One thing in British Columbia is certain: Surrey politics is never boring.
The last four years in the province’s second-biggest city have seen a dysfunctional city hall, a start of a change in police forces and a mayor charged with public mischief.
Even with a court case looming, incumbent Mayor Doug McCallum opted to run again in the hope to keep his job.
But with so much chaos surrounding the mayor, seven others decided to enter the race.
City councillor Brenda Locke is seen as having the clearest path to unseating McCallum, having originally run on his Safe Surrey slate four years ago only to become one of his most vocal critics.
Experienced politicians Jinny Sims, Sukh Dhaliwal and Gordie Hogg are all vying for the mayor’s job as well.
If you find yourself in that boat – whether you don’t have time to comb through all of the promises or are struggling to cut through the noise – don’t panic. Global News has prepared a straightforward breakdown of who the candidates are and where they stand on some big policy issues.
Getting ready to vote
You are eligible to vote in the Surrey municipal election if you registered as a resident elector in Surrey, are 18 years of age or older on general voting day, are a Canadian citizen, are a B.C. resident for at least six months and are a resident of the City of Surrey for at least 30 days.
There are 52 voting locations set to be open on election day in Surrey.
Meet the mayoral candidates
There are eight people running to be the mayor of Surrey.
Multiple public opinion polls have pointed to five different candidates as having an opportunity to win.
Doug McCallum
First elected as mayor in 1996, McCallum is one of the most familiar and long-standing political forces in Metro Vancouver.
The now 78-year-old lost in 2005, opening the way for Dianne Watts and Surrey First. But McCallum was not done with politics, winning again in 2018 by more than 17,000 votes in a decisive victory over Tom Gill.
This time is shaping up to be as easy for McCallum. The face of the Safe Surrey Coalition has fulfilled the promise to bring SkyTrain to Surrey and transition the RCMP to the Surrey Police.
But those commitments have come with a cost, opening the mayor up for criticism with the SkyTrain not going to Newton and the police force still not supported by a majority of residents.
Then there is his legal challenge, a single public mischief charge linked to accusations McCallum made of a woman running over his foot with a car in a Save-On-Foods parking lot. The court case is expected to begin shortly after the election.
Unlike all the other mayoral front runners, McCallum turned down an opportunity to go on Focus BC on BC1.
Even though he has dodged debates and numerous one-on-one interview requests, the mayor has promised to maintain property tax hikes at 2.9 per cent annually for four years and build a 60,000-seat stadium if re-elected.
Brenda Locke
Locke has had a front-row seat to the chaos at Surrey City Hall over the past four years.
Locke originally was part of McCallum’s Safe Surrey Coalition but quit in 2019 citing dysfunction at city hall.
Since then she has been one of the biggest critics of the mayor and is committing during this election to stop the transition to a municipal police force.
“We have had four really rough years in our city and we need to deal with that,” Locke said.
“We need to make people proud of living in this city again. I am the only person running who has the ability to jump on board immediately.”
There have been debates around the cost of the police transition but according to Locke reversing course and staying with the RCMP would save $521 million.
Locke has also committed to hiring an ethics commissioner and advocating for municipal recall legislation to give residents the ability to recall elected officials.
Jinny Sims
Sims has seen so much in politics as the head of the B.C. Teachers Federation to Ottawa as an NDP MP and then most recently to Victoria as an NDP MLA.
Now her sights are set on a foray into municipal politics as mayor. She has taken a leave as the Surrey-Panorama MLA and will return to the job if her mayoral bid is not successful.
Representing the Surrey Forward slate as the mayoral candidate, Sims has focused the campaign on restoring order to city hall and taking a pause on the transition to a municipal police service for three months to study the financial details and collect public input.
“Our city hall is broken. It lacks transparency, it lacks accountability,” Sims said.
“Many people came to see me and said we need you to run and we need you to run to get elected and fix city hall.”
Sims says the culture at city hall would immediately change with a new mayor at the helm.
Her focus would be housing, child care and public transit rather than bickering around the city hall table.
Sukh Dhaliwal
One of Dhaliwal’s calling cards is giving his cell phone number to anyone who asks.
It is this sort of accessibility Dhaliwal hopes will allow him to make the transition from being the Liberal MP for Surrey-Newton to becoming the mayor of Surrey.
Dhaliwal is currently on leave from his MP job and will return if he loses the mayoral race.
Running under the United Surrey banner, Dhaliwal says his experience as a professional engineer would help with the day-to-day running of the city.
His political experience would help with running council meetings and restoring trust in city hall.
“If you look over the past four years you have seen division. This mayor and council created public division. I have never seen such a destructive council,” Dhaliwal said.
“We are missing the leadership on the scene. That is why I stepped up.”
Dhaliwal plans to continue with the police transition to a municipal force. Part of his public safety plan also includes establishing a law enforcement training facility in the city.
Gordie Hogg
Hogg is the former mayor of White Rock, the former BC Liberal MLA for Surrey-White Rock and the former Liberal MP for South Surrey-White Rock.
Now he wants to be the current mayor of Surrey.
Running under the Surrey First banner, Hogg is hoping to bring back a municipal party that has ruled Surrey for much of the 2000s.
Hogg is committing to better coordination between local, provincial and federal governments on issues ranging from transit to the environment to public safety.
“I am just darned excited about the potential of Surrey. The potential of Surrey is unbound. We have more land than Richmond, Burnaby and Vancouver combined,” Hogg said.
“Things have so dramatically changed over the last 20 years. I think my experiences have given me a context on how to deal with things. All three levels of government need to work together.”
Hogg said the city needs to bring back the Surrey City Development Corporation to control the property owned by the city and help create housing opportunities.
Meet the council candidates
Four years ago the Safe Surrey Coalition swept to power in Surrey winning all but one of the council seats.
But McCallum’s political party has eroded over time, with three of the councillors quitting the party over the past four years.
Six of the eight incumbents are running again. With Locke is running for mayor and Jack Hundial not running again.
Slates have been extremely effective in Surrey, with Surrey First sweeping the council seats in 2014, four years before the Safe Surrey Coalition won seven out of eight seats.
There are some storylines worth exploring for the council race.
Safe Surrey Coalition slate
The Safe Surrey Coalition boasts four incumbents with Doug Elford, Allison Patton, Mandeep Nagra and Laurie Guerra all running for re-election.
The party has bolstered its ranks with Debra Antifaev, Stuart Drysdale, John Gibeau and Raman Jassar hoping to earn a seat on the council.
The slate is expected to vote with McCallum on freezing the property tax, building a new 60,000 stadium and completing the police transition.
Surrey First slate
Surrey First was dealt a serious blow four years ago, losing all but one of the eight seats they help on the council.
Linda Annis is running for re-election and is hoping to be joined by newcomers Mike Bose, Bilal Cheema, Sargy Chima, Paul Orazietti, Ajit Mehat, Kulwinder Saini and Mary-Em Waddington.
The slate will support a public inquiry into Doug McCallum’s four-year approach to approving development applications in the city.
Annis boycotted the final council meeting of the term, as McCallum pushed 45 land use applications through the city council.
Surrey Forward
The team led by Jinny Sims as the mayoral candidate is full of political newcomers.
The slate including Philip Aguirre, Ramon Bandong, June Liu, Arsh Mander, Paramjit Malhi, Theresa Pidcock and Jody Toor is full of newcomers.
The slate is promising to immediately stop spending money on the police transition and spend it on crime and fire protection.
Surrey Forward is promising to put together a community safety plan to reduce violent crime, arrest and prosecute perpetrators of petty crime and eliminate gang activity.
United Surrey slate
Surrey politics makes unlikely bedfellows with former federal NDP MP Jasbir Sandhu running on a slate alongside current Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal.
The slate also includes Nicole Bennett, Jeff Bridge, Andy Dhillon, Margaret Lange, Zubeen Sahib, Julie Tapley and Becky Zhou.
The slate launched the campaign with four promises: An immediate one-year tax freeze, an incremental rollback of the land parcel tax to pre-2018 levels, the largest expansion of fields and parks in Surrey’s history and the shortest development permit approval times in Metro Vancouver within two years.
Surrey Connect slate
If the polls, and Surrey’s recent electoral history, are to be believed the Surrey Connect slate should expect a big night on election night.
Locke is topping the ticket of newcomers including Harry Bains, Gordon Hepner, Wil Kwok, Rob Stutt, Pardeep Kooner, Sebastian Sajda and Ramona Kaptyn.
Although Bains has a familiar name, he is not the current B.C. Labour minister and long-time MLA.
The slate of candidates has promised to work to recover legal fees for McCallum’s criminal defense case and clean up ethics at city hall.
Independent
Surrey city Coun. Steven Pettigrew is seeking re-election as an Independent candidate. Pettigrew won four years ago as part of the Safe Surrey Coalition.
Pettigrew says his main focus is planting more trees in the city and says the community has lost 5,000 trees since the last election.
The Big Issues
Police Transition
The number one issue from four years ago is once again on the political agenda.
McCallum is convinced the transition is finished and everything is in place to complete the move from RCMP to the Surrey Police Department.
Locke wants to end the transition and keep the RCMP operating police in Surrey.
Dhaliwal plans on continuing the transition to a municipal police force, while Sims would pause the transition for three months to study the financial details and collect public input.
Hogg has promised to hold a referendum on the transition.
Integrity at City Hall
City council meetings held in secret, control over the council agenda consolidated in the mayor’s office and dysfunction around the table have defined the last four years.
McCallum has done nothing to address how he would change the culture and the election ultimately comes down to whether people trust the way he has been managing the city.
Sims wants to open city hall back up by reinstating citizen advisory committees and Locke wants the province to put in legislation to recall municipal elected officials while hiring an ethics commissioner.
Hogg and Dhaliwal want to open up council meetings, with Dhaliwal calling for an immediate forensic audit of the city’s development applications.
Housing
Dhaliwal has embraced the “333 Approval Plan”, calling for development applications to be reviewed within a guaranteed time frame. This would mean three days for renovation applications, three weeks for applications to build a single-family home and three months for a multi-family dwelling.
Locke wants to reduce construction permit backlogs and increase the housing supply.
McCallum is proposing an online system where residents choose a house plan template and get a permit within two weeks.
Sims is promising to double the number of housing permits approved in the first two years, and increase the supply of below-market rental housing to 25 per cent.