Supervisor Preston Calls for $50 million of Police Budget to be Placed On Reserve Pending Measurable Progress on Racial Disparities and Transparency

SAN FRANCISCO — As the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) returns to the Budget and Appropriations Committee on Thursday, Supervisor Dean Preston is calling on the committee to place at least $50 million of the SFPD’s budget on reserve pending measurable progress in addressing racial disparities and lack of transparency that have plagued the Department.

Preston’s call for increased Board of Supervisors oversight on SFPD reforms comes as the SFPD’s 2021 statistics continue to show that Black San Franciscans are overpoliced on every level in San Francisco. Black San Franciscans are stopped 5 times more, searched 8 times more, and subjected to police force 15 times more than their white counterparts. Reforms such as reducing pretext traffic stops could significantly reduce these disparities.

Under Preston’s proposal, the Board would hold back $50 million from any approved SFPD budget, conditioning its release on SFPD returning to the Budget Committee with meaningful progress to decrease racial disparities and address the five-to-ten year projected backlog in producing police records mandated for disclosure under Senate Bill 1421 and, more recently, Senate Bill 16.

City leaders have long discussed the need for police reforms and serious changes to public safety policy. But despite announcing her 2020 plan to divest resources from SFPD, Mayor Breed reversed course with a proposed budget this year that seeks to increase SFPD’s budget by $52 million, bringing the police budget to a record-breaking $708 million. “Ever-growing police budgets do not make us safer and contain huge amounts of wasteful spending that could be better used to address community needs and root causes of crime,” said Preston. Citing wasteful spending like the City’s Mounted Unit, a unit of 10 full-time employees that serves no current law enforcement function, Preston has called for there to be no increase to the police budget this year.

Regardless of where the negotiations land on the final police budget amount, Preston’s proposal would hold $50 million of it on reserve. This means the funds would be budgeted but not released to the department at this time. SFPD would need to return to the Budget Committee in six months to demonstrate measurable progress on reducing racial disparities and releasing police records, as required by state laws.

“Over the past years, we have seen lots of promises at budget season, only to hear nothing about them again once the budget has been passed and signed,” said Preston. “Placing money on reserves until we see meaningful progress on these absolutely essential goals will give us an opportunity to ensure some accountability.”

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