San Francisco, California, Neighborhood Crime Unit Creation, Proposition R (November 2016)

• Text of measure
  • Ballot question
  • Impartial analysis
• Support
  • Official argument
• Opposition
  • Official argument
• Path to the ballot
• See also
  • External links
  • Footnotes
• More
  • Local ballot measures
  • State ballot measures
  • Local politics

Proposition R: San Francisco Neighborhood Crime Unit Creation
The basics
Election date:
November 8, 2016
Status:
d Defeated
Topic:
Local law enforcement
Related articles
Local law enforcement on the ballot November 8, 2016 ballot measures in California San Francisco County, California ballot measures
See also
San Francisco, California

A measure to create a Neighborhood Crime Unit was on the ballot for San Francisco voters in San Francisco County, California, on November 8, 2016. It was defeated.

A yes vote was a vote in favor of requiring the city police department to create a unit consisting of 3 percent of all sworn police offices dedicated to preventing crimes harmful to neighborhood safety and quality of life, provided there are a minimum of 1,971 sworn police officers.

A no vote was a vote against this proposition, thereby leaving efforts against neighborhood crime as an equally shared responsibility among all police officers with no dedicated task force.

Election results

Proposition R
Result		Votes	Percentage
d No		201,059	54.82%
Yes		165,723	45.18%

Election results from San Francisco Department of Elections

Text of measure

Ballot question

The following question appeared on the ballot:

“

Shall the City create a Neighborhood Crime Unit to prevent and investigate crimes that affect neighborhood safety and quality of life when the City has at least 1,971 full-duty uniformed police officers?

”

Simplification digest

The following summary of Proposition R was provided by San Francisco's Ballot Simplification Committee:

“ The Way It Is Now: The Charter requires the City to have at least 1,971 full-duty uniformed police officers. The City will likely meet this threshold by the end of 2017. The Police Department has different units, many of which share responsibility for preventing, investigating and making arrests related to neighborhood crime. The Proposal: Proposition R would require the Department to create a Neighborhood Crime Unit when the City has at least 1,971 full-duty uniformed police officers. The Department would have to assign no less than 3 percent of all sworn personnel to the Unit. The Unit would be responsible for preventing and investigating crimes that affect neighborhood safety and quality of life, by using neighborhood foot patrols, among other tactics. Crimes include robbery, auto and home burglary, theft and vandalism. The Unit would also coordinate with other City agencies to move people who commit street offenses—such as obstructing the sidewalk and aggressive panhandling—off the streets and into shelter, housing and critical health services. Proposition R would not require the City to maintain the Unit if the City has fewer than 1,971 full-duty uniformed police officers. If the number drops below 1,971, the Chief of Police could either keep the unit or not. Proposition R would allow the Board of Supervisors to change these requirements without further voter approval while maintaining the intent of the ordinance. A “YES” Vote Means: If you vote “yes,” you want to require the City to create a Neighborhood Crime Unit to prevent and investigate crimes that affect neighborhood safety and quality of life when the City has at least 1,971 full-duty uniformed police officers. A “NO” Vote Means: If you vote “no,” you do not want to make this change. ”

Fiscal impact

The following fiscal impact statement about Proposition R was provided by the San Francisco Controller:

“ Should the proposed ordinance be approved by the voters, in my opinion, it would have a minimal impact on the cost of government. The proposed ordinance would require the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) to assign no less than three percent of its sworn officers to a new Neighborhood Crime Unit should the total number of sworn SFPD officers meet or exceed the San Francisco City Charter-mandated level of 1,971. However, these officers would be reassigned, not hired specifically as a result of this ordinance, and thus would be a reallocation of existing costs, not a new cost. The Police Department projects that as of the beginning of fiscal year (FY) 2016–17 it will have 1,957 full-sworn officers available for neighborhood policing and patrol, 14 officers short of the 1,971 baseline staffing level. As a result of new officers graduating from academy classes, the Police Department should meet the minimum staffing levels in FY 2016–17, which would trigger the creation of a new Neighborhood Crime Unit if this proposed ordinance is passed. The proposed ordinance also requires SFPD to prepare a Deployment Plan for the Neighborhood Crime Unit as well as an annual report on the work performed by the Neighborhood Crime Unit, and also requires the Neighborhood Crime Unit to conduct community meetings and coordinate efforts related to addressing homelessness issues with other City departments, but these costs would be minimal. ”

Full text

The full text of the measure is available here.

Support

Supporters

The following individuals signed the official argument in favor of the measure:

• Mayor Edwin Lee
• Supervisor Scott Wiener
• Supervisor Malia Cohen
• Supervisor Katy Tang
• Supervisor Mark Farrell

Arguments in favor

Official argument

The following official argument was submitted in favor of the measure:

“

Proposition R will make San Francisco safer. San Francisco’s neighborhoods have seen significant increases in crimes like burglaries and car break-ins that make people feel unsafe. For example, the Civil Grand Jury found that in 2015 car break-ins had reached a record high of 24,800 recorded incidents. According to the Police Department, bike theft incidents have increased by almost 300% since 2011. While the City is taking many steps to combat this crime, including hiring over 300 more police officers in the next year alone, we need to better organize our efforts to stop neighborhood crime. Proposition R requires the City to: • Create the Neighborhood Crime Unit • Significantly increase the number of beat cops and bike patrols assigned to our neighborhoods • Provide a dedicated presence of beat cops whose sole mission is to proactively prevent neighborhood crime, and to respond directly to it when it occurs We have to push back against the petty crime that’s plaguing San Francisco’s residential neighborhoods and commercial corridors. Police officers walking beats in our neighborhoods can prevent and investigate these crimes. Police officers working daily with our communities can develop relationships, build trust, and serve as a deterrent to crime. Only with stepped-up police enforcement can we stem the tide of car break-ins and muggings that are all too common these days. Vote Yes on Proposition R.

”

Opposition

Opponents

The following individuals signed the official argument against the measure:

• San Francisco Democratic Party
• Coalition on Homelessness
• Public Defender Jeff Adachi
• Supervisor John Avalos
• Supervisor Eric Mar
• Former Supervisor Bevan Dufty
• Police Commissioner Petra DeJesus
• Paul Boden, Western Regional Advocacy Project

Arguments against

Official argument

The following official argument was submitted in opposition to the measure:

“

Proposition R only adds more bureaucracy—not any more foot patrol officers. Instead it takes 60 officers away from neighborhood stations to staff a new centralized unit. These officers will be dispatched to non-emergency 311 calls, sent to numerous recurring meetings, and required to coordinate with at least seven City departments. When would these 60 overworked officers have time to walk foot patrols if they spend all their time in meetings? The City's Accelerated Police Hiring Plan has stopped the decline in our police force, and we are finally on pace to reach the charter-mandated staffing level of 1,971 officers. Do we really want to divert uniformed police officers to respond to non-emergency 311 calls and spend hours in countless meetings? This measure was put on the ballot without the consent of the Police Commission. It sets no standards for community policing or how to reform the department that still has much work to do to build relationships with our diverse communities–relationships that are central to neighborhood safety. Mandating police officers to respond to homelessness is counterproductive. San Francisco's primary response to homelessness is already enforcement, and this response is failing. Last year, SFPD gave out 14,000 citations simply for resting in public. Those citations saddle homeless people with debt and threaten their eligibility for housing. A law enforcement-based response to homelessness creates barriers, not solutions. Neighborhood crime is a complex challenge that we can't address by micromanaging police officers through a vanity ballot measure. Let's work together on a nuanced and multi-disciplinary approach that gets police out of their patrol cars and conference rooms and onto the streets.

”

Media editorials

Support

Email editor@ballotpedia.org to submit media editorials that should be posted here.

Opposition

• San Francisco Chronicle: "Prop. R’s prime mover is Supervisor Scott Wiener, who is running for state Senate. He’s heard from enough residents in his Castro and Noe Valley district to know the problem is genuine. He’s pushing for a vote because he doesn’t think a progressive majority on the board cares about effective policing and this measure would provide a wake-up call. That may be the political mood afoot at the board, but it doesn’t mean the board should insert itself into department staffing decisions. The right tactics to stop neighborhood property crimes should be left to law enforcement. Vote NO."

• The Bay Area Reporter recommended a no vote for Proposition R.

• San Francisco Bay Guardian: "Again: A bad piece of public policy that’s on the ballot only for crass politics. This time it’s Wiener leading the charge, and he wants 3 percent of all sworn police officers to be assigned to a new Neighborhood Crime Unit that will focus on quality-of-life issues. Guess that that means? More harassment of homeless people. This is no way to assign officers and manage the Police Department; in fact, it shifts resources away from more serious crimes."

• San Francisco Examiner: "Echoing our objections to Prop. Q in this election, which seeks to establish a timeline to remove tents from sidewalks, The City has a department of dedicated professionals to make these kind of decisions and establish the best practices for dealing with issues, be it the new department on homelessness or the police department. As much as possible, the leadership of these departments should be responsible and held accountable for what they do or do not accomplish. If their leadership is lacking, they should be replaced. That is, after all, why The City is now searching for a new chief of police. To undercut their authority by injecting politics into making public policy in this fashion is counterproductive and ill-advised."

Path to the ballot

See also: Laws governing local ballot measures in California

San Francisco's city code allows four or more members of the San Francisco board of supervisors to sponsor a measure and put it before voters by signing the proposed ordinance and submitting it to the San Francisco department of elections. The following supervisors signed the ordinance proposed by Proposition R and submitted it on June 21, 2016:

• Mark Farrell - District 2
• Katy Tang - District 4
• Scott Wiener - District 8
• Malia Cohen - District 10

Recent news

The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms San Francisco Neighborhood Crime Unite Proposition R. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.

San Francisco, California, Neighborhood Crime Unit Creation, Proposition R (November 2016) - Google News

See also

Local measures

• Local measures in 2016
• Local law enforcement ballot measures

• San Francisco County measures

California

• November 8, 2016 measures in California
• Local ballot measures, California
• San Francisco, California

News and analysis

• State and local preemption conflicts
• Measures advancing national agendas

External links

Suggest a link

• San Francisco County Elections Office website