Surrey councillors blast mayor after reports of police chief ouster<\/p>\n
Published 7:48 am Tuesday, June 2, 2026<\/p>\n
The Surrey police board has confirmed that Surrey Police Service Chief Const. Norm Lipinski has left the SPS, with councillors and Surrey mayoral candidates Mike Starchuk and Linda Annis issuing releases Tuesday morning blasting Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke for the reported ouster.<\/p>\n
The Vancouver Sun reported Lipinski has until Thursday (June 4) to resign or be terminated without cause after a Monday (June 1) meeting.<\/p>\n
In a release Tuesday morning (June 2), the Surrey Police Board announced that Lipinski \u201chas left Surrey Police Service,\u201d and that Deputy Chief Const. Todd Matsumoto has been appointed interim chief constable.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to assure our partners and all community members that we remain focused on protecting public safety and providing uninterrupted service delivery to the community. We are confident in the leadership team of SPS, and in the continued professionalism of all SPS personnel,\u201d the release said, adding the board will initiate a recruitment process for a new permanent chief constable.<\/p>\n
Annis said the reports that Lipinski has been ousted as the head of the SPS \u201craises troubling questions\u201d about Locke\u2019s four-year campaign to \u201cstop, stall and derail the police transition, which is now in year eight because of her bad decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Locke\u2019s opposition to the SPS is well-known, Annis continued, and added Lipinski\u2019s termination by the mayor\u2019s \u201crecent hand-picked police board is another tragic example of how her political interference and personal vendetta against our local police department is making our city unsafe,\u201d in the release.<\/p>\n
The dismissal of Lipinski \u2014 who has served as SPS chief since 2020 and had his contract renewed for three years in October 2025 (with option of renewal for two additional years) \u2014 means the transition\u2019s timing will be further impacted, and the leadership disruption at the SPS is not good for morale or public safety, Annis continued.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe mayor has treated the SPS like a political football, and that has to be hard on the men and women of our police department,\u201d Annis said. \u201cChief Lipinski and the men and women of the SPS have done an incredible job in the face of the mayor\u2019s constant opposition, interference and budget cuts. Instead of being a champion for our local police service, the mayor has been its biggest opponent, and the termination of Chief Lipinski is one more example of how she puts politics ahead of public safety.\u201d<\/p>\n
Starchuk also attacked Locke in a release, saying the mayor has \u201conce again destabilized the Surrey Police Service transition \u2014 this time by enabling her newly constituted Surrey Police Board to fire Chief Norm Lipinski \u2014 after meetings held predominantly behind closed doors, with five new Locke-preferred board members leading the charge.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cMayor Locke has been swinging a wrecking ball over Surrey\u2019s police transition since day one. Now her hand-picked board \u2014 with less than 10 weeks of formal experience \u2014 has fired the chief of police behind closed doors. Surrey families deserve to know who is really driving decisions at the Surrey police board,\u201d Starchuk said in his release.<\/p>\n
Monday night, SPS senior media relations officer Staff Sgt. Lindsey Houghten said SPS knew \u201cnothing\u201d about the ouster, and deferred all questions to the SPS board.<\/p>\n
Locke issued a statement Tuesday morning thanking Lipinski for his service to the city and the SPS.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs mayor, my focus remains public safety, and I look forward to working with interim chief Todd Matsumoto during this transition period,\u201d Locke said in the statement. \u201cI am confident that the Surrey Police Board has a plan in place that will continue to prioritize keeping our neighbourhoods safe, while supporting the SPS to become a Canadian leader in trusted, modern, and responsive policing.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement released Tuesday afternoon, Matsumoto also thanked Lipinski \u201cfor his leadership and guidance of SPS over the past five-and-a-half years, and for his 47 years of service in policing.\u201d<\/p>\n
As interim chief constable, Matsumoto said he is committed to serving in the role while the police board begins its search for the next SPS chief, and looks forward to working with the board \u201cto maintain momentum on the work that matters most for Surrey.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThroughout this leadership transition, our focus remains unchanged: keeping people in Surrey safe,\u201d the statement said. <\/p>\n
Peace Arch News has also reached out to SPS police board executive director Jason Kuzminski.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Surrey councillors blast mayor after reports of police chief ouster Published 7:48 am Tuesday, June 2, 2026 The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":710391,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,163792,87674],"class_list":["post-712404","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-surrey","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-lower-mainland","tag-surrey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712404","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=712404"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712404\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/710391"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712404"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712404"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712404"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}