Stopping Surrey's policing transition could save taxpayers $235M, report says

SURREY, B.C. -

The divisive debate over who should provide policing in Surrey is back on the agenda Monday.

City council is set to decide whether or not to endorse a plan to keep the RCMP.

According to a staff report, stopping the police transition would save taxpayers an estimated $235.4 million over five years.

However, the chief of the Surrey Police Service says he wasn’t consulted about the report.

“We believe that there's some errors in the assumptions that were taken there," said Chief Norm Lipinski, adding that the SPS believes the report is "incomplete."

Several councillors also say the numbers in the report don’t add up.

“We first of all saw a number of in excess of $500 million from Surrey Connect under Brenda Locke’s leadership,” said Linda Annis, a Surrey First councillor.

“We've seen these numbers today and the Surrey Police Service are saying that the cost will be just over $100 million. Clearly, we can't make a decision without the facts. The residents of Surrey, at the very least, deserve to know the facts if they can't have a referendum,” she told CTV News.

The report projects it would cost about $1.2 billion to fund the Surrey Police Service from 2023 to 2027.

That’s compared to $925 million it would cost to drop the new force and keep the RCMP during the same time period.

The $235 million in savings, projected by city staff, includes a 10 per cent subsidy the federal government grants to municipalities that contract the RCMP.

“We disagree with that. We think it's half that, we think it's $99 million and we've gone over the numbers repeatedly. What should have happened is that we get together with their financial people, everybody in one room and discuss the numbers,” said Lipinski.

Coun. Annis agrees.

“I'm very concerned that nobody from the SPS was consulted on the report. And in fact, I was asking at the last council meeting that we bring in an independent person that's not either affiliated with the Surrey police service, or with the RCMP to provide an unbiased report,” said the councillor.

The SPS says the numbers provided by staff do not factor in severance costs, it estimates at about $81 million.

“If you look at the Employment Standards Act, where there's mass layoffs, there's additional weeks that employees could get,” said the chief.

“That could be upwards to 12 more weeks, depending on the situation, depending on the interpretation. But you're talking about 18 weeks plus another 12 weeks, you're talking big money here. So that was not in the report,” said Lipinski.

The municipal force currently employs 375 officers and civilians.

A recent survey by the Surrey Police Union found that 94 per cent of its membership are not interested in joining the RCMP.

“Some of these people came from out of province, they came here, incurred debt, bought houses, and they're going to be out of a job. They came here in good faith,” said Lipinski.

The chief says there’s also $107 million in sunk costs such as IT infrastructure – taxpayer dollars that will be lost if the transition ends.

“How many times can you flip-flop? And if it's not this issue, is that another issue for a municipality? I don't think it serves the citizens of Surrey to go through this exercise perhaps every four years. I don't think it serves the citizens of Surrey to reverse this is too far down the road,” said Lipinski.

Scrapping the police transition was a key election promise made by Mayor Brenda Locke during October’s civic election.

She declined to comment until council makes a decision.

The report will go before Surrey’s mayor and council Monday night, with a recommendation it be endorsed and presented to Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth by Thursday.