in East Annex Room 1100, SFU

Problems of scheduling of police resources

Abstract: We discuss the problem of resource scheduling in the RCMP and other police forces. The main concern regards the assigning of personnel to incoming tasks, such as those generated by emergency calls. It has become apparent that the efficiency of a policing unit is highly dependent on the protocol used for prioritizing and assigning such tasks. The assignment protocol in turn depends on the roster of available personnel. This leads to very complicated scheduling problems faced by police units throughout the world.

We describe the history of this problem in the Canadian policing industry over the past 35 years, and the methods used to address it. It is possible that a significant gain in policing efficiency can be obtained by applying modern scheduling methods.

About the Speaker: Sgt. Mather is in contact with police departments throughout Canada, the United States and England, and has first hand knowledge of the scheduling problems faced by the various police departments. Sgt. Mather believes that the scheduling of police resources has a huge impact on resource demand, and sees room for mathematical research in this area. Sgt. Mather will be available for discussions before and after his talk.

Hosts: Lou Hafer lou@cs.sfu.ca, Bruce Rout bbrout@sfu.ca, Luis Goddyn goddyn@sf u.ca ~

PIMS/MITACS

Simon Fraser University

8888 University Drive

East Academic Annex

Room #120-1213

Burnaby, B.C.

V5A 1S6, Canada

+1.604.268 6654