Surrey council ends 4-year term on cordial note<\/p>\n
Published 4:31 pm Monday, October 5, 2026<\/p>\n
The current Surrey council held the final meeting of its four-year term with no debate or election stumping on Monday, October 5, but rather went around the table to thank city staff for the work they do.<\/p>\n
A new Surrey council, to be elected on October 17, will have its inaugural meeting on Monday, November 2.<\/p>\n
Mayor Brenda Locke began the meeting with a tribute to city manager Rob Costanzo, who has worked with city hall for 35 years. <\/p>\n
He joined 1991 as engineering assistant with traffic operations.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou were just a little baby boy then Rob,\u201d Locke remarked.<\/p>\n
Costanzo was appointed city manager in 2023.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a remarkable career and one that has unfolded alongside decades of growth and change in the city of Surrey and through it all Rob has brought a real passion for public service and creative solution-oriented approach to his work,\u201d Locke said. \u201cHe\u2019s always looking for a way to get to yes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Later, Councillor Harry Bains thanked city staff \u201cfor all that you guys do for the city. It\u2019s an honour and a privilege to be sitting at this table.\u201d Councillor Pardeep Kooner called the term \u201can amazing four years and it\u2019s all because of the staff here at the City of Surrey. Your dedication, it\u2019s been an honour to work alongside you guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councillor Rob Stutt echoed that. \u201cThe learning curve has been incredible but without your guidance and wisdom we couldn\u2019t run this city.\u201d Councillors Doug Elford, Mike Bose, Linda Annis, Mandeep Nagra and Gord Hepner also paid tribute to the staff.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis group does a lot with a little,\u201d Elford said. \u201cYou are top-shelf people way across.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bose said it\u2019s been \u201can honour and a pleasure,\u201d Annis said city staff have \u201cbeen amazing in terms of helping us and keeping us focussed and keeping us informed,\u201d and Nagra added \u201cthank you for everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Councillor Gordon Hepner also weighed in.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just wanted to say to all the staff, you\u2019ve built this city, all those roads, all those parks, everything. Whether or not we\u2019re sitting in these chairs next month or not, you guys have something pretty special to actually show and showcase,\u201d Hepner said.<\/p>\n
All nine members are seeking re-election.<\/p>\n
Locke ended this council\u2019s final meeting with an olive branch of sorts.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just have a quick message. As this is our final council meeting of this term with the election coming up I want to thank my council colleagues for the respect and decorum they have brought to these chambers over the past four years,\u201d she told her fellow politicians. \u201cWe haven\u2019t always agreed but we have remained focussed on the work before us and on serving the good people of Surrey. Some of us may return to these seats and some of us may not, but I want to wish each of my colleagues well in the weeks ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Surrey council ends 4-year term on cordial note Published 4:31 pm Monday, October 5, 2026 The current Surrey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":922145,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194299],"tags":[49,48,87674],"class_list":["post-922144","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-surrey","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-surrey"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922144","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=922144"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/922144\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/922145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=922144"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=922144"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=922144"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}