City council in Surrey, B.C., has voted to send a plan to the province to keep the RCMP as its police force, saying it would save $235-million over five years.
Mayor Brenda Locke recently campaigned on a promise to reverse the city’s plans to create a municipal force and instead said she would retain the RCMP. She said on Monday that the savings for Surrey taxpayers is enormous and the city must stick with the Mounties because it can’t afford to make the change.
The city council vote comes as Alberta considers replacing the RCMP, which currently serves under contract as the provincial police force, with its own police agency. Policy makers in Alberta, including former premier Jason Kenney, have pointed to Surrey as a sign that the province was not alone in its desire to replace the RCMP.
The Surrey report said the cost of 734 officers with the Surrey Police Service would be $249,460 per officer, while each Mountie would be $205,990.
The city said the plan will be sent to Solicitor-General Mike Farnworth by Dec. 15 for his final review and approval, and Ms. Locke said she expects an answer back by early in the new year. The mayor said a prompt decision from Mr. Farnworth is essential to prevent any further unnecessary spending.
The Surrey Police Service, which is well into its transition in the city, said in a statement the report overestimates how many of its officers would join the Surrey RCMP and doesn’t consider $100-million in costs that have already been incurred.
Successive conservative governments in Alberta have debated for years whether to replace the RCMP with a provincial police force. Mr. Kenney revived the idea as part of a process designed to seize more control from the federal government and seek a “fair deal” for Alberta in its relationship with Ottawa.
The Alberta government, now under control of Premier Danielle Smith, has yet to make a formal decision, though Ms. Smith has also been a vocal supporter of a provincial police force.
A report released last year concluded that an Alberta police force could be operated at a lower overall cost than the RCMP, but at the same time the province would lose out on hundreds of millions of dollars in federal subsidies that Ottawa uses to subsidize the Mounties. The report also said it would cost $366-million to make the switch.
With files from Globe Staff