Saskatoon police appoint first female superintendent in force's 120-year history
Supt. Tonya Gresty is the Saskatoon Police Service's highest-ranking female officer.
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Tonya Gresty has achieved a new milestone in the history of the Saskatoon Police Service: she’s the first woman to be appointed to the rank of superintendent, the highest rank a female officer in the force has earned to date.
Gresty said she’s both excited and feeling some pressure in her new role.
The excitement is around the “grit” of shaping police policies. High on her priority list is to work on answering calls to action for reform, particularly around addressing root causes of violence, and focusing on de-escalation, crisis intervention and trauma-informed approaches to better serve victims, she said.
She’s feeling pressure to perform at a high level, which she’s likely putting on herself, Gresty said.
“I do acknowledge that there would be eyes on me as the first female to have achieved this level of leadership within the organization,” she said in an interview on Tuesday, adding that she wants to be an example and role model.
Superintendent is one of the highest ranks, followed by deputy chief and chief. It’s been nearly 15 years since the first woman ascended to the rank of inspector — Shelley Ballard, now retired, who was promoted to the role in 2009.
Gresty said Ballard was her supervisor on patrol for years, and was a role model for her.
Gresty said she was drawn to policing out a feeling that she was part of the community and wanted to take on a leadership role to help solve its problems. She also felt the “allure” of an action-packed career in which she could help others, she said.
Early in her career, the force had about 30 female officers, and few were in leadership roles. She felt at the time that she was performing in “masculine ways” to fit in and achieve what was viewed as success in policing, she said.
“I think in a lot of ways I performed in different ways that weren’t maybe natural to my disposition.”
Over the years, she began to “embrace what was unique about me as a woman and what femininity brought to policing,” she said. She wanted to take on roles that were traditionally male-dominated, such as special teams.
In a prepared statement, Chief Troy Cooper said Gresty has an important role as a member of the executive, with influence over strategy, budget and resource allocation at the highest level. He praised her experience, education and accomplishments.
“As the first female officer to be promoted to this rank, she has a valuable perspective, along with a diversity of experience. I can see that she brings her authentic self to the role and understands how meaningful that is to the organization,” he said.
Gresty said she’s seeing a generational shift in the police force that’s more responsive to female leadership and values consensus-building and collaborative decision making, which is part of her leadership style.
The force has been working to achieve targets set by the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission for workplace diversity. In a profession like policing, where women are traditionally under-represented, the SHRC has set a target of 47 per cent female representation.
According of the force’s 2022 diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) report, 315 of its 730 employees are female, including 196 sworn police officers.
Many of the female staff work on the front lines — 94 out of 352.5 constables. Gresty said the effect of this is significant.
“The value of diversity of the people responding on the front line in and with the community is so important, that people see their service reflective of who they are, and that’s something that we just weren’t able to accomplish in the early years. We’ve come a long way,” she said.
One area to be improved is advancing women into positions of senior leadership, she added.
According to the DEI report, six out of 19 members of the executive (the chief, deputy chiefs, superintendents, inspectors, executive director and directors) were women in 2002, as were 30 of the 127 supervisors (sergeants and staff sergeants).
There are no female staff sergeants, which is something she wants to change, Gresty noted.
Unlike the Regina and Prince Albert city police, Saskatoon’s force hasn’t yet had a female deputy chief.
“I would say that next level leadership in our organization is on my radar,” Gresty said.
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