When it comes to improving community safety, candidates for council and mayor were near evenly split on whether they would Invest in addressing root causes to reduce disorder or Increase enforcement in public spaces and on transit when answering Taproot's candidate survey.
Thirty-three candidates chose the investment option. Among candidates for mayor, Paul Bakhmut, Abdul Malik Chukwudi, Vanessa Denman, Andy Andrzej Gudanowski, Andrew Knack, Utha Nadauk, and Michael Walters — just more than half of the 13 total candidates for the position — chose this option. Among candidates for council, incumbent candidates Michael Janz, Aaron Paquette, Ashley Salvador, Anne Stevenson, and Keren Tang also chose this option.
Twenty-nine candidates chose the increased enforcement option. That included mayoral candidates Ronald Stewart Billingsley, Jr, Tony Caterina, Rahim Jaffer, Omar Mohammad, and Olney Tugwell. No incumbent council candidates picked this option.
Mayoral candidate Tim Cartmell and Ward Métis Candidate Caroline Matthews, both with the Better Edmonton Party, chose the Press other orders of government to deliver health and social services option. So did council candidates Jackie Liu in Ward pihêsiwin, James Miller in Ward O-day'min, Thu Parmar in Ward sipiwiyiniwak, Justin Thomas in Ward Métis, and Jo-Anne Wright, the incumbent in Ward Sspomitapi.
As of this writing, 23 candidates for council and mayor have not yet completed the survey.
The Edmonton Police Service is the city's largest line item on its budget, at roughly $592 million in 2025. The council previous to the current council created the Community Outreach Transit Team, a partnership with Bent Arrow Traditional Healing Society. The current council has expanded it and approved a contract extension.
The city once funded the Edmonton Downtown Business Association's core patrol teams but stopped that funding in 2025. The program now operates with fewer service hours. Since then, the city has awarded a grant to the Old Strathcona Business Association to operate a similar program in that area. The next council will be tasked with a review on expanding the authority of peace officers, thereby reducing the need for police in some matters, though any change would need to be enabled by the provincial government.