In San Francisco, Minimum Police Staffing Will Cost Extra If Progressives Get Their Way

One of the fundamental jobs of local government is public safety. Usually that means funding a police force that is capable of dealing with whatever crime a city is facing. But progressive city supervisors in San Francisco, many of whom were fans of defunding the police just a few years ago, are now putting forward a new proposal which could best be described as public safety costs extra. One supervisor compared it to turning the city into Spirit Airlines where every aspect of your flight comes at an additional cost.

This started a year ago when two city supervisors of a more moderate bent proposed a plan to bring the city’s police staffing back up to a mandatory minimum over the next five years.

The measure would reestablish a mandated staffing level for the San Francisco Police Department at 2,182 officers citywide. As of January 2023, the department had 1,537 full-duty officers. As the city increases its police presence, it would also create a budget provision to reach benchmark numbers over the next five years.

The ballot measure will require voter approval to amend the City Charter. The earliest that it could be put on a ballot would be March 2024, and Dorsey and Stefani will have to marshal either a majority of the supervisors to support it or gather voter signatures to place it on the ballot.

Dorsey said he was prompted by the recent temporary closure of the Mid-Market Whole Foods Market over public safety concerns to issue the drafting request earlier than planned.

In case you’ve forgotten, the Whole Foods market closed after a little more than a year. Initially the reasons weren’t clear but later the NY Times shed some light on what caused it.

People threatened employees with guns, knives and sticks. They flung food, screamed, fought and tried to defecate on the floor, according to records of 568 emergency calls over 13 months, many depicting scenes of mayhem.

“Male w/machete is back,” the report on one 911 call states. “Another security guard was just assaulted,” another says. A man with a four-inch knife attacked several security guards, then sprayed store employees with foam from a fire extinguisher, according to a third.

In September, a 30-year-old man died in the bathroom from an overdose of fentanyl, a highly potent opioid, and methamphetamine.

In short it was the kind of street mayhem for which San Francisco is now well known worldwide. But the plan to bring up police staffing levels was not to the liking of the more progressive City Supervisors. So they came up with a poison pill designed to make basic police staffing something taxpayers would have to pay extra for.

At the Board of Supervisors’ Rules Committee, Supervisor Ahsha Safaí proposed amendments that Dorsey called “hostile” and a “poison pill” during a testy discussion…

Safai’s amendments proposed making the staffing mandate contingent on certifying that a “future tax” could fund the measure. Dorsey earlier agreed to some amendments to the measure, including reducing the minimum staffing level from 2,182 to 2,074. But he decried linking the staffing mandate to a new tax, saying that fully staffed police “is part of the baseline obligation of what a well-functioning city government should do.”

“This is holding San Franciscans hostage … for a tax hike,” Dorsey countered. “This is making San Francisco into the Spirit Airlines of municipal governments. I think it would be funny if it weren’t so harmful.”

The “cop tax” amendment was approved and will appear on the March ballot as Proposition B. Supervisor Dorsey, Mayor Breed and others who had supported the initial proposal turned against it because of the tax and are now leading a campaign to kill it.

Prop B’s proponents are lying to voters. Their campaign continually fails to mention that even minimum police staffing levels in San Francisco would be contingent on “a future tax measure passed by the voters,” which must “generate sufficient additional revenue” to hire police — in other words, it’s a tax hike. 

And when its proponents insist that “by passing Prop. B, we will achieve minimum police staffing levels,” it’s patently false. In fact, Prop. B could only achieve minimum SFPD staffing…

• If voters approve some future tax…

• In some future election…

• With sufficient future funding.

A candidate who is opposing Supervisor Connie Chan (who supports the cop tax version of Prop B) says she is sending out mailers which tell voters this plan will generate more public safety.

Chan is now promoting Prop. B, using it to falsely claim that she is in favor of public safety—all while ignoring the cop tax that she voted to add to the amendment. District 1 residents are now receiving mailers featuring a smiling Chan, claiming that Prop. B “does not raise homeowner taxes” and will “make San Francisco safer.” These mailers are deliberately misleading, obstructive to policy and offensive to residents of the Richmond.

It’s amazing that nearly four years after “defund the police” swept through the country with terrible consequences almost everywhere, there are still elected officials who are playing games with police staffing. To be clear, San Francisco’s violent crime rate is relatively good for a city its size but its rate of property crimes, thefts, shoplifting, car break-ins etc. is one of the highest in the country. Dealing with those problems shouldn’t require an extra fee from taxpayers.

Matt Dorsey makes the case against Prop B in a relatively brief video (4 minutes) which you can watch here. Unfortunately I can’t embed this one so you’ll have to click over to watch it.