SURREY - Mayor Dianne Watts is taking over as interim chair of the police committee.
The announcement, made at Monday night's council meeting, caught former police committee chair Coun. Barinder Rasode off guard.
"I'm quite surprised," Rasode said after the meeting.
Watts said she will be acting as chair on an interim basis, while both the police and community safety committees go through restructuring.
"I was going to be bringing some changes forward to the police committee, as chair, around transparency and openness and receiving delegations from the public and live-streaming the meetings," Rasode said.
"So I was quite surprised by the announcement tonight that I would no longer be chairing the committee. So, I was actually not in a position to make the changes I had been hoping to."
Rasode said she doesn't know why the mayor made the change.
Watts insists the move was not personal, but rather simply about reorganizing the two committees.
"The public safety portfolio still sits with Rasode. She's still chair of the community safety committee. We've just done some reorganizing," Watts said.
"In terms of the police committee, in the interim, while we do the reorganization, I'm stepping in as chair.... I want to make sure that the flow of information is structured in a way that it comes through to council in an open format and to the community as well," Watts said.
"So there's some administrative stuff, and I want to be clear here, because this is no reflection on Coun. Rasode's ability. I think she's done a great job.... I'm stepping in as interim, just to realign stuff."
The changes come after questions about why the police committee meeting minutes for the past two years are not available on the City of Surrey's website.
The city's website shows minutes from 2002 to 2011, but they stop in 2012.
"I think that in terms of the police committee, we need to have those meetings consistent and regularly scheduled," Watts said, adding that the police committee met five times in 2012 and four times in 2013.
"We need monthly meetings in an open forum making sure that the community and council have that flow of information, and as standing items on the agenda, I think we need to... have items on the community safety committee update, mayor's task force update, integrated team update," Watts said.
When asked when Rasode would be put back on as chair, Watts said, "We'll discuss that at the police committee meeting, just seeing what that framework looks like."
At Monday night's meeting, Watts formalized the community safety committee and added councillors Barbara Steele, Linda Hepner and Bruce Hayne to support the work being done.
The community safety committee was originally set up as an informal working group to review recommendations of the Crime Reduction Strategy.
Minutes from that committee will now go through the police committee.
When it comes to why there weren't many police committee meetings over the past two years, Rasode said, "I know the mayor's schedule is very challenging, because she is very busy, but that is one of the reasons we didn't have as many meetings as we should have."
Rasode said she is committed to public safety, community engagement, transparency and openness with or without titles.
"We don't get boxed in by what title we hold because we should still be doing the work and asking the tough questions."
WATTS, RASODE DENY RIFT
Rasode and Watts both maintain there is not a rift between them, but Rasode did say she and the mayor have "a difference in opinion on community public safety."
The two Surrey First politicians have made headlines recently.
After Julie Paskall's murder outside Newton Arena, Rasode broke party lines and went public with comments that Surrey did not do enough in the neighbourhood.
Less than a week later, Watts said it was an accident that she liked four posts on Facebook that slammed Rasode, including one that called her a "coward."
Then, when questions were raised about why police committee meetings weren't publicly available for the past two years, Watts referred comments back to Rasode, as she was chair at the time, until Watts took over as interim chair of the committee last Monday.
In January 2013, media reports made note of a rift at city hall following the divide among Surrey council following the rejected South Surrey casino proposal, but Rasode and Watts both said that was not the case.