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Board president pushes ballot change to remove SFPD minimum‑staffing number as public demands to 'defund' swell
Summary
President Norman Yee introduced a charter amendment to remove the long‑standing 1,971 sworn‑officer minimum and require a biennial staffing study; the item produced hours of public comment—overwhelmingly urging defunding or abolition—and the committee amended the proposal and continued it to July 13 for further work.
San Francisco Board President Norman Yee asked the Rules Committee on July 9 to place a charter amendment on the November ballot that would remove the city’s long‑standing minimum police staffing number and replace it with a data‑driven, biennial staffing assessment.
The current charter requirement—1,971 sworn officers—was adopted in earlier ballot measures and originally reflected authorized positions decades ago, Yee said. ‘‘We should not base our community safety policies on an arbitrary police‑staffing number,’’ he said, urging a process that requires the Police Department to submit a staffing and workload assessment every two years for the Police Commission’s review and for budget considerations.
Public comment filled the better part of the afternoon and evening. Hundreds of callers signed up; many said one minute was not enough. The dominant view among public speakers was that policing has harmed Black, brown, trans and unhoused San Franciscans and that the city should use savings from reduced police staffing to fund housing, mental‑health services and other community alternatives. Several community organizations including the ACLU (San Francisco chapter) and tenant‑rights groups urged supervisors to remove the minimum and to delete charter language directing maximized police presence.
Police Commissioner John Hamasaki and department representatives described a multi‑year staffing task force and defended a data‑driven approach; the Police Department said it does not oppose a measure that requires independent analysis but flagged concerns about methodology and biennial reporting. ‘‘The Police Department does not oppose the Charter amendment,’’ a senior SFPD representative said, but requested clarifying language about the report methodology.
Members of the Rules Committee voted to amend the proposal to specify the staffing‑report methodology and to add required reports on civilianization impacts; the committee then voted to continue the matter to the July 13 Rules Committee meeting to permit additional technical edits and to collect further information.
The hearing captured the large public sentiment that grew during and after nationwide protests earlier in the summer: many speakers explicitly called to “defund, disarm, disband” SFPD; others urged more modest reforms or careful data analysis. Committee members said the charter amendment would allow the city to replace an outdated, fixed number with a regular process to determine police staffing needs based on workload, legal duties and impacts of civilian alternatives.
