Windsor’s police chief is calling for changes to Ontario’s Mental Health Act, describing it as “antiquated” and ill-suited to meet the modern needs of communities.
During a presentation to Windsor city council Monday, Chief Jason Bellaire said police officers have spent hours waiting in hospital emergency departments with individuals apprehended under the act — diverting resources from front-line policing.
In one case, he said the wait time ranged from three and a half to 11 hours per person in crisis.
“We don’t get to just backfill. We don’t get to call people in,” said Bellaire. “We don’t have that ability or budget to do that.”
Ontario’s Mental Health Act governs how and when individuals experiencing a mental health crisis can be taken into custody and transported to hospital for psychiatric evaluation.
Police have a legal obligation to remain with those individuals until hospital staff can assume responsibility.
The law has been in place since 1967.
Bellaire said the current legislation forces police to commit significant time and resources to duties that may be better handled by mental health professionals
As a stopgap, the Windsor Police Service now stations a dedicated officer at Windsor Regional Hospital around the clock.
“It meets the legislative requirements. And it’s an antiquated legislation. The Mental Health Act needs to evolve. It needs to change,” he said.
“It doesn’t meet the modern needs of the community.”
That partnership with Windsor Regional Hospital has helped reduce average police wait times to about 12 to 15 minutes per person, freeing up officers to return to active duty.
Bellaire said that change alone recovered about 50 per cent of Windsor Police’s time previously spent off the road.
The force has also expanded its crisis response efforts in partnership with health agencies.
That includes the nurse-police teams (NPTs) who are dispatched to respond to high-use emergency department patients with justice system involvement.
Bellaire said they saw a 50 per cent reduction in those cases within four weeks.
He pointed to a broader shift within local institutions— hospitals, family services and housing agencies —toward more integrated and responsive crisis care, saying it’s already showing results.
Calls for service are down as much as 17 per cent, with fewer violent incidents and faster response times.
While Bellaire credited the city’s leadership for supporting new programs, he reiterated that long-term change hinges on modernizing the legislation that governs police response.
“We’ve tried [traditional methods] for about 50 years, and what our data shows us is it doesn’t work,” he said.
“It’s about using what resources we have in a modern way that fits the modern needs of a modern society.”
