Looks like it boils down to:
“The Surrey Police Service had a budget of $48.7 million for 2023 and they’ve exceeded it by about $23 million, and it’s now in the area of $75 million,” said Peter German, an advisor to the city.
“My understanding from the reporting is that they have now gone ahead and hired up to 10 more officers despite being advised by the City they are well over budget
and
The SPS would not comment on the matter.
so 75m for a municipal police force a year, dang.
I went and check Burnaby,
https://www.burnaby.ca/sites/default/files/acquiadam/2023-04/2022-Annual-Municipal-Report.pdf
page 35, police contract is 58.7m for 2022.
So Surrey probably spend on par or more than Vancouver.
What did they spend the first $48 million on?
Civilian murder and abuse payouts?
That does rack up the bills I suppose.
The one thing I like about a national police force is that, if you are found to be incompetent or abusive, you can’t just go down the road to the next city over, and get hired on by their police force. Because that’s what happens in America.
With a national police force, you either behave yourself, or be out of a job within the entire bloody country. You can’t just bounce to the next town over, because they make use of the same org you left or were ejected from.
Seems it was Mike Farnworth’s decision to force the metro cops on the citizens of surrey, despite a clear vote otherwise. It’s a gutsy move to nullify the vote of the public, and an expensive idea to fund a police service from his own budget.
…because that’s what he needs to do, now.
The City needs to say “this is your budget. You get No More. And don’t try to pad it with some cost-splitting on fines.”
