The city has shared its proposed budget for 2020 and, as usual, there’s another big increase in there slated for the Vancouver Police Department (VPD).

The draft budget for 2020 prepared by staff proposes that Vancouver spend $340.4 million on policing next year.

That’s 21 percent of the city’s entire annual expenditures. In comparison, Vancouver’s fire department receives nine percent of the city’s annual budget, engineering and public works receives six percent, libraries get three percent, and parks and recreation receive eight percent. Arts, culture, and community services, only get five percent of the budget.

The $340.4 million going to police is 7.3 percent more than the $317.2 million Vancouver spent on policing in 2019 and up 10.8 percent from $307.3 million Vancouver gave to the VPD in 2018.

An appendix attached to the 2020 draft budget states that some of the additional dollars will go to hiring 25 new police officers.

“The increase in all-staff full-time equivalents between 2019 and 2020 reflects an increase of additional police recruits and civilian staff in response to recommendations from the third year of the five-year Operational Review,” it reads. “It also includes the auxiliary pool of Community Safety Officers, Traffic Authority personnel and Jail Guards.”