Limited List Of Openings Proves The Point: Surrey Mayor Is Keeping Facilities Closed To Pay $129 Million Police Transition Bill

Surrey, BC: Councillor Linda Annis says a city press release distributed Friday afternoon outlining the limited opening of a handful of city facilities reinforces that the mayor is keeping rinks, rec centres, pools, seniors centres and libraries closed to help pay his $129 million police transition bill.

“One look at the list and you can see it’s all the low-hanging fruit, a handful of easy outdoor facilities and programs that don’t cost much at all,” said Annis. “Closing our facilities when Covid-19 hit us was the right thing to do, but now it’s time to reopen our pools, rinks, rec centres, libraries and seniors centres in ways that meet the provincial health guidelines.

Stores, restaurants and other facilities have all found creative and effective ways to re-open safely, and so should our city facilities. Instead, we have some of the province’s best public facilities sitting empty, all to save money so the mayor can pay for his police department. We have really smart staff and terrific facility managers, don’t tell me that if they were given the green light to open that they couldn’t figure out how to do it and run their facilities safely. Our teams are terrific, but that’s not the direction they’ve been given.”

Over the past week Annis has been posting pictures of closed pools, rinks, seniors centres, libraries and rec centres across the city on Twitter and Facebook. “For instance, the new Clayton rec centre is completed, but sitting behind fencing because it was closed even before it opened,” noted Annis.

‘Important public amenities like these make cities more livable and they are really important for our kids, seniors and families. If the mayor wanted them open they’d be open, but every day they remain closed he can siphon off more money to pay the costs that are mounting around his police department.”