Regional police seized nearly $2 million dollars worth of illicit drugs and 1,000 firearms in 2025, numbers included in their 2025 review released to the police services board on Wednesday.
“There’s amazing numbers that stand out,” said Waterloo Regional Police Service Chief Mark Crowell at Wednesday’s meeting.
In many categories, statistics are down year over year.
“Our commitment to the substances that are prohibited in terms of drugs, weapons, and other things throughout the course of our investigations, not only adds up in the tallies of the numbers themselves, but in the dollar value,” added Crowell.
Last year, police were called a total of 342,578 times, a mix of emergency calls to 911 and for other services. In 2025, police responded to four homicides, down one from the year prior. Eighteen shootings in 2025 is also a statistic that has fallen from 22.
When it comes to drugs, the amount and value of the illicit substances that regional police seized were down significantly. Police seized less than half the amount of methamphetamine and fentanyl, and less than a tenth the amount of cocaine and marijuana. The dollar value of the total amount of drugs they seized was roughly $1.88 million, down significantly from the roughly $4.2 million seized in 2024.
The number of fatal and non-fatal overdoses also fell significantly. In 2025, police responded to 1,020 non-fatal overdoses and 49 fatal overdoses, down from 1,553 non-fatal and 86 fatal overdoses in 2024.
In traffic policing, 967 charges were laid for impaired driving, and just over 5,000 for speeding. Police handed out more than 22,400 traffic-related charges in 2025.
Spending, however, is up year-over-year. The police service spent about $222 million on staffing costs, up roughly $14 million from the year before. The service reported 889 sworn members in 2025 and 496 civilian professionals.
