The city has promised to start
publicly disclosing what it costs taxpayers to settle liability claims against
Hamilton police.
The move comes in the wake of the
high-profile but secret out-of-court settlement between Myanmar refugee Po La
Hay and the police services board.
Hay’s $2.5 million lawsuit —
alleging he was the victim of excessive force during a mistaken identity drug
raid — was dropped following a resolution that both parties agreed to keep
strictly confidential, including whether Hay received any money.
The city provides insurance
coverage to the police services board.
But until now, all settlements
involving police have been buried in the unspecified “all other” category in
the city’s yearly insurance claims report, making it impossible to know the
impact on the public purse.
City treasurer Tony Tollis says
that’s going to change immediately.
He says insurance payouts arising
from claims against police will appear as a line item like other personal
injury and property claims such as sewer backup, sidewalk falls and fallen tree
limbs.
According to Tollis, specific
details of the police cases will not be released, but the number of claims and
the cost for settling them will.
Tollis says the reports may very
well include out-of-court police settlements but the details need to be kept
confidential because they could provide valuable information on what the city
might be willing to pay to settle similar claims.
“I have no problem listing it,
even if it’s just one claim. I do have a problem with telling you what it’s
about,” he said.
That means, for example, if Hay
did receive a financial settlement — as many believe he did — it would show up
in the 2012 report as an unidentified number and expense among a group of
others.
Even on the off chance there were
no other claims that year, there would be no way of knowing if the listed
figure represented a lump-sum payment to Hay or an agreed upon yearly
instalment to be paid over a period of years.
The point, however, is some
information is always better than no information.
And it’s important to have as
much information as possible on all liability claims against the city —
including those involving police — given the financial consequences of
insurance claims on the tax base.
Tollis was responding to
questions from The Spectator about why police payouts were embedded among 244
unspecified claims in the city’s insurance review for 2010, the latest year
available.
He says the omission was probably
an “oversight” and he readily agrees the claims categories need to be broken
down in finer detail.
Tollis promises greater detail
will be seen in the 2011 report, which will be released shortly.
After drilling down into the 2010
review, he reports there were six liability claims against the police for a
total cost of $55,574.
By way of comparison, that same
year there were 648 sewer backup and flooding claims for a payout of $326,248
while 70 sidewalk falls cost $324,322.
In total, the city settled 2,706
claims, ranging from pothole to grass cutting incidents, at a cost to taxpayers
of $5.6 million.
If you add to that the $3.7
million a year the city pays for insurance coverage — with a $250,000
deductible for liability claims and a $500,000 deducible for property claims —
the financial impact of litigation on the city’s bottom line comes suddenly and
sharply into focus.
Had enough? Write to
the Speaker of the House, U.S. House
of Representatives, Washington, DC 20515 and demand federal hearings into the
police problem in America. Demand
mandatory body cameras for cops, one strike rule on abuse, and a permanent DOJ office on Police Misconduct.