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Community speakers urge pause on SFPD taser adoption; commissioners plan cost analysis
Summary
Dozens of public commenters, including advocacy groups, urged the Police Commission to delay any vote on adopting tasers, citing DOJ oversight changes, health risks and disproportionate impacts; a commissioner said she would request a cost analysis from the Controller's office.
Public comment at the Police Commission meeting centered on proposed adoption of conducted-energy devices (tasers). Alexander Post, identifying himself as a member of the Democratic Socialists of America's San Francisco chapter and an appellate attorney, urged the commission to pause any vote while federal oversight is in flux. "Without an independent body, I think that we need to take the pause," he said, asking the commission to schedule more community meetings in neighborhoods most likely to be affected.
Multiple speakers followed with opposition as a theme. Darby Thomas said the city should "stop entertaining, trying to buy" tasers and called for a cost-benefit analysis; Blake described tasers as "not non lethal weapons" and urged the commission to vote no. Another speaker, reading postcards collected from residents, said tasers "are disproportionately used on black and brown people" and asked the commission to include more community input in the record.
On the dais, Commissioners discussed scheduling and process. Commissioner Aung Hing publicly noted she will be absent November 8 and asked that any taser vote not be scheduled for that date. Commissioner De Jesus said she will work with Commissioner Turman to draft a letter asking the Controller's Budget and Analysis Office to produce a cost analysis on conducted-energy devices on behalf of the commission. "It will have some specifics in the letter and I will present...that to...we'll work on it together and then we will send that out," she said.
Commissioners and several public speakers also linked concern about tasers to broader policing issues, including mental-health responses, the new use-of-force policy requiring time and distance, and recent deaths elsewhere following taser use. No formal vote to adopt conducted-energy devices occurred at this meeting; speakers and commissioners signaled further process steps, including a planned cost analysis and additional community engagement.
