January 2022
New Year, New Hires
Surrey Police Service (SPS) continues to grow! We started the new year with two swearing-in ceremonies on January 4 and 13, welcoming a total of 40 new employees, including 30 police officers and 10 civilians.
We were excited to welcome our first sibling duo – a civilian employee with our Employee Services Section, and a Sergeant who has joined our Investigative Bureau. Combined, these siblings bring an amazing 56 years of policing experience to SPS! Surrey’s transition to a municipal police service is well underway, and SPS continues to expand with more employees starting every month.
To date, 188 talented employees have joined SPS – 29 civilians and 159 police officers. Our experienced officers come from 18 different police agencies and collectively speak 26 different languages. Fifty-five percent of our officer hires are Constables, which is the rank that makes up the largest component of frontline police response.
Our Recruiting Unit is also hard at work processing the 534 applications we received for new recruits. We will be hiring 26 new recruits in the coming months who will begin their police training at the Justice Institute of BC later this year. Chief Constable Norm Lipinski speaks with Lower Mainland police chiefs on a monthly basis to understand any hiring challenges agencies may be experiencing and adjust SPS’s hiring and timing accordingly. SPS is also careful not to over-hire from any one police agency – particularly smaller agencies – to ensure they can continue to meet the service demands of their community, and to allow them time to fill positions.
Throughout this policing transition, SPS is committed to ensuring the continuity of public safety here in Surrey and across the Lower Mainland.
On January 24, the next 12 SPS police officers will be starting their orientation with the Surrey RCMP and will begin responding to calls for service not long after. These officers will join the 29 that were deployed in November, bringing our total number of deployed officers to 41. SPS anticipates the remaining nine officers in the first cohort of 50 will be security cleared by the RCMP to begin operational policing in March.
All SPS officers in this cohort have been trained and security cleared to provincial policing standards. However, as they will be temporarily working alongside the Surrey RCMP, they are also required to undergo an RCMP security clearance process. In case you missed it, SPS officers have now responded to over 1,000 calls for service since deployment began in November 2021. The first group of deployed SPS officers have responded to calls ranging from property crime to well-being checks, to disturbance and assault files.
We’re Hiring Experienced Officers
SPS is currently hiring experienced officers to help build and grow the Frontline in our Community Policing Bureau. We’re calling on the creative and the brave to bring your unique skill sets and commitment to community policing to SPS. Help us reimagine policing as we create an innovative and forward-thinking police service. For more information on the application process, please visit the experienced officers page on our website. To apply as an experienced officer, click here.
Our appreciation to SPS for the information