{"id":487084,"date":"2026-02-20T07:01:19","date_gmt":"2026-02-20T07:01:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/487084\/"},"modified":"2026-02-20T07:01:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-20T07:01:19","slug":"surrey-police-budget-slashed-by-47m-with-union-sounding-the-alarm-bc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/487084\/","title":{"rendered":"Surrey police budget slashed by $47M with union sounding the alarm – BC"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Surrey Police Union says it is concerned after the Surrey Police<\/a> Board cut $46.95 million from the budget for the upcoming year.<\/p>\n

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The reduction came from the provisional 2026 budget, which the board endorsed in November.<\/p>\n

The union stated, in a release, that the cut represents the annual cost of approximately 87 officers, with the average annual cost of each officer being $158,510.<\/p>\n

\u201cCutting nearly $47 million from policing at the 11th hour, while Surrey is facing an extortion crisis and while SPS is being asked to expand operations and assume additional districts, is reckless,\u201d said Ryan Buhrig, president of the Surrey Police Union, in a release.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou cannot demand more policing, more visibility and more capacity while simultaneously gutting the resources needed to deliver it.\u201d<\/p>\n

This follows the news on Wednesday that Surrey Police Service Chief Norm Lipinski expressed concern about being told they will need to take over District 4<\/a>, Cloverdale, from the RCMP before they have enough officers to do so.<\/p>\n

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The union says Surrey residents should be asking the police board if there will be times that officers won\u2019t be able to respond to calls, or if there will be cuts to critical teams, such as school liaison and mental health units.<\/p>\n

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The union said there is also a concern that fewer officers may be available for patrol and proactive policing.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt minimum, the Police Board must publicly disclose what services will be cut,\u201d Buhrig added in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe community should not learn about reductions only after response times rise, proactive patrol drops, or specialized supports disappear.\u201d<\/p>\n

The City of Surrey is also in the midst of an extortion crisis.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur members are under tremendous stress,\u201d Buhrig told Global News on Thursday.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe have an unprecedented extortion crisis in Surrey that\u2019s drawing members away from front-line policing. And at the same time, we\u2019re being directed by the province to take over additional districts.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow is not the time to be cutting police budgets. Now is the time to give us the resources to make sure that Surrey is safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke, however, said she is pleased to have a budget that furthers the balance between protecting public safety and keeping taxes low.<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe are funding exactly the number of police officers they asked us to, 189 officers are being funded,\u201d Locke said on Thursday.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so I\u2019m sure once they fully understand the budget, they will see it differently.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Surrey police, as of Monday, Feb. 16, since the beginning of the year, there have been 53 reported extortion cases in Surrey, with 11 shots fired, two related arsons and 31 victims, 17 of whom are repeat victims.<\/p>\n

The Canada Border Services Agency said on Tuesday it had launched probes<\/a> into 296 people who were \u201cbrought to our attention by B.C Extortion Task Force<\/a>\u00a0partner agencies as persons of interest.\u201d<\/p>\n

The latest statistics, which are as of Feb. 4, represent a\u00a0sharp increase<\/a>\u00a0from just a month ago, when the task force said that just over 100 CBSA investigations were underway.<\/p>\n

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Immigration enforcement officers are reviewing the files for \u201cpotential inadmissibility,\u201d meaning the CBSA may try to remove the individuals from Canada for immigration violations.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs a result of these investigations, 32 people have been issued a removal order, including 10 people who have already been removed from Canada,\u201d the CBSA said in a statement.<\/p>\n

\u2013with files from Stewart Bell<\/p>\n

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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tCanadian immigration officers investigating hundreds identified by extortion task force\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t&copy 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Surrey Police Union says it is concerned after the Surrey Police Board cut $46.95 million from the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":487085,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,2169,68979,87674,104653,194486],"class_list":{"0":"post-487084","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-surrey","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-crime","11":"tag-extortion","12":"tag-surrey","13":"tag-surrey-police","14":"tag-surrey-police-service"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487084","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487084"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487084\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/487085"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487084"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487084"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487084"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}