Toronto officials unveiled a new $12.5-million police command centre on Tuesday that is the centrepiece of the city’s security plans for the FIFA World Cup.
The Toronto Integrated Safety and Security Unit Area Command Centre, known as the TACC, will bring together the co-ordination of emergency services under one roof.
Toronto police Chief Myron Demkiw said police have learned from previous major sporting events held in the city, including the World Series last year, and have gleaned best practices and tactics from police in other countries that have hosted World Cup games.
“Policing FIFA is the longest, continuous operational period requiring the largest deployment of members in Toronto police service history so we needed the right tools to succeed,” Demkiw told reporters ahead of a media tour of the centre.
Demkiw added that a central separate building was necessary to bring expertise into one space, which he described as a state of the art operations facility led by police and built for the World Cup.
Emergency services that will have staff at the centre include the Toronto Police Service, Toronto Fire Services, Toronto Paramedic Services, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto Hydro, Toronto Water, the Ontario coroner’s office, Metrolinx and the TTC.
Demkiw said the centre will have “decision makers” from each service who will be able to co-ordinate a response if an incident occurs and enable the services to work closely together.
Toronto police Supt. Dave Ecklund said police will be able to monitor activity in real time, including crowd movement and traffic conditions, using drone footage and traffic cameras from the city and Ontario’s Ministry of Transportation.
“The drones will provide clear real time pictures to support planning and immediate response,” Eckland said.
Cameras stationed around the city will feed into the centre, where operations staff will be able to look at footage.
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow, left, and Toronto police chief Myron Demkiw, right, talk to reporters about a new command centre that has been built as part of the city’s security plans for the World Cup. (Martin Trainor/CBC)
In an email Tuesday, Toronto police spokesperson Nadine Ramadan said police are installing cameras temporarily at key locations, including the FIFA Fan Festival at the Fort York National Historic Site and The Bentway, where they have not been cameras before, to monitor key movements of people.
“These cameras will be deployed for the World Cup games and then taken down after,” Ramadan said.
Collaboration needed to keep city safe, mayor says
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow said collaboration is needed to make sure the city is safe during the World Cup.
“This command centre will bring together police, emergency services, health partners and agencies from across all orders of government into one coordinated real time operation centre,” Chow said.
Police will test the command centre operation this weekend during Saturday’s Toronto FC and Inter Miami game.
The plan is to use the command centre beyond the World Cup for such events as the Toronto Caribbean Carnival and Pride Toronto festival weekend. It will be up and running on June 6 and for the duration of the games.
Demkiw said police are also prepared for protests that might happen during the games.
“We’re very much prepared for that,” Demkiw said. “We scale up and down as events require.”