San Francisco voters will be asked to settle a burgeoning dispute over how to rectify the San Francisco Police Department’s officer shortage.
The Board of Supervisors narrowly approved a charter amendment on Tuesday that would set aside funding to recruit and hire new cops.
The measure is now set to appear on the March 2024 ballot.
Its original sponsor, Supervisor Matt Dorsey, has already disavowed the proposal, which was successfully amended by Supervisor Ahsha Safai.
Safai’s amendment required that funding for police recruitment efforts be paid through either an existing or new tax. He critiqued Dorsey’s original proposal as an unfunded mandate that would inevitably pull money away from other city priorities, such as child-care programs, just as The City enters a perilous fiscal future.
Dorsey slammed Safai’s amendment as a “poison pill” forcing voters to choose between a new tax and a fully staffed police department.
Safai acknowledged Tuesday that he was even slightly surprised to take the helm of the proposal. But he blasted Dorsey’s original proposal for focusing on police staffing when The City is short on nurses, 911 operators and other important professionals.
“That is the responsibility of this body — to be thoughtful, to be responsible and to think about all aspects of government,” Safai said.
To some of Dorsey and Safai’s colleagues, the legislation resulting from their dispute was incoherent and largely ineffective, partly because it would require a second ballot measure to fund police staffing efforts.
“This measure does nothing concrete to fund and hire police,” Supervisor Joel Engardio said.
Supervisor Hillary Ronen bluntly called the proposal “nonsensical” and voiced concern that it would force The City to dedicate future tax-measure revenues to police staffing — regardless of whether or not that’s The City’s most pressing need.
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Supervisor Dean Preston described it as a lump of cash without accountability and voiced skepticism that the funding required by the charter amendment would have its intended effect.
But those who supported the measure said they felt it was, at the very least, a step in the right direction. Supervisors Myrna Melgar, Aaron Peskin, Catherine Stefani, Shamann Walton, Connie Chan and Safai voted in favor of it.
Safai and Dorsey agree that the department is far short of the number of officers it needs. The department currently has about 1,500 officers, and the goal laid out in the charter amendment is 2,074.
For five years — assuming that voters pass a new tax or measure amending an existing tax — the charter amendment would establish a Police Full Staffing Fund to help recruit new officers.
In the first year, $16.8 million would be set aside for the fund, and the amount dedicated to it in each subsequent year would be based on how far short the department is of its staffing goals. The minimum number of officers would be 1,700.
The annual appropriation into the fund would not exceed $30 million and could be frozen if The City’s projected deficit exceeds $250 million.
Dorsey said his initial proposal would establish “how we could have a minimum staffing level that’s adjusted over time.” But, he said, “This is now not a police staffing measure; this now has a contingency in it that it will not take effect unless and until a ‘future tax measure passed.’”
“Voters deserve the agency because it is their dollars to prioritize police staffing for just a five-year period,” Dorsey said.
Dorsey’s original proposal had the backing of Mayor London Breed, who appointed him to a vacancy on the Board of Supervisors last year before he won election to a full term in November. She has since withdrawn her support.
Safai is challenging Breed in her bid for reelection next year.
