Letter to Editor
SF Examiner
December 19, 2010

When will the police union stop opposing every reasonable step to cut costs and possibly police in better ways? Police Chief Gascon is expanding use of civilian investigators to replace SFPD officers and reduce an astounding $411 million budget that has almost doubled over the past ten years when other departments expanded by only 20% (see, "Civilian police help pitched"). It's not surprising that the union president Delagnes "doesn't agree." What is surprising is why the Chief and this City don't also quickly expand the numbers and use of private initiatives that don't cost taxpayers anything except a pittance for administrative liaison or minimal regulation, such as the Castro Community on Patrol (civilian observers) and the Patrol Special Police. For162 years the Patrol Specials have been trained according to Police Chief standards and hired by business and residents to add supplemental street patrols and help prevent neighborhood crime. They work in tandem with the four-year old Castro Patrol in a program established with the help of Supervisor-elect Scott Wiener and the support of Supervisor Bevan Dufty. At least one City library branch has contracted with the Patrol Specials in the past, and other City agencies such as MUNI could hire them to ride troubled bus lines. Even Delagnes admits that "There is a role for the special police as extra eyes and ears for police officers" and the Chief knows that some of the Patrol Specials are "very effective in what they do." More to the point, these two private-sector programs don't add civil service employees with pension benefits. They constitute two more obvious ways to cut back the SFPD budget and manage crime.

Ann Grogan
Glen Park resident and client of the Patrol Special Police