Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. Thank you to all the guests for being here today.
We certainly are hearing a very similar message, whether it's from Calgary, Halifax, or Toronto, and then today from rural communities like Selkirk and Stonewall, about this Hub and COR approach, or a multi-agency approach.
What we as a committee want to find out is how is it actually helping to save resources and making sure that policing is done in a more efficient manner, and I think we're hearing that in terms of prevention and reduced calls, etc.
I want to focus on the START program. When I met with Tammy and Walter initially, during the break week a few weeks ago, I was excited because it was a rural example. We haven't heard a lot of examples of rural communities being able to do this. It's also a little different because it appears that it's not police driven as much as it's driven by the actual program, and then bringing in different organizations.
I was also impressed that there actually has been some research done. The University of Winnipeg did some research into the START program, if I'm correct. Could you tell us a little bit about those findings? Could you speak specifically to the findings in terms of reduced crime rates and how it relates to police work directly? What did the research tell you?