San Francisco committee adopts amendments to ban tear gas, rubber bullets in most crowd-control situations; item continued for meet-and-confer

The Public Safety & Neighborhood Services Committee on May 27 adopted amendments to Supervisor Matt Haney's "Right to Safely Protest" ordinance and agreed to continue the item to the call of the chair to finish meet-and-confer. The ordinance would broadly prohibit San Francisco Police Department use of kinetic impact projectiles such as rubber and plastic bullets, chemical agents including tear gas and CS gas, disorientation devices such as flash-bangs and stun grenades, and military-grade equipment as crowd-control tactics except in narrowly defined circumstances.

Haney, the ordinance's sponsor, told the committee the measure grew out of last year's nationwide protests and local review of crowd-control tactics. "No one should ever now or in the future be gassed by chemicals or shot by dangerous rubber bullets or stun grenades or flash bangs when they…