march 2024 primary
No On Prop B
Police Officer Staffing Levels
Conditioned on Future Tax Funding
The city’s $14 billion budget should fully account for public safety—full stop. This measure to fully staff SFPD, originally proposed by Supervisor Matt Dorsey, has been altered so radically that Dorsey no longer supports it. Originally, San Francisco’s General Fund was going to provide funding for officers, but Supervisor Ahsha Safaí added an amendment that made funding contingent upon new, unidentified taxes. This defeats the entire purpose of the original measure: making sure basic public safety needs are covered in San Francisco.
ENDORSEMENT TEMPERATURE: OOF.
The Context
Originally proposed by District 6 Supervisor Matt Dorsey, this measure was intended to establish a minimum staffing level requirement of 2,074 full-duty, sworn officers, the number of police needed as determined by an independent, third-party analysis,for San Francisco’s Police Department in the city’s charter. $30 million in funding for officers would have come from San Francisco’s General Fund, which would have provided a dedicated, stable source of funding for these critical public safety positions. SFPD is short hundreds of officers, and TogetherSF Action strongly supported Supervisor Dorsey’s measure when it was first introduced. But then District 11 Supervisor Ahsha Safaí got involved.
Like Supervisor Dorsey himself, we no longer support Prop B after Supervisor Safaí made drastic changes to the measure. Supervisor Safaí’s amendment makes the $30 million funding dependent on new, unidentified taxes—there’s no guarantee that these taxes would ever be raised, making this staffing requirement pretty pointless. To make matters worse, Safaí only amended this measure after the labor unions that represent city employees raised a fuss. The original proposal pulled from the city’s General Fund, which is also the funding source for the unions. By introducing this amendment, Safaí squandered an opportunity to make sure that San Franciscans’ basic safety needs are met, while also caving to special interests who didn’t want to lose any of their share of the city’s General Fund.
The Support & Opposition
Support for the amended proposition comes from amendment author Supervisor Ahsha Safaí, and two large labor unions in San Francisco, SEIU 1021 and IFPTE 21.
Opposition for the amended proposition comes from the measure’s author Supervisor Matt Dorsey, Mayor London Breed, the San Francisco Travel Association, the Hotel Council of San Francisco, and the Golden Gate Restaurant Association.
Anything Else I Should Know?
The City and County of San Francisco has a $14.6 billion budget, while the San Francisco Police Department has a $761 million budget. This measure means to fool people into thinking new taxes are needed to fully address SFPD’s staffing shortage, when San Francisco can easily afford to fund a fully-staffed SFPD.
Paid for by TogetherSF Action (tsfaction.org). Not authorized by any candidate or committee controlled by a candidate. Financial disclosures are available at sfethics.org.