Old Mounties are the New Guard in Surrey

Posted on by Pete Cross

As many of you are now aware, a new Chief has been anointed by the Surrey City Counsel Police board. The signalling white smoke has come out of the Surrey Detachment chimney officially proclaiming that Norm Lipinski has metamorphosed once again and become the head of the brand new Surrey Police Department. The selection process was described as an extensive “world wide search” and after casting this wide all encompassing net, it was then conveniently discovered, that they only needed to look a couple of miles west of Surrey to find the perfect candidate in the hamlet of Delta.  

The Police Board said they chose Lepinski because he was “a seasoned leader in community level policing”. Further, Mr. Lepinski after this thorough vetting, showed “demonstrable experience promoting progressive policing policies, including commitment to de-escalation training and ability to foster a diverse and inclusive environment”.

Now, many of you readers, will at this time begin the slow roll of the eyes skyward, but one must accept that this is after all the “new” policing world. Clearly, Mr. Lipinski has reached master class level in professing and promoting the politically acceptable —the lauded dialogue of “consultation” “progressive” “diversity” “representation” and “equity in policing” and he can probably put them all in one sentence.  

These professed qualities will undoubtedly be tested early. The large South Asian community in Surrey has already begun expressing displeasure at the choice of Mr. Lepinski.  

What may be more questionable is that Lepinski has now decided that at least two of his three Deputies should be from the Mounties— the same Mounties, they are striving to replace. The fact that he has chosen from the Mounties is somewhat perplexing, but even more baffling may be the two he has chosen for those Deputy positions. 

To help us better understand maybe we need to review the curriculum vitae of Mr. Lepinski, who is orchestrating this controversial transition, as it may provide some clues.  

Mr. Lepinski spent thirty years in the Edmonton Police Service before deciding that he wanted to re-settle into this land of the lotus. He seemed to use his time in Edmonton wisely. He achieved a Masters of Business Administration degree as well as a Bachelor of Laws Degree while there. 

He left Edmonton in 2010 after thirty years and then in a somewhat unusual move applied to be a red serge Mountie. This proposition was apparently received with wide open arms. In fact they were so taken with him, they immediately assigned him the high rank of Assistant Commissioner for E Division British Columbia. One could assume that this move was approved by the then Commissioner of the RCMP Bob Paulson.   

Then in 2015,  Lepinski, after a relatively brief five years with the RCMP (maybe long enough to find the way to the Tim Hortons in Green Timbers) then applies and becomes Deputy Chief of the Delta Police Department, a small 200 person department on the geographic boundary with Surrey. Here he joins his old alumni from Edmonton Police Service— Neil Dubord —who had become the Chief of Delta PD. No doubt this was a coincidence.  

Chief Dubord himself had spent twenty-five years with the Edmonton Police Service eventually rising to the rank of Deputy Chief in Charge of Community Policing. He left Edmonton in 2012 and he too headed for the milder climate of British Columbia where he too impressed the locals and won the job of Chief of BC Transit Police. 

After three short years Dubord also got itchy feet and then applied and won the competition to become the Chief of Delta PD . That was also in 2015. Dubord is also academically inclined and managed to earn a Masters degree in Leadership and Training and now lists himself as a Canadian Human Resource Professional. He has also written a dissertation for his PHD in business.

It may be a little cheeky to point out that, although academically gifted, loyalty would not be the single foremost characteristic for either of these individuals. 

But for Lepinski the career march continued once again. Lepinski spent five years in Delta and despite now having spent forty years in police work—having already reached the normal declared age of retirement at sixty-five— decides that he should apply and indeed warrant the job to become the  Chief of Surrey. 

It may be pertinent in the future to note that Lepinski’s spouse of many years is former Global television reporter Lynda Steele— who now has a radio talk show on CKNW the preeminent station in Vancouver and Surrey. CKNW throughout the development of MacCallum’s vision of a separate police agency was very anti-MacCallum. It will be interesting to note if the coverage changes in the next few years. 

So now, Lepinski after picking up his third pension cheque, has now assumed his new role as Chief of the  Surrey Police Service. 

Clearly, Mr. Lipinski is well versed in RCMP and Municipal police politics. It is equally clear that he has a deft ability to self-promote. However, he is now facing problems in Surrey that he would not have seen in Delta or during his brief stay in the Mounties. Surrey is unique in many ways in both its makeup and the problems that come with it; extensive gang activity, disparate ethnic communities, massive population growth, and a large immigrant contingent will create a fire hose of daily problems and emergencies– and that is not even considering the logistics of changeover of equipment and personnel. It will all demand an enormous amount of operational competency and a dextrous administration in this city which proclaims “Where the Future Lives Here” 

One has to constantly remember that the Mounties are being dispatched from Surrey because the policing need was not being met in that city; at least according to the majority of the voters and taxpayers of that City. The underlying enormous structural and cultural problems within the RCMP are at the root of the various issues and those issues can be placed squarely at the feet of the upper management of this organization over the last number of decades. It is not the individual police members. 

Therefore there is a singular issue of paramount importance in this transition and that is the need to transform the RCMP current structure. The normal organizational pyramid one expects, in the Surrey RCMP, is upside down. It is ridiculously top heavy.

The general duty officers, the uniforms, need to once again become the largest and dominant component of the detachment. Advancement and promotion need to be contingent on first coming through the rank and file where experience lurks, not in the carpeted cubicles of the current over bureaucratized offices. It is at the first attendance level that your future professional police officers are fed and cultivated and grow to be professional and competent officers of the law and would form the backbone of any professional service.

With deference to the background of Mr. Lepinski; his speciality in “community policing” or “diversity” is not either the main problem nor is it the solution to making Surrey a viable and professional police service. 

If one accepts the need for change and recognizes the obvious mis-management that has been occurring and accepted for many years in the RCMP, it would be seemingly counter-intuitive to think that in the building of this new force, that the Mountie system should be adopted wholesale in any way. Should it not be assumed that bringing into the fold some Mounties, who have thrived under this dysfunction, they would not be the likeliest candidates to lead any reform. In naming RCMP Supt Jennifer Hyland and RCMP Assistant Commissioner Mike Lesage as his Deputies, clearly Mr. Lipinski does not agree. 

Supt Jennifer Hyland, is a former twenty year member of the New West P.D. After this stint she also discovered it beneficial to move over to the Mounties where she too was welcomed with open arms and rose up the ranks. Inspector in North Vancouver for a brief time and then quickly promoted to being the Superintendent for the Maple Ridge RCMP; the same detachment she had served in from 2006-2014. 

Upon returning to Maple Ridge she said “This is my hometown, and this has been a career highlight for me—to be the chief of police in my hometown.”

(Coincidently, Hyland’s spouse, Paul Hyland just got made the Deputy Chief in New Westminster PD.) 

Apparently that homecoming feeling wore off after four years and she is now heading over to the Municipal force in Surrey.  She will oversee the “support services bureau, in charge of recruiting, training, leadership and development.” 

Supt. Hyland never seems hesitant to speak of her accomplishments and says that she is leaving having “fostered that culture of respect and support in Ridge Meadows”.

Hyland received the 2020 International Association of Women Police award for mentoring and coaching. The program according to the advocates was “successful in assisting female police officers with their advancement in leadership roles.” All laudable of course, especially in this woke age, but one wonders if the average Surrey voter feels that the problem with the current police department is a lack of female officers or that the officers are victims of a toxic culture. Again, Mr. Lepinski may think so. 

The second deputy choice, Mike Lesage, is even a little more baffling. If there was a classic manager personifying the RCMP in the last number of years it would be Mr. Lesage, who often points out that he is a member of the Garden River First Nation. His career trajectory is common to many in the high ranks of the RCMP; into Ottawa, and then out to the hinterland to dip his toe in the waters of the unwashed. National Aboriginal Policing, National Crime Prevention Section, the Community Policing Bureau, then stints with the Integrated National Security Enforcement Team and most recently the RCMP Anti gang unit at Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit. 

So what can we make of these appointments. First and foremost the populace of Surrey will be hearing a lot about “community engagement”. We can also easily assume that the third and final Deputy will be of South Asian descent. But, when we get past the community consultation phase, the coffee klatches and the town hall meetings (the Delta PD have many town hall meetings) will there finally be some final recognition of the real problem? That is the unanswered question.

Only time will tell and maybe National Police Federation President Brian Sauve is right when he describes it as a “flawed transition” and that everything is in “disarray”. Of course, Mr. Sauve has been spending good Mountie union dues fighting against the obvious inevitably of the transition even happening. He also clearly has a vested interest in his union not losing the biggest RCMP detachment in the country. So it is entirely possible that he is wrong once again. 

To be sure, there is a cloying feeling to all of this, a feeling of old hat, old broom, nothing new; and that is indeed unfortunate.  The first opportunity may already have been missed.

Photo Courtesy of Reg Natarajan via Flickr Commons – Some Rights Reserved

Surrey RCMP – the Walmart for Law and Order

Posted on by Pete Cross

Surrey, home of the RCMP’ s biggest municipal detachment, is now a political plank in the current election platforms of the two major parties in the wacky world of British Columbia politics. Unusual to be sure for an RCMP organization which historically considered itself apolitical.  The old Mountie guard remained above the pettiness— the grimy dirt of politics— it needed to be objective, forever the humble and unbiased servant of the people.

The N.P.F. is now changing those mores.

Surrey has now become the site for the ongoing battle between the RCMP– more accurately the union representing its current 800 plus members— the National Police Federation (NPF) –and the duly and properly elected government of the Surrey Coalition Party led by Mayor MacCallum. 

The NPF has taken the position that they know what is best for an  electorate which only a short time ago dramatically voted in favour of a new municipal police force, a promise that was a central tenet proposed by Mayor MacCallum and his municipal party.  

The NPF along with their political cohorts now argue that Surrey needs to retain the RCMP—the primary reason– they are cheaper.

Why pay more they say, when Surrey is already the Walmart of policing.  Their argument in point of fact fits in nicely with the new Walmart slogan “Save Money, Live Better” (the old slogan was “Always Low Prices ” which would also have worked)

For a long time, the debate pro and con has been waged in small skirmishes for the most part confined to the boundaries of Surrey. However, the calling of a Provincial election and a new Liberal promise has now thrust the issue on to the electoral and media stages as much as they can elbow away Covid.

Struggling from a very distant second in the polls Liberal leader Wilkinson is sprinkling Liberal gold dust throughout the Province. Sprinkling may be an understatement, more a fire hose, offering to  spend billions of dollars in various parts of the Province. Like most parties who get a glimpse of some sort of electoral advantage, Mr. Wilkinson is now grasping for a possible political gain by supporting a referendum in Surrey. No concern apparently for the independence of municipal politics or the duly elected government. 

The Liberal party has three ridings in Surrey which are of interest and may be in trouble; Guildford, Panorama and Cloverdale. He and his party clearly believe that his newfound stance will play well in these areas of middle class rectitude. 

The NDP government for their part having climbed on to the shoulders of poor Dr Bonny Henry to scan the horizon, now feel that this is an opportune time to ride that Covid wave. They are in a difficult spot in Surrey as their government through the Police Services department has already approved the going forward of a new police department–at least in its initial stages. When previously approached about changing his mind, Horgan quite rightly stated that the city of Surrey has the right to go forward with their proposal. The Province has no legitimate right to intervene.  

With the Wilkinson announcement the usual rolodex of commentators have now been given some political fertilizer to spread on the idea of a referendum. They already disliked MacCallum.

The NPF is the wedge. Although political neophytes, this has not hampered their enthusiasm.

Their motivation seems simple enough—they do not want to lose the membership in their union. The Surrey detachment is a flagship in the overall contract policing environment.  It is representative of the “big city” RCMP policing model, one of only a handful throughout the entire country. To lose the biggest out of your group is not the best first step for any union. 

There are other chess pieces in this process; the NDP and their leader Mr. Horgan; the Liberals under Mr. Wilkinson. Then there are the very vocal Surrey City Counsil members Linda Annis and fellow Surrey Counsel member and former Mountie himself Jack Hundial.  The centre is held by the curmudgeonly Mayor MacCallum, the dastardly wizard pulling the levers.

The NPF using house money pouring in from their new found members have begun launching ads, enlisting supporters and putting out lawn signs (which apparently, legally, they were not allowed to do–I guess they forgot to check local bylaws) . They believe, rightly or wrongly, that they enjoy the support of all the officers of Surrey in putting up the show of a good fight. However, in speaking with officers in that detachment, one does not get a sense that all are enamoured with their new union bosses.

The NPF have enlisted local politicians to spout their platform, and are receiving encouragement from former Mounties writing in to the printed media. Including, the former head of Surrey detachment Al McIntyre and ex- Deputy Commissioner Peter German (who recently authored the report on money laundering for the Province.) With the exception of one local politician, all of these individuals are of course former RCMP officers. 

The centre piece of the NPF argument is the evidence they claim to have gained from a paid for survey that they conducted. This blogger has talked about it previously, suffice to say the veracity of the survey can be questioned. But emanating from this “survey” they are putting out narratives such as: only “14%” of the current RCMP officers would switch to a new agency. That the undertaking is “costly…unsafe…unpopular”.  

As previously eluded to, the enlisted municipal political arm for the NPF come from two clearly disgruntled politicians; Linda Annis, and to a somewhat lesser degree ex-Mountie Jack Hundial. 

Ms. Annis was a member of the Surrey First political group, finished 6th in the election for counsel and was the single survivor of the overwhelming majority won by Mayor MacCallum who won on two central issues, a separate police force and a skytrain extension. 

Annis was previously a cohort of Dianne Watts, a popular mayor who believed that this would translate into a run at the Provincial Liberal leadership. It didn’t work out for her.  Interestingly, Watts first won a seat with MacCallum’s group in 1996 but then had a falling out and went on to form her own party. 

Watts enjoyed a very bonded, some would say intimate relationship with the RCMP during her time. Annis as head of Crimestoppers B.C clearly believes she has that same connection.  

Annis currently runs an ad where she proclaims that the Surrey residents are facing “an unprecedented crisis”, that moving to a new local force would “risk public safety on an unknown, untested, and under-resourced force”.

She goes on to say that the plan will result in “chaos and significant risks to public safety around the region”. This latter argument is based on the theory that any new agency will draw out resources from other departments. The chaos and risk to public safety language is simply pandering to Twitter and the rest of the media.

So on the one hand, her argument goes—no new Mounties will want to go this agency, but on the other it will be too much of a draw on resources from all the other agencies surrounding Surrey?

Needless to say, Annis is not and has never been a supporter of MacCallum.

This fight, marching in step with the NPF reeks of being a very personal battle for her.

Councillor Jack Hundial on the other hand actually ran under MacCallum’s ticket with the Safe Surrey Coalition in the past election. He has now become a turncoat.

Clearly, no longer enamoured with the Mayor and just as clearly he has been pushed from the inner political power circle. He has now gone on to form his own group with Councillor Brenda Locke, now calling themselves Surrey Connect. The reason for this falling out is not clear. This writer has known Mr. Hundial for some time and have had many personal discussions working together–usually about the failings of the RCMP. So this sea change to retain the RCMP on a personal level seems somewhat out of sync.

The talk media, especially CKNW has a very historical connection to the Liberal party. Remember Christy Clark’s radio show? They are equally motivated by the fact that they do not like MacCallum, never have. He won’t go on their shows.

Linda Annis on the other hand answers on the first ring and appears almost daily.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Indo Canadian Voice newspaper says Annis politicking “hysteria knows no bounds” and says that the enlisting of Peter German “is an utter disgrace”.

So what should we take from all this? 

First and foremost, the call for a referendum may be legally flawed.  

Furthermore, all of this debate  has little to do with the facts or the actual possible transition to another police force. The debate and the call for a referendum has descended into parochial politics. 

There is one guarantee. The cost of policing in Surrey is going to increase dramatically regardless of who wins this debate and the political tug of war. 

What the anti-MacCallum forces don’t mention is that the RCMP is currently in negotiation with the Treasury Board for a pay raise. A pay raise that will be retroactive to 2017. The RCMP has already warned the municipalities that they are currently projecting a 2.5% increase per year. 

This 2.5% increase would mean a $3600 per year per officer— or roughly $2.8 million per year. Over three years $8.6 million just to catch up. Let’s not forget that the RCMP, the very same NPF who argues about the Mounties being cheaper is arguing for a 17% increase, not a 7 or 8% increase. 

On the other side the transition to a new Force is currently projected to increase policing costs by 10 or 11%. Many argue that this figure is too low and there is not enough transparency to make a full determination. They could be right, but any transition costs money. For the opposition to now argue that the electorate did not think  it would cost any money to commit to a transfer is a bit specious. 

The voters of Surrey were and seem to have been asking for a transition for greater accountability and an ability to set local policing priorities in terms of resourcing and policing initiatives. How much are they willing to pay for that extra accountability and local input would be very difficult to measure. 

The referendum advocates clearly want to couch any future question to the electorate as a question of whether people want to see their taxes go up.  Do you know any group of taxpayers who would answer in the positive? (By the way it also costs money to run a referendum.)

Walmart is the largest private employer in the world, and the RCMP is the largest police force in Canada. Maybe, there are some similarities.

But remember, Walmart keeps prices down –partly because they proudly state that they don’t believe in unions — the Mounties now have the NPF. 

The NPF is arguing that they must keep the Mounties, they are cheaper, while also stating that they need to hire more RCMP officers. But, to the Federal Treasury Board they are saying the Mounties are worth much, much more. 

Conundrums, Aisle 5.