The saga of Surrey’s beleaguered police transition took another turn this week with the province’s public safety minister sending yet another ominous letter to mayor and council.
The missive from Mike Farnworth warns Surrey’s elected leaders that he expects to see a draft of the report they vote on when the matter of whether to keep the RCMP or revert to the municipal Surrey Police Service (SPS) finally goes to a vote in the coming weeks.
In April, Farnworth “strongly recommended” keeping the SPS, and offered $150 million to help offset transition costs. If Surrey’s council plans to keep the RCMP it must meet several mandatory conditions around staffing and recruiting.
Farnworth said the province needs to see whether a plan to meet those conditions is included in whatever Surrey council votes on, but that he’s since been informed that the city won’t be sharing the draft.
“I am concerned that should Council vote on a plan that does not adequately address the mandatory and binding conditions on the transition, this already precarious situation could become further destabilized in an expedited timeline,” Farnworth’s letter states.
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“This could create a policing crisis which puts into question safe and effective policing in the City of Surrey.”
Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke, who has holds a majority on council and was elected on a promise to scrap the SPS, has previously indicated she hopes to hold a vote on the issue by the end of the month.
“If they vote to go back to the Surrey RCMP they have to abide by all of those conditions. They’re not maybes, or if-you-feel-like-its, they are binding,” Farnworth told Global News.
“That’s why council needs to have a full understanding of the implications of those conditions and of the costs, for example, of those conditions, and that’s why its important that we’re able to see that report so we can make sure that is in fact the case.”
Locke refused to comment on the letter, but has called a last-minute closed council meeting for 2 p.m. Thursday afternoon.
Coun. Doug Elford, who supports keeping the SPS, said he was surprised to hear the minister’s concerns.
“I was certainly surprised to see the letter indicated that the city had not communicated their intentions to the province,” he said Wednesday.
“It really surprises me that there was a lack of transparency on the part of the city in terms of the information that should be forwarded to the province.”
Elford added that the public is getting tired of the back and forth, and wants to see a decision on the future of policing in the city.
The Surrey Police Union echoed that concern.
“All police officers in Surrey, whether SPS or the RCMP, need a clear timeline. We need a timeline for a decision,” spokesperson Ryan Buhrig said.
“The uncertainty has been dragging on too long and we need to be able to move forward in the best interest of Surrey residents.”
Despite recent efforts to halt it, the transition to the SPS had been underway for months before Locke’s majority was elected, with more than 400 officers and support staff on the payroll.
The SPS’ plan to eventually hire 734 officers is estimated to cost about $30 million more annually than Surrey’s contract with the RCMP, but severance costs for SPS officers if the force was disbanded would now cost about $72 million.
The RCMP currently has about 1,500 job vacancies throughout B.C.
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