{"id":776233,"date":"2026-07-02T20:35:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T20:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/776233\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T20:35:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T20:35:08","slug":"surrey-mayor-brenda-locke-denies-bailing-out-developer-on-arena-deal-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/776233\/","title":{"rendered":"Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke denies \u2018bailing out\u2019 developer on arena deal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Surrey mayoral candidate Doug McCallum is accusing Mayor Brenda Locke of \u201cbailing out\u201d a land developer in a celebrated land swap that was publicly revealed on <\/a>June 30 where land owned by the City of Surrey was traded for what\u2019s to be the site of a 10,000-seat arena in Whalley, to be built where a Safeway grocery store was on 104 Avenue and King George Boulevard.<\/p>\n

McCallum, the former mayor leading the Safe Surrey Coalition into the October 17 civic election, says city hall has paid $116.6 million worth of public assets for a site that according to BC Assessment is worth $86.8 million, \u201ccrashing\u201d from the $108.5 million the developer paid for the site in November 2022 to build four towers there (40, 42, 49 and 50 storeys).<\/p>\n

\u201cLand in City Centre currently trades at $8 to $10 million an acre,\u201d McCallum noted. \u201cBrenda Locke paid $23.3 million.\u201d<\/p>\n

Locke is standing her ground on the deal.<\/p>\n

She told the Now-Leader people are excited about it and the only \u201cnegatives\u201d she\u2019s heard are from people seeking public office. \u201cSo I think those negative comments are primarily politically driven.\u201d She denies any \u201cbail out.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe double-checked, triple-checked, we had Ernst & Young (accounting firm) do all kinds of breakdowns,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are very confident in the numbers. All of those negotiations are done by SCDC \u2013 our Surrey city development corporation \u2013 we\u2019re very confident in the deal that was made; it was made to be fair for both the owner of that property and for the City and especially for our taxpayer.\u201d<\/p>\n

The former Safeway grocery store site \u2013 at 10355 King George Boulevard just east of Surrey City Hall, is a five-acre parcel of land owned by Wesgroup Properties, which will receive three city-owned parcels \u2014 at 2750 194A Street and 19165 39 Avenue in Campbell Heights and Campbell Heights East, and part of the Cedar Hills Shopping Centre at 12820-12842 96 Avenue \u2014 as part of a deal to construct the City Centre Arena and Cultural Event Centre.<\/p>\n

Locke said it\u2019s \u201cprobably one of the most iconic\u201d pieces of property in the region. \u201cAll the transit lines go there,\u201d she noted. \u201cWe are getting so much interest, so much positive feedback from that particular piece of property.\u201d<\/p>\n

The City of Surrey, city-owned Surrey City Development Corporation real estate office (SCDC) and Vancouver Giants hockey team are among partners in the projected $360-million development, which could be built by 2030. Giants owners plan to move their team to Surrey from Langley Events Centre.<\/p>\n

McCallum said of the \u201cbehind closed doors\u201d deal that Locke credited Wesgroup nearly $30 million over assessed value \u201cfor land that is going down in value.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe developer bought at the top of the market. The condo market crashed. His project does not pencil. His land has lost a third of its value. And Brenda Locke handed him $116.6 million in public assets, more than he paid at the very peak of the market. His condo project failed, and the taxpayers of Surrey are paying for it. That is not a land deal. That is a bailout,\u201d McCallum charged.<\/p>\n

EY-Parthenon Corporate Finance Inc. provided a report to city manager Rob Costanzo on June 2 assessing the real estate exchange, summarizing four appraisals and a broker\u2019s opinion of the value completed for the SCDC and four appraisals completed for the propery owner.<\/p>\n

Its findings suggest the proposed transaction values \u201care within a reasonable range of the appraised values or broker opinion of value which suggests that the City is achieving market values for the assets.\u201d<\/p>\n

The report noted that as Wesgroup had not been offering the former Safeway property for sale and had the four-tower project in the works, \u201cit is reasonable to assume that in a scenario like this, it would be very challenging for the City to secure a discounted transaction price especially when it is understood that the location is strategic for the Arena and Entertainment Hub development.\u201d<\/p>\n

The consultant\u2019s report addressed market conditions wherein the \u201cfeasibility\u201d of high-density market housing development is \u201ccurrently challenged\u201d in Greater Vancouver. In Whalley there are just over 100 completed and unsolved condominiums but more than 5,500 under construction and developers have reported \u201cmuted demand\u201d for presale units.<\/p>\n

McCallum translates this into the City Centre\u2019s condo market \u201ccrashing under a glut of supply.\u201d The site\u2019s assessed value has crashed from $141 million to $86.8 million, he noted, \u201cand it is still falling.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of the properties Surrey \u201cgave up,\u201d McCallum said, Locke took $12 million less \u201cthan the City\u2019s own appraisers said they were worth. The developer got full price for a failed project. Taxpayers took the loss. That is a bailout, and taxpayers are Brenda Locke\u2019s bank.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meantime, he noted, the Cedar Hills Shopping Centre is 100 per cent leased with 17 tenants \u201cand has risen in assessed value every single year for five years\u201d while the Campbell Heights lands, at nearly 19 acres, \u201csit in the region\u2019s strongest industrial market, up an average of six per cent a year.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese were the city\u2019s trophy assets. A working, income-producing shopping centre. Prime industrial land. Property that pays the city every year, goes up in value every year, and belongs to the taxpayers,\u201d McCallum said. \u201cBrenda Locke traded the assets that keep appreciating for a condo site that keeps falling. She rescued a developer from his own bad bet and made Surrey eat the loss. And she did it behind closed doors.\u201d<\/p>\n

Locke retorted that councillors Doug Elford and Mandeep Nagra, McCallum\u2019s SSC running mates, voted in favour of the in-camera deal.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe voted to have the vote released,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s important to know that the very person that\u2019s making the political hay of it, or one of them, two of the councillors on his team voted in favour of the project because it\u2019s going to be a game-changer.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only negatives, as were predicted, councillor Annis and Bose, who don\u2019t seem to have a vision for the growth of this region,\u201d she said, getting a political poke of her own in.<\/p>\n

McCallum is calling for an \u201cindependent, public review\u201d and says the deal\u2019s status is only agreement in principle only and can still be reversed. \u201cThe transaction has not closed,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

On June 29 council approved setting up a policy governing the sale of city-owned land<\/a> with an aim to ensure compensation remains based on fair market value and passed a bylaw aimed at maintaining \u201cappropriate oversight of significant transactions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Surrey council voted on two corporate reports on June 29 related to land transaction rules and passed the bylaw at third reading.<\/p>\n

\u2013 with file by Tom Zillich.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Surrey mayoral candidate Doug McCallum is accusing Mayor Brenda Locke of \u201cbailing out\u201d a land developer in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":776234,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,163792,87674],"class_list":["post-776233","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\/776233","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=776233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/776233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/776234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=776233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=776233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=776233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}