Vancouver Greens Announce New 24/7 Non-Police CROW Team and Office of Community Safety
Community Response Outreach Workers would divert non-emergency calls from police, while a new Office would bring City departments together on neighbourhood safety.
VANCOUVER, B.C., SEPTEMBER 24, 2026 — The Green Party of Vancouver today announced plans to create the CROW (Community Response Outreach Workers) Team, a new 24/7 non-police, non-medical mobile response team to handle non-emergency calls involving people experiencing homelessness, street-level addiction, public intoxication, and mental health crises. The Greens also announced an Office of Community Safety to coordinate the City's approach to safety across departments.
Right now, police and paramedics are the default response to situations that do not require them. Every minute they spend on a non-emergency call, such as public intoxication or moving someone along from a doorway, is a minute they are not available for an emergency that could cost someone their life. CROW would change that. Available around the clock, the team would accept calls from the public and handle the full range of non-emergency situations that currently fall to police.
CROW workers would respond in pairs to calls made through a dedicated number available to the public, businesses, and partner agencies. They would arrive without sirens, lights, or uniforms. For the businesses and neighbours dealing with the situation, that means a calm, quiet resolution without the disruption of an emergency response. For the person in crisis, it means being met with compassion and connection instead of escalation or criminalization.
“People in crisis on our streets need help, not handcuffs, and our police and paramedics need to be free to respond to real emergencies,” said Pete Fry, Green Party candidate for mayor. “CROW would give Vancouver a dedicated, compassionate response for our most vulnerable neighbours, and it takes pressure off a system that is stretched too thin.”
This model works. Calgary's DOAP Team, now known as HELP, has operated since 2005, diverting nearly 60,000 calls a year from police and paramedics and returning $9.43 in social value for every dollar invested. Similar programs now operate across North America. No equivalent program exists in Metro Vancouver.
The Office of Community Safety would bring together fire, police, licensing, property use, and planning into a single, proactive system, breaking down the silos that treat neighbourhood safety as a series of separate problems. It is grounded in the universal right of Vancouverites and visitors alike to feel and be safe.
“Safety in Vancouver shouldn't depend on which department happens to pick up the phone,” said Fry. “The Office of Community Safety gets our departments working together on prevention and long-term solutions, and CROW would give us the right responder for the right call.”