Metro Vancouver defends itself after Doug McCallum vows to leave | Daily Hive

Metro Vancouver defends budget as Surrey mayoral candidate vows to withdraw

Safe Surrey Coalition

Last week, Surrey mayoral candidate Doug McCallum sent out a list of campaign promises, including that he would pull the city out of the Metro Vancouver Regional District (MVRD) if elected — with the exception of the core utility services of water, sewer, and waste.

“Everything else ends. Surrey is big enough to run its own affairs. We will keep our money in Surrey, spend it on Surrey, and answer to the people of Surrey. Nobody else,” McCallum said in a release.

But following his announcement, Metro Vancouver reached out to Daily Hive to state that 90 per cent of what households pay towards Metro is for those very services.

On average, Metro Vancouver households will pay $897 in 2026 for all the services the region provides. About $816 of this is for the utility services of drinking water, treating liquid waste, and solid waste management.

“These services require ongoing operations, maintenance, and long-term infrastructure investments to support communities across the region,” said MVRD in an email.

It pointed out that households contribute an average of $81 per year towards additional MVRD services, like regional planning, air quality management, regional parks, and Invest Vancouver. It said that the Metro Vancouver Housing Corporation is a non-profit housing provider, financed through rents paid by tenants and therefore doesn’t impact the taxpayer.

However, the Safe Surrey Coalition, the municipal party McCallum is running for, said that its issue remains with the $816.

“If the suggestion is that withdrawal only touches $81, that is Metro Vancouver’s framing, not the reality, because the other $816 in utility charges is precisely where Metro Vancouver’s cost overruns land on Surrey families,” the Safe Surrey Coalition said in an email.

It pointed out Metro Vancouver’s notorious North Shore Wastewater Treatment Plant project, where costs have escalated from $700 million to $3.86 billion.

The Safe Surrey Coalition said that these costs are being recovered in sewer rates inside MVRD’s bill for households “for a plant that is not in Surrey.”

“Surrey will soon be the largest city in British Columbia, yet these costs are set by an unelected regional board Surrey voters cannot remove. Surrey pays, somebody else decides, and the household bill nearly doubles in a decade. That is why Doug McCallum is pulling Surrey out,” the Safe Surrey Coalition said.

When we asked how the coalition plans to stay connected to Metro Vancouver’s core utilities, it said that Surrey will keep them through service agreements at the cost of the service.

The municipal party said that withdrawing from the MVRD saves money in three ways. First, it said the regional district requisition would stay in Surrey. Second, the city would stop “being captive to the escalation in Metro Vancouver’s own plan,” noting that Metro Vancouver fees are set to increase. Third, it would look at Metro Vancouver’s development cost charges, which it said add “real costs to every new home.”

Other Surrey mayoral candidates have issues with Metro Vancouver

McCallum isn’t the only candidate with gripes about Metro Vancouver. Mayor Brenda Locke, who is also running for re-election, and the current council announced in 2025 that it would remove its municipal jurisdiction from the MVRD’s masterplan about how the region will grow over the next three decades. In April of this year, the City of Surrey also filed a petition in the Supreme Court of British Columbia, looking to invalidate “Invest Vancouver.”

And following the announcement that Metro Vancouver is planning on shrinking its board of directors from 45 to 34, Linda Annis, a Surrey First councillor and another mayoral candidate, sent out a release saying this “does not go far enough.”

“Reducing the Metro board by a few directors tells me the organization isn’t listening to voters or taxpayers who have had enough,” said Annis in the release.

“Metro Vancouver should be run like a utility and get out of all the other areas it has taken on, particularly in recent years. Today, Metro is involved in everything from parks and affordable housing, to economic development and planning, and along the way they have become another level of government that costs taxpayers more and more each year.”

Metro Vancouver told Daily Hive that it has been “taking action to strengthen Board governance, enhance accountability, and reduce costs for ratepayers,” mentioning a board governance review, services and cost efficiencies review, and a review of the North Shore Wastewater Treatment plant.

The municipal election is on Oct. 17 of this year.

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