A squad of police officers dedicated to catching drivers who endanger pedestrians and cyclists will soon be patrolling Toronto streets for the first time since 2013, amid ongoing deaths and serious injuries.The Toronto Police Services Board on Thursday approved creation of a traffic enforcement squad — two teams, each with three officers and a supervisor, covering a morning shift and evening shift every weekday — smaller than one disbanded years ago after helping reduce collision numbers.The unanimous vote followed sustained calls from some city councillors and safety advocates who said police had appeared to abandon traffic enforcement as pedestrian and cyclist deaths spiked. Thirty-four pedestrians have died in Toronto this year — the same number fatally shot.Those advocates expressed shock and outrage when a report from Chief Mark Saunders revealed Toronto “does not currently have a complement of officers that are solely dedicated to enforcement duties on a daily basis,” with traffic services focused on crash investigations.“How many of the innocent, loved human beings killed since 2012 would still be alive today?” Jessica Spieker, a member of Friends and Families for Safe Streets who suffered a broken spine and brain injury when a driver hit her in 2015, asked board members, holding up photos and reading names of Torontonians killed on the streets.A day earlier Heather Sim, whose father Gary, a cycling advocate and retired accountant, was killed by a driver in 2017, asked the same question in an interview with the Star.“If this (enforcement) team hadn’t been disbanded in 2013, would the man who hit my dad have been ticketed before — maybe hit with a big fine, or change his driving habits, or lost his licence? ... Maybe he wouldn’t even have been driving that day. My dad could still be here.”Supt. Scott Baptist of Toronto police traffic services told board members that all officers can an ...
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