federal piece of legislation, it would be federal.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I agree with that.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
We definitely used the authorities granted to us under the Emergencies Act.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe so, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There was no indication in any of the efforts that we had made that that would be a way that we could successfully negotiate the end of this.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know that I could make the nexus that it was Ottawa that caused others to want to occur. What I can say is that it was a phenomena or an occurrence that we saw at several locations across the country.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I absolutely agree, there was an interconnectivity between all of the protests that were occurring. My exception that I was taking was I don’t know that Ottawa was necessarily -- that they were doing it because Ottawa was still existing. I think there was absolutely just an interconnectedness between all of the movements that were being undertaken at that point.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It was the first and it was the largest.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree that it was the first, that it was the largest, and that people watched what occurred here on an ongoing basis.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you. Good afternoon.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
You said the Ontario Police Service. I believe you mean the Ottawa Police Service?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Do you have a document that you can reference for that media release, or is that a clip?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I do recall, I don't specifically recall references to enforcement, but I do specifically recall the discussion around our concerns with children in the footprint, particular as the situation there was becoming more volatile.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So no, I don't recall that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don't specifically recall the references to enforcement that you're speaking of. I do specifically recall us raising the issue of the potential danger that the children would be -- would, could or would be in in the red zone footprint.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don't recall where the genesis of the announcement was, but I do stand behind I had grave concerns with the fact that there were children within the footprint of an area where the activity that was occurring was occurring, but beyond that, within the area where there could be enhanced or would be enhanced enforcement activity.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So regardless of where it came from, I had and shared those concerns.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I was the one who was liaising with the Children's Aid Society, and they were -- that was something -- in gaps, we identified there was a gap that we identified I should have had conversations with them prior to that announcement being made. But as a result of the announcement, we were able to work together to identify the proper mechanisms that we would use in the event that we did identify children who needed support within the red zone.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I'm not aware of any report that was actually generated by Navigator. If you could take me to it I can ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I wouldn't because I don't believe that the Children's Aid Society of Ottawa ever directly engaged or intervened in the protest. What I do understand is that we set up mechanisms in order to be able to, in the event that there was an enforcement action and children needed to be removed and then reunited with family, we set up the processes that would be put in place for that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I didn't develop that specific plan, so we'll -- you'll need to ask the Planning Team what the specific plan was.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, because I don't know the specifics of what they're speaking about. What I do know is that we, as part of our planning, and Inspector Lucas tomorrow will be able to provide more details, but we did have remote arrest processing sites, not in rural Ottawa, in the south end of Ottawa in a residential, mixed commercial area, where they were protests and then released to be able to find transportation to wherever they needed to go, which is a common -- which is common with the police.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's in the south end.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I don't know what the logistics at the building were. I would imagine it would've needed to have a phone because you have to be able to call your lawyer, so ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I'm not aware, and it wasn't outside of Ottawa, it was still within the geographical boundaries of the City of Ottawa.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don't recall that statement.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I'm -- well, physical assaults do contribute to what I'm describing. I was specifically describing the violence that our community felt as a result of the culmination of actions that the occupiers engaged in.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct, not the Criminal Code definition of violence, but the violence that they felt by having excessive horns blared ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- and having trucks run 24/7 a day.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
By having people intimidate them and follow them, and by having people rip masks off their head. By feeling sheltered in their homes where they couldn't be ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I'm not.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
He's a manager within our data section. So he does a lot of data collection. He works on uniform crime reporting.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I would agree that the email states that, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what I would agree is that the data analysis that he would have done would have represented that. There may have been more that were in the terms of being processed, and I think this is on February 15th. There's a better table within our institutional report that more ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- clearly identifies the numbers that would have occurred.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do believe it is just an adaptation of the report in our institutional report, so once I'd be able to see it, I'll be able to assess, but I don’t believe I have any challenges with it or problems with it.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t believe from the 29th to the 13th is 17 days.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s -- yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, I'm not sure how you're classifying violent charges. We'd have to go through them again to identify.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I'll take your word for it. We'd have to go through the list again.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
What I -- so as I defined violence, it wasn’t strictly Criminal Code violence, and I'm happy to again go through the definition that I was using when I was talking about community violence. This is a part of it, threats, charges under the Criminal Code was a part of it, but it was the trauma that the community felt. It was the extreme circumstances that they were exposed to and the duration of time that they were exposed to that has very clearly been described to me by community members as violence inflicted on them and towards them.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Honking would be one of them.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what I think -- but I think it’s important you put it in context. It’s the honking of large airhorns ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- of approximately three, to four, to 500 trucks simultaneously for 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It’s not just tooting a little horn. It’s the incessant noise pollution that is being inflicted on the people that we were referring to.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I think they got better for a period of time, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
But that was on the 7th. That was nine days, 10 days into the circumstance.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That would be -- that would be accurate, I believe.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Just over a million.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t think the size of the amount of people that were being exposed to it minimizes the trauma that those community members felt and very clearly expressed. On the general population of Ottawa, it was a smaller number, but it doesn’t minimize the impact it had on that number of people or that group of people.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It’s difficult for me to scale exactly -- he’s a seasoned, and experienced, and senior intelligence officer, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe it’s a perspective, for sure, and I think it’s one that would be more appropriate to question her on. I’ve been very clear about how we utilize the provisions under the Emergency Act to actually execute our plan and create stability around the execution of our plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do believe there was other -- there could have been other opportunities. There was provisions within all of those. What I have said, and I say again, is, we leveraged the Emergency Act as it came out to create a very stable platform, to be able to access tow-trucks, to be able to do the four or five different that I identified. So while these abilities do exist, absolutely, in what Commissioner Lucki has identified, the Emergency Act created a very stable platform, a stable environment for us to execute our plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
We had a plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
We were going to execute a plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon, Mr. Champ.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good to see you again.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I absolutely agree. And beyond being unable to work, there were businesses that were severely impacted by the consequences of the occupation.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
And their employees, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That would be my assessment of the situation. The different protests, as they went, or occupations across the country, had didn’t leverage points. The Ambassador Bridge leveraged economy. Coutts, Alberta, leveraged economy and access to the United States. Ottawa leveraged the citizens and the discomfort that it created with -- for our community as the leverage point to be heard.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It could be characterized as that, yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
My understanding of what “Bear Hug” was is it was to be a protest that would incense -- encircle of Ottawa to, in essence, close down the entirety of Ottawa.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I think it was larger than downtown. It was supposed to be a large geographical area up to and including all of Ottawa.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think that the level of depth that we had attributed to contingency planning was an area that we need to be better on moving ahead and one that we’ve identified and improved on.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I would agree that if Deputy Chief Ferguson feels that there wasn’t a properly developed contingency plan, she was in charge of the planning, so yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the Ottawa Police Service was absolutely unprepared for the unprecedented circumstances that we were faced with on the 28th through to the end of February, middle of -- middle to end of February.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, I think it caused concerns for all of the police agencies who were involved because it wasn’t just Ottawa Police members. It was police members, military members from across the country in a small number. But the knowledge that that group would have about our operations was concerning.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So there was concerns raised around that regularly. And there was investigations conducted into that. And as a result of those investigations, we didn’t find any circumstances where there was a compromise of information or actions because information was shared from inside our organization into the protestors.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So there was two circumstances where members had donated funds beyond -- to GiveSendGo, sorry, ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- GiveSendGo accounts, and those were followed up on through discipline.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So can you be more specific?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That was of concern.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it was.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I believe through my testimony today, we’ve gone through the individual circumstances. There was an occasion where OPS did not deploy a number of OPP officers. That was rectified shortly thereafter. The concerns about our plans were raised, communicated, and as we progressed, and as we had the integrated planning team come in, that was rectified. So I believe, from my perspective, all of the concerns that Supt. Abrams were raised to me were appropriately channeled and dealt with.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I wasn’t aware that those conversations were occurring.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I had -- I would have concerns about the time that it was taking to develop the plans. I do think, particularly once we had the Integrated Planning Team, with the amazing assistance of the Ontario Provincial ---
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- Police and the RCMP, that we did develop the fulsome plans that we needed. That took some time to get to. So while this is occurring in our streets, the time it’s taking to plan, coordinate, and then execute is of concern to me.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe Chief Sloly was raising concerns or kicking the tires on what an integrated commander planning team would look like that would have indicated he had some resistance to it.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry, I don’t believe it was that he was taking operational advice. It was the fact that a PR firm, a crisis communication firm was involved in that level of operational discussions. It was atypical to me. It was ultimately, at the end of the day, Chief Sloly’s prerogative and choice to make as the Chief of Police. It was just something that I hadn’t experienced before.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well I had -- not specific concerns about his leadership overall. I’ve identified the areas that were of concern to me around the incident command and his involvement at a lower level than I ---
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- believed it should be.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So there was different areas of concern that I had, yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that is what she asked me.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe she testified that I said I wouldn’t have done anything differently, but that a plan was coming together and we needed to support the chief as we led through that plan. I think when you listen to her testimony, that’s the ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- more fulsome explanation of what I said.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely not. What I would go on to say is my perspective is, particularly as a Deputy Chief, my responsibility is to support the Chief of Police, the Office of the Chief of Police, regardless of who is sitting there, and that my obligation is to make sure that that person is successful as we move ahead.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
But I do believe I was serving the people of Ottawa by ensuring that we, as an organization, through the Chief of Police, had success moving ahead. At every opportunity where I had concerns with Chief Sloly, I raised those. Ultimately, he’s the Chief of Police, so he makes the decisions on how we move ahead. But to have him fail, particularly in the middle of a crisis, would not have benefited anyone, particularly the citizens of Ottawa.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So my concerns would not have met to the level where I felt that obligation was necessary. The challenges I had were addressed on a regular and ongoing basis. And if I thought they had surpassed a level that I needed to report it, I would have reported it. It did not reach that level.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I believe I first learned about rumours of it on social media, but then ultimately Chair Deans did call me at some point during the day to indicate -- to assess out my interest in taking over as interim chief.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I did not.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It was atypical. It would likely have been -- could have been -- facilitated what we wanted to accomplish more easily, but at the end of the day, like I said before, I truly believed it took the temperature of the protest down and that was a good outcome. Could we have arrived at that circumstance better by having police involved, and by advising our Incident Command earlier? Yes. It was an imperfect process, I will absolutely agree with that, but I do believe the outcome of it was beneficial to having the streets remain calm for the time we needed it to execute our operation.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That I don't know. That I can't answer.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Sorry. Thank you.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I can. Good afternoon.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Do you have a document to reference? And I'm going to apologise, I met with several different people on several different occasions.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I recall the meeting.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
At a high-level, that's correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do -- I am not totally versed on what the protective policing mandate is. I think it encompasses more than that, but I'm not best suited to answer that question.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It does include that, yes.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, for sure.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That I'm -- that I am not sure of. I don't believe so, but I can't definitively say.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
-
Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The Ottawa Police Service, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the Ottawa Police Service would be a primary responder to it, but depending on the nature of the incident it may be us, it may be a national security -- if it's a national security issue, it may be the RCMP. So we would be a primary response, and then we would have to decide amongst the other policing organisations in the city who would be doing the follow up.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's -- not for the purposes of laying criminal charges, no.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It would be unfair for me to comment on that. I'm not sure of the curriculum of the Parliamentary Protective Services training.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, no, I'm -- I am aware that there is extensive training that is provided to Parliamentary Protective Services, I just -- I can't comment on what the content of it is. But I do absolutely know that they are trained.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
To the Parliamentary Precinct, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we actually don't need an invitation if we're called upon to there to provide police of jurisdiction responsibilities, but in terms of general patrol or general activity within the Parliamentary Precinct, no we don't engage in that, we -- that is the responsibility and left to the Parliamentary Protective Services.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I can't comment on that. I don't know. I don't know the answer to that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Okay. Thank you.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. What I -- and I'm going to suggest this is a question better posed to Inspector Lucas -- but as I read this, what I understand is that all of the movement in and around the area of the Parliamentary precinct will be directed and controlled by the NCRCC. That would be typical and understandable, because it's going to be important that there's communication and deconfliction around activities that are happening between the Ottawa Police Service, the Ontario Provincial Police, RCMP, and Parliamentary Protective Services. That would be funnelled through the NCRCC because there are -- the Incident Commander and representatives from all of those agencies present there.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Comes up to the gate of Parliament Hill's, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. Well, Ottawa's Police -- again, Ottawa Police's jurisdiction for the entire area. PPS has responsibility for safety and security up to -- on the Parliamentary precinct, which extends to the sidewalk of Wellington Street.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I'm not sure of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don't know that for a fact, but that would be my expectation.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the PPS was part of our integrated command at the NCRCC, and in that, they would be able to be assigned taskings that were appropriate to their responsibilities, particularly in and around the Parliamentary precinct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I can't respond to that. That would need to be directed to Superintendent Bernier or Inspector Lucas.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It can be, yes. In the example you gave, yes, I would agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I am.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don't know what instructions via Ontario Provincial Police liaison team members gave.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I can't comment on that. I don't know what the expectations of the truckers were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So I would agree that we were developing a plan based on those authorities, but when the Emergency Act came in, it negated the need to rely on those authorities and provided a really well-structured legislative framework for us to be able to enact an exclusionary zone and explain the legal authorities and our officers' legal authorities, so all of our members on the frontline so they could clearly, efficiently carry out their duties to enforce that exclusionary zone.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I would suggest it was much more than just a good demonstration of authority. It was a very clear, legal framework that we could rely on to create the exclusionary zone with direct wording and intentions around creating that exclusionary zone.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So we didn’t create and exclusionary zone in the same way. We created a restricted zone in our downtown core for vehicular traffic.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, we worked on the authority of the -- with the City Manager to look at areas that we would look at limiting or prohibiting vehicles from flowing.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would -- I would agree with that in every circumstance that we exercise of authority, the situation and context that we’re in needs to be considered prior to us exercising out authority, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I would agree with that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I would believe that this is exactly the forum of the necessity, that that will be fleshed out and discussed. It was exceptionally beneficial to us in the execution of our plan, well-utilized, and created a stable environment for us to actually remove the occupiers from our streets.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, they were a crisis communications firm that were contracted in to provide us crisis-communication advice.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
They weren’t involved in making operational decisions, no.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
When I became Interim Chief, yes, I ended the contract.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, but I don’t believe I said “may” have been helpful. I believe I indicated it “was” helpful.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
All ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
All of them.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
All of them were helpful.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. And not to contradict Deputy Chief Ferguson but, as my role of CAO, one of my responsibilities was the processing of those swearing-ins. It is a much more labour-intensive administrative process that has several checks and balances and layers to it so I wouldn’t personally describe it in hours; I would describe it in, normally, days. It likely could be streamlined into 24 hours but there are a lot of people you have to line up to be able to do that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It could likely have been done in 24 hours but I don’t -- I don’t think the benefit was as to when it could get done. I think the benefit was to -- that as soon as a member was boots-on-the-ground in Ottawa, landed in Ottawa, they were operationally ready to be deployed, and that’s what we needed as we were bringing members in from across the country.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Oh, no, they could -- they absolutely could have been sworn in without it. It just could have created a backlog and lag time ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
--- particularly with the number of officers we were bringing to the city from all across the country.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It was helpful to us, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t know that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So that could -- that’s a better question directed at Supt. Bernier who directly interacted on that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I’ll let him testify to that; I don’t know that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
If that’s what he testifies to, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Again, I can’t comment on that because I don’t know the structure or the challenges that were -- occurred with towing. That was a planning responsibility.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, I do not.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I don’t have any direct knowledge of that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
And so you don’t -- you have no direct knowledge of the power to freeze financial accounts being necessary to the clearing of the protest, then, I guess?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
You speculate that perhaps it helped but ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, there were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The exclusionary zone and the powers granted around it were very clear. There was no debate about them. And that’s what we leveraged to actually execute our plan. The need for the exclusionary zone was -- it was very important because we needed to be able to limit the movement of pedestrians in and out of that area. That is an uncommon authority that police exercise. So the ability for us to be very clear in how we were managing, striking up, and excluding people from that zone was extremely important to us to be able to execute the plans that we did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
In the absence of the invocation of the Emergencies Act, the OPS, the OPP, the RCMP, as part of a unified command were going to clear the protests.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Good afternoon, Mr. Migicovsky.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, they did. And as I indicated this morning, we determined that there was no long- term booking of any hotels in the city, that the reference to what Mr. Ball had made was actually a three-day booking, that the 90 days, I forget the actual number, hadn’t materialized.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
What I obtained was that hotels had only been booked for Friday/Saturday and that groups were leaving on Sunday. There was no long-term booking.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, I do.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So to my recollection, I don’t recall us ever establishing temporary parking for other demonstrations. This was the first time, I believe, that we’d attempted that.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
For other special events, yes, it would be a regular and common occurrence.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It was done in this case to try and limit the footprint that we -- that trucks would come to for the demonstration and allow people to park in other areas and access downtown through bussing, through rideshare, however, so that they could participate in the protestor demonstration without actually bringing their vehicle into the downtown core.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct. It was a boom ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That piece of equipment was a boom truck. A truck that would normally be used to lift construction equipment and deliver construction equipment.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It was used for two purposes. One is the boom was extended and a flag was raised from it, and I also believed it was used as a temporary set up for stages for speeches and events.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Not to my knowledge, no.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There’s multiple -- had been multiple vehicle-borne protests every year in and around the area. And I can think of five or six different examples. One, farm, where tractors were brought into the downtown core, another truck related one where tractor trailers were brought in. Vehicle-borne protests in passenger vehicles around the -- around Indian farmers, East Indian farmers. Protests around Sri Lankan and Tamil conflict that is existing. There’s several events that occur, several demonstrations and protests that occurred in the past, where vehicles were used and brought into the downtown core.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No, it wasn’t.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It’s difficult to assess, because as I indicated in my testimony before, community impact is one of the main things that we’re looking at as we’re looking to manage protests and demonstrations in that area. So I think the impact could be two-fold. One is it may impede their progress in the area at some points in some ways, but on the other side, it will eliminate the potential that such an occurrence would happen in their neighbourhoods again.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
The police resources and City resources are considerable to be able to execute that plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Past experience since the convoy or prior to?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Prior to, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it did indicate all throughout that the indications that had been received from the protestors -- the protest organizers, was that there was a desire and an intention to be peaceful and lawful.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yeah, that is correct. As the intelligence continued to come in and became more refined, in terms of the size of what was going to occur, we moved from a traffic plan, the Planners then pulled together a larger, more complete, fulsome operational plan.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So while I wasn’t directly involved in the planning efforts or the development of the plan, all of the information that I have seen; the back and forths between the Planners and Intelligence; the conversations that occurred around how to build it, would indicate it wasn’t just a pulled-off-the-shelf plan; it was one that was fully developed and sounded out around the circumstances that were evolving and developing and coming towards Ottawa.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Were they seen as -- they were significant risks if they materialized. They didn’t materialize. It was risks that we identified through our threat assessment and our planning process.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, it did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, we did.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, their use was necessary over the course of managing the dynamics that we had, specifically towards lone actors around issues of violence. I’m unsure but the POU units, every resource that came to Ottawa was utilized.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
In the first weekend, POU units were utilized in terms of crowd management.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That those numbers are unknown.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
I think there’s two pieces; one that it is the organizer promoting as a safe, lawful, and peaceful protest, while other individuals seem to be advocating aggressive tactics.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, they were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That’s correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
There were thousands of tractors. There were very few if -- and I don’t believe any tractor-trailers that made it down into the red zone.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
No. But I also think it’s very important to note as we go through these that -- I understand the challenges of gathering this information and intelligence, and I understand that it’s imprecise and unrefined, and that’s why I tried to make the -- tried to make the point that the experience we have is so important in assessing these. So I believe every best attempt and great work was done by the Ontario Provincial Police and all the partners in bringing together this information to be able to share with communities through other police services to be able to conduct planning.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It is one of the pieces we take into account, yes.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So the convoy would've been monitored by other police agencies as it came across Canada, and I know that once it entered Ontario, it was monitored by the Ontario Provincial Police until it came to Ottawa where we took over.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes. So there were several -- as I indicated before, the numbers and the reporting in Hendon enhanced as we went through and as we got closer to the time, and this, on the 27th, is the first day that we saw actual numbers recorded, and understandably the first day, but the first day that we got a much better picture on the numbers that would be attending.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That's correct.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
It could mean either.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
"The available information indicates that protesters plan to remain in Ottawa at least until 2022-02-04. We continue to identify indicators to support at least some protesters remaining beyond the weekend of 2022- 01-29, 30. These indicators include collecting donations of cash, food, and water from supporters along the route."
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So what I would assess from that is that there is an indication that at least some may remain beyond it, and that those remaining would remain -- the intelligence at this point would remain up until as late as the 4th of February.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
That is ---
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Well, the Ottawa Police, the OPP didn't allow. We did it in conjunction, but no, we didn't allow them to stream into the downtown.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, there were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, there were.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Absolutely not, and what I will say, and I said it before and I want to say it again, our officers, our officers, the officers of the Ottawa Police Service, the OPP, the RCMP, and every other agency that came in worked in exceptionally difficult and challenging circumstances at an exceptionally difficult and challenging time. So they -- their -- to criticize their activities is challenging for me because they did absolutely everything they could to help support this city and remove this occupation.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Yes, that's correct, and I think I've highlighted a couple of examples today.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So sorry, can you go to the top, please?
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So by this point, we had a regular eyes briefing schedule, and I believe we were at two if not three a day, where there was a briefing where all of the heads of areas would come together to get updates and plans, operational targets or issues would be addressed there, and everyone would then go and execute on what they needed to do. So this was one of those updates.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
So one of the concerns that we had, and this wasn't confirmed from any discussions with anyone in the City, but one of the things that we were speculating about around the challenges with engaging different levels of government and potentially negotiating or potentially having discussions with convoy leaders, was that when the first one went, and if it was the City, then they would be the ones who would be responsible for conducting the negotiation. This was never confirmed. We were just wondering or whiteboarding what some of the concerns about different levels of government would be -- would or could have in coming into negotiations.
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Steve Bell, Interim Chief (Ott-OPS)
Thank you very much, sir.