New data from Statistics Canada shows 13.5% of officers at the Chatham-Kent Police Service are female, well below the national average of 21.4%.
Chief Gary Conn says recruiting women into law enforcement is a work in progress.
“This year alone I can tell we finished a process and we had 51 applicants apply for a police constable position and only six were female which constitutes 12%,” says Conn. “So as you can see it’s difficult to attract females to our profession, we are always actively attending colleges and job fairs to seek female applicants.”
Conn says while the Chatham-Kent numbers are low, they’re higher than they were 10 years ago, which is a positive trend.