SURREY, B.C. -- The City of Surrey has been left with a $7,000 bill after Mayor Doug McCallum was involved in another crash in the car the city bought for him to drive, a CTV News investigation has found.
And, even though the mayor promised to pay the costs of the car out of his annual car allowance, the city plans to forgive the debt and pay him $1,794 in car-related costs this year instead.
“He absolutely should repay the money. It still deserves an investigation into what went wrong here. This is the public trust. This is the public’s money,” said city councillor Brenda Locke.
The costs come at a time when the city has just raised taxes by 2.9 per cent, while raising the parcel tax by $200, Locke said.
It’s the latest twist around the controversial decision by the City of Surrey to buy a $46,000 Buick Envision SUV for the mayor’s use without any announcement, even though the Mayor already gets a $14,500 car allowance.
CTV News reported last month that the mayor injured an 81-year-old woman by rear-ending her vehicle in what ICBC deemed an at-fault crash in July.
According to documents obtained through a freedom of information request, in November 2019, McCallum reported to the city that he was driving the same car along Fraser Highway at 7:30 a.m. when he was involved in a four-car pileup.
McCallum claimed in that filing that he was the third car in line, and city staff have said that the fourth car disappeared after the crash. He says the city car got a scratch on the rear bumper, and that he took no pictures of the crash scene or the damage.
Surrey RCMP have no record of a hit-and-run at that location and time, and ICBC ultimately deemed that the owner of the mayor’s car — the City of Surrey — should pay for the damage to the vehicle.
“If you are not privately insured and are repairing your vehicle, you will be responsible for 100 per cent of your repair costs as you do not carry collision coverage with ICBC,” the Crown corporation wrote to the City of Surrey in December 2019.
The costs when the car was repaired in February, according to documents, were $6,334.07 to repair the bumper, wheel, lamp and other items. And the mayor got a loaner car for one week and three days for $692.
Part of the rationale the mayor’s office has given for his unusual vehicle arrangement is that he would repay the car costs, including fuel, depreciation, and maintenance – akin to a leasing arrangement with the city itself.
City spokesperson Amber Stowe said the city was paying for the crash because the mayor was on city business at the time.
“In this case, the accident occurred when the mayor was on city duty and not on his personal time,” Stowe said. “The costs associated with that accident were charged to the department and not his personal account that includes his salary remuneration, expenses, and vehicle allowance.”
More city documents say in 2019, the mayor paid $2,592 for fuel, $7,540 in fleet charges including replacement costs, basic and third-party insurance, and maintenance. But because his car allowance is $14,580, he received the difference: a payout in cash of $4,448.
In 2020, the year the crash repairs were done, the city still lists a net estimated cash payment to the mayor, at $1,794.
The drop is because his basic insurance costs went up by about 80 per cent, and the mayor took out a $754 additional collision insurance package with ICBC in May.
Locke said all of the benefits need to be calculated properly and transparently, so taxpayers better understand the deal, and so that the mayor's filings represent the true benefits he is getting from the arrangement.
