EDITOR’S NOTE: The Now-Leader obtained an embargoed copy of Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner’s third State of the City Address, which she delivered Thursday in Surrey. This story uses Hepner’s embargoed speech as its main source.
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It was with tears and laughter that outgoing Surrey Mayor Linda Hepner delivered her fourth and final State of the City Address this week, as she prepares to bid farewell to a city hall she’s worked in for more than three decades.
Hepner delivered her sold-out speech on Sept. 19 at the Sheraton Vancouver Guildford Hotel to a business crowd of roughly 500.
She used the opportunity to take a look back at the city’s evolution over her 33-year career, point to the city’s many achievements in recent years, announce a new “Director of Housing” that is to be hired, and, poke fun at some of her “media missteps.”
“Don’t ever say you want a Ferris wheel,” she smirked, eliciting laughter from the crowd. “Maybe a small carousel, or to be even safer, stick to a pony ride, but not a Ferris wheel. Even though the best cities in the world do all seem to have them.
“Secondly, don’t take your husband’s advice when he says, ‘Why don’t you just tell them you’re not the sheriff.'” Hepner added, referencing a controversial comment she made in the wake of 2015 gunfire on city streets. “And thirdly, all it takes is one short fall on a crumbling bridge, a bit of blood and bingo, you can have a new (Pattullo) bridge. Who knew it could be so easy?”
Hepner talks of her media missteps. “Don’t you want a Ferris wheel,” she says, eliciting laugher. #surreybc pic.twitter.com/6SoOPHXW8s
— Surrey Now-Leader (@SurreyNowLeader) September 19, 2018
Hepner told the business crowd that she is full of “mixed emotions,” as she prepares for the end of her long career. Hepner worked her way up the ranks at city hall as an employee, most recently as the city’s economic development manager before being elected to council in 2005, then winning the mayor’s chair in 2014.
She teared up, paused, and looked down as she said the miles she’s travelled, “were never travelled alone.”
“I had good company along the way,” she smiled, as applause erupted to encourage her to continue.
READ ALSO ZYTARUK: Hepner, to her credit, rose to the occasion
“It feels like the final episode of a favourite TV show,” she said, pointing to the final episode of Friends, “when after 10 seasons, Ross, Rachel and their friends all move on, but leave their keys to the apartment on the counter for the next group of friends who move in.”
She said her time at city hall has “included a real cast of characters, with people and circumstances that have inspired me, intrigued me, influenced me, and sometimes event made me want to change the channel.”
See also: Surrey mayor’s 2017 State of the City Address focuses on ‘big ideas’ May 18, 2017
Hepner looked back at what Surrey was like 33 years ago, when she began her career, noting population has grown from 150,000 to nearly 550,000.
“And that growth continues today as we welcome 300 new families every month,” she said. “They come because we have housing options and prices that don’t exist in other parts of the region. They come because we have one of the lowest per capita city taxes and expenses in the region.”
Back then, the value of building permits was just $200 million but Hepner said “these days we top $1.5 billion annually.”
“Thirty three years ago we had just 45 parks,” said Hepner.
“Today we have 265 parks, with another 46 on the drawing board including a new waterfront park along the Nicomekl and new urban parks in Newton, Guildford and Fleetwood,” she added noting the 10-year parks and rec plan calls for a “record” $357-million investment in new parks, rinks, recreation and cultural centres.
And, 33 years ago, the city didn’t have a downtown core.
“Today, that’s all changed,” said Hepner. “Today, our City Centre covers more than 1,300 acres and stretches from the new Avani high rise and hotel development near Surrey Memorial in the south, to gateway projects north of 108th Avenue. Already, project worth more than $5 billion have been built, and many more are planned for City Centre” with 65,000 more people expected to call City Centre home over the next three decades ago.
Education is another area that’s grown leaps and bounds in the last few decades. Back then, there were about 2,000 students at Kwantlen College, but today the city’s expanding university district includes SFU and Kwantlen Polytechnic University with close to 25,000 students expansion on the horizon, including SFU’s soon-to-open sustainable energy and environmental engineering building with 440 seats and KPU’s Civic Plaza Campus opening in a few months.
The rodeo was the city’s biggest celebration 33 years ago and “continues to be an iconic event” but the city’s calendar now includes other huge events such as Newton’s Vaisakhi Parade, Surrey International Children’s Festival, Fusion Fest and Surrey’s Canada Day celebration which has been named “B.C.’s most outstanding public event.”
And Surrey sure has a lot more civic amenities today than it did 33 years ago. hipness pointed to the North Surrey Sport and Ice Complex, scheduled to open next year, the Cloverdale Sport and Ice Complex expected to be finished in the summer of 2020, the under-construction Clayton Community Centre and, opening next week is phase two of Surrey Museum expansion.
See also: PHOTOS: New look, name and logo for expanded Surrey Museum
See also: What would happen if Surrey LRT was scrapped?
See also: Trudeau ‘officially launches’ SNG light rail transit line in Surrey
The outgoing mayor also plugged LRT, said “the deal is done” and that 33 years ago, Surrey would have been thrilled to even see a single bus route added. Hepner said light rail will be “the most significant investment in transportation in Surrey’s history, and the beginning of an entire South of the Fraser network.”
Hepner said today there are more than 2,000 business in Surrey every year, with more than 200,000 people working in the city including 5,000 jobs in the film industry, “a sector with an annual Surrey payroll of nearly $100 million.” Hepner said since opening, Skydance Studios has added five new sound stages and the “longest rain stage in the world.”
The city has also produced a number of strategies over that time, Hepner noted, pointing to its Sustainability Charter, Climate Adaption Plan, a biodiversity plan mapping out the city’s environmental vision, in addition to a 10-year economic and job strategy. Back then the city didn’t have a local immigration partnership, or a city-led poverty reduction coalition or urban Indigenous committee.
But one thing that hasn’t changed in 33 years? Surrey still has one hospital.
A new one is “overdue,” she said, noting Surrey Memorial Hospital has pushed past capacity and “citizens deserve better.”
She acknowledged there are “positive signals” from the provincial government, and that Surrey was chosen to be home to the first of 10 primary care centre in B.C., which aim to take the load off the “over-taxed emergency department.”
See also: Cloverdale is the best location for a new Surrey hospital, says mayor
See also: VIDEO: Inside look at Surrey’s new $68M biofuel facility that turns food to fuel
Hepner outlined the “firsts” she oversaw at the helm, including the “single largest investment” in policing with 134 new officers hired and the hiring of a public safety director, as well as the “single largest investment” in transportation infrastructure between the approvals for a Pattullo Bridge replacement, along with Surrey’s light rail system.
And, the “single largest invent in housing units for the homeless and most vulnerable in our community,” she said, referencing housing the homeless along 135A Street into modular housing.
Another “first” was being the first North American city to open a closed-loop biofuel facility, located in Port Kells.
Development investment also peaked, she said, to $1.5 billion in a single year under her watch, highlighting Walmart Canada investing $177 million and creating 200 high-tech jobs as it builds a sustainable distribution centre in Campbell Heights.
Hepner also spoke of the ongoing overdose epidemic, that continues to plague Surrey and the rest of the provinces, noting that adversity sparked creativity.
She praised the Surrey Fire Services “overdose cluster” program that watches where overdoses are happening, and how often. When three overdose calls happen in a square kilometre in a four-hour, the software triggers an alert.
“Now that’s innovation,” Hepner remarked. “And, it’s working.”
See also: Overdose calls drop, while deaths rise to more than 17 per month in Surrey
See also: Surrey mayor says ‘party is over’ as gang task force recommendations revealed
Hepner re-capped the work of the Mayor’s Task Force on Gang Violence Prevention, that she described as an “all-hands-on-deck approach” that looked at gang prevention initiatives, with the goal of finding gaps. Its recommendations included “much earlier” intervention, support for those looking to leave gang life, targeted prevention efforts, getting guns out of the hands of gangsters, establishing an “Inadmissible Patron Program” for restaurants, and “most importantly, establishing a Community Safety Centre where all partner agencies come together for research and program development.”
Hepner added that “maybe it is time to have the broader discussion about policing, and what type of police force a major urban centre like Surrey needs” but said “let’s be smart about it and do it with facts and analysis, not emotion and fear mongering.”
The mayor also elaborated on this year’s “creative and thoughtful response” to housing those living on 135A Street.
She noted the city spent a year “to bring the right people together to develop the first real solution to the issues that have plagued 135A for decades.”
Hepner said it required “strength of conviction to see it through, even in the face of skeptics,” noting “it took less than 27 hours to remove more than 100 tents and house more than 200 people” when the plan was put in place in June.
“It happened quickly, smoothly and with the appropriate degree of care and respect. No injunctions, and no push-back.”
See also: VIDEO: Tents gone from Surrey’s 135A Street, but not all accepted housing: city
Addressing today’s housing needs while planning for the future is “absolutely critical,” said Hepner as she announced the city would hire a Director of Housing to “plan and execute a City of Surrey housing strategy.”
She also touched on the incoming cannabis legalization, and said Surrey, like other cities, will have to deal with social, policing and bylaw issues. Hepner said it’s “essential that revenue from those sales stay right here in our community” and “we must continue to push to ensure this happens.”
Hepner also spoke about Surrey’s Innovation Boulevard, which has become home to 50 companies over the past four years and receive global recognition for its works. Other accomplishments Hepner touched on were the recently approved Congestion Relief Plan, the signing of Water and Sanitary Service Agreements with Semiahmoo First Nation and the expansion of the MySurrey App three months ago to allow residents to use a single digital identify to access online city services such as paying invoices, reporting problems and receiving city news.
She recapped other Surrey achievements in recent years, including receiving an A-plus rating from the CD How Institute for financial reporting, the city supporting 4,500 people and 4,300 pets during last years wildfires, in addition to the city being named the best place to invest in B.C. every year since 2010.
Hepner also spoke about the creation of Surrey First, and how there was a need for a “collaborative council” at the time that could be “civil” and listen to one another. She introduced the Surrey First councillors seeking re-election (mayoral candidate Tom Gill, Vera LeFranc and Mike Starchuk), those who were retiring (Judy Villeneuve and Mary Martin), and those who had split from the party to run on their own (mayoral candidate Bruce Hayne and his Integrity Now teammates Dave Woods and Barbara Steele), thanking each of them for the time dedicated to the community.
“We’ve come a long way because we’re always striving to do better. And that includes not shying away from the tough issues that require long hours and innovation solutions,” Hepner said of the city, describing Surrey as “a progressive city that isn’t afraid of big ideas.”
Linda Hepner tears up as she says goodbye as #surreybc‘s mayor, and a career at city hall that spanned more than 3 decades. #SurreyBC pic.twitter.com/WhwoeTmrzi
— Surrey Now-Leader (@SurreyNowLeader) September 19, 2018
As she concluded her speech, Hepner passed on her advice for the incoming mayor that voters choose on Oct. 20.
“I understand that in the United States the outgoing president always leaves a handwritten note on top of the desk in the Oval Office, with a bit of advice for the incoming president,” she said. “It’s a note that’s never made public or shared. But, if we did that here, and I could leave a note for my successor, for our next mayor, it would be short and sweet and in big bold letters: Be good to this city, because it’s headed for greatness.”
Hepner said “it has been an honour and a real pleasure to serve you and our city.”
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