Is Mayor Doug McCallum calling the shots in Surrey City Hall? Or is he simply one of nine council members steering the ship?
For the purpose of defending the City of Surrey against an injunction filed by ride hailing company Uber, city lawyers would have you believe the latter. Yet if you ask councillors on the outside of McCallum’s majority coalition of five, they affirm the former.
On Wednesday, City of Surrey lawyer James Yardley argued in front of BC Supreme Court Justice Veronica Jackson that “no one member” of city council, including McCallum, “binds the city.”
Yardley had been countering Uber’s position that McCallum’s frequent public statements opposing ride hailing is evidence the city is attempting to prohibit the company from operating, which Uber lawyer Michael Feder said would run contrary to the province’s Passenger Transportation Act.
“The [provincial] legislation doesn’t say it [City of Surrey] can’t create a bylaw that prohibits ride sharing. It says it cannot prohibit [ride hailing]. It doesn’t matter if they do it by a ride sharing specific bylaw or focused enforcement,” contested Feder, who is trying to stop the city’s proactive ticketing campaign against ride hailing vehicles, via the injunction.
Ultimately, Jackson is tasked with weighing the legalities of a municipality enforcing a bylaw that appears at odds with superseding provincial legislation and a company that is breaking an existing bylaw for operating without a business licence – but only because such a licence does not exist at city hall.
Jackson will make a ruling on the injunction application – to stop the issuance of $500 fines – this Friday.
In arguing against the injunction, Yardley distanced McCallum’s public statements on ride hailing from representing the City of Surrey’s actions. As an example, last September, McCallum told taxi company representatives at a luncheon: “We will not be issuing any business licences to ridesharing companies in Surrey.”
Yet, he said, “Council speaks for this city; the mayor is head of council, who presides over meetings,” said Yardley, citing the “weak mayor system,” whereby the mayor is just one of nine votes.
“The mayor is stating his opinions,” said Yardley, referring to a McCallum media statement on ride hailing used by Uber as evidence.
Yardley’s assertion gave Jackson some pause.
“Is it not on city letterhead?” asked Justice Jackson.
“No one member of council binds the city,” replied Yardley.
“But he speaks for the city,” said Jackson.
“It’s very clearly stating what he thinks,” said Yardley.
Yardley then noted council on the whole has made no determination for a ride hailing business licence. “The mayor, however, on his own does not decide if a business license will be issued,” asserted Yardley.
“Does he know that?” asked Jackson.
In his closing remarks, Feder scoffed at the notion the decision to ticket drivers was done only at the bylaw department level, as if Surrey City Hall is a place where the rank and file, management and politicians “all do different things and don’t talk to each other.”
But Yardley chalked up McCallum’s anti-ride hailing statements as political.
“Council acts in the public interest and council is permitted to take political positions. Where the border lies, it varies,” said Yardley. “The mayor is allowed to and does have views
“But to attribute to the city as a whole … that there is something improper based on statements of one person out of nine. …I think the point is basically lost by my friend [Feder],” said Yardley.
On January 25, two days after the Passenger Transportation Board approved Uber’s operation in Metro Vancouver, the city’s bylaw officers were given orders from senior management to issue warning tickets to Uber drivers it found to be operating in the city.
What isn’t clear is the sort of direction, if any, senior management took from McCallum, who has refused to comment on the matter since the injunction was filed last Friday.
Councillors Brenda Locke and Linda Annis have said, prior to the injunction being filed, city staff will often take into consideration remarks, public or otherwise, made by council members to conduct day-to-day operations or draft policy. As much was acknowledged last December by finance manager Kam Grewal at a public hearing for the budget. Locke also said city management takes into consideration that McCallum has a majority coalition on council, and so what McCallum says could affect decisions.
It’s understood from four non-coalition councillors that very little communication occurs between McCallum and them.
Annis said Wednesday she doesn’t know the exact source of management’s directives to bylaw officers, however, “I know bylaw officers would not act on their own to do this.”
So, was this a case of McCallum explicitly directing managers? Did managers glean such a coarse of action was appropriate given McCallum’s public statements? Or were managers enforcing a bylaw as they see fit, without political input?
Surrey is the only city in Metro Vancouver that has not drafted its own ride hailing licence bylaw while also ticketing ride hailing vehicles. Vancouver, Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam, Port Moody, Burnaby and Richmond have all enacted bylaws to license ride hailing vehicles. The City of North Vancouver has not, but its mayor, Linda Buchanan, has stated municipalities cannot prohibit such operations and, as such, no enforcement action will take place while the Mayor’s Council crafts an inter-municipal (regional) ride hailing business licence.
When asked Wednesday if she thought the city would be ticketing Uber drivers if the mayor wasn’t so vocal against ride hailing, Annis declined to speculate.
Coun. Jack Hundial said Wednesday that he does not know any details on how bylaw officers were ordered to ticket drivers, although he’d like to know the precedent for such proactive bylaw enforcement and whether it has, in the past, come at the behest of a formal council directive.
Hundial says he and Locke have been waiting since October to hear back from staff as to how the city would license ride hailing, considering the province approved legislation in September. Hundial said Wednesday he has still yet to hear back from staff. A notice of motion to direct staff to do this was submitted by Locke last Monday.
City manager Vince Lalonde declined an interview request, citing the court proceeding.
