SF Mayor Breed is touting a major increase in the number of police recruits

Mayor London Breed announced a sharp increase in police recruiting on Wednesday – with the largest number of people training to become police in San Francisco in six years – as she enters the final stages of a tough re-election campaign marked by voter concerns about public safety is dominated.

Breed announced that the police academy's latest class, which began this week, includes 50 recruits, which her office said is the largest class size since 2018, the year she was elected mayor. Breed and Police Chief Bill Scott quickly touted the numbers as a sign that the law enforcement expansion measures they supported were working, even as the police force remains understaffed by hundreds of officers.

Police staffing has been a top issue as Breed fights for another term against four serious challengers, all of whom share her desire to increase police staffing but argue they could accomplish the goal more effectively. One of the mayoral candidates, Mark Farrell, served as interim mayor for six months before Breed was elected in 2018 and has been a particularly vocal critic of her record on public safety.

Farrell, Lurie and the other mayoral candidates will likely continue to press Breed on public safety in the coming weeks, despite the numbers her office announced Wednesday. SFPD says officer numbers are still more than 500 below the level recommended in an independent workforce analysis, and not everyone in the current academy class will graduate and become full-time police officers. Breed said she expects the department to reach full staffing levels by 2026.

While the number of reported crimes in San Francisco is down more than 30% from last year, a recent Chronicle poll found that public safety remains the top issue driving voters' likely decisions in the mayoral race influenced. The survey was conducted before the high-profile shooting of San Francisco 49ers rookie Ricky Pearsall in Union Square, an incident that Farrell blamed on Breed, although a police officer immediately rushed to the scene and rendered aid to Pearsall.

“The numbers say one thing, but if people don't feel safe, then of course we have more work to do,” Breed told reporters at a news conference outside the police academy building in Diamond Heights on Wednesday. “And I also want to be very clear that we know no matter what happens, this is a big city and there is crime. But the difference is that our officers are there when something happens.”

San Francisco had the highest number of officers per 1,000 residents among major California cities in 2023, at 2.39, according to FBI data on law enforcement staffing. However, San Francisco has a relatively high number of tourists and day commuters, meaning the actual number of people per police officer may be higher than official population figures suggest.

Breed and Scott pointed to several factors they believe are responsible for the growing number of people trying to join the SFPD. Among them is the contract the Breed administration negotiated last year, which gave police a 10.75% pay raise over three years and made San Francisco the Bay Area city with the highest salary for an entry-level employee offers. The same contract also included retention bonuses, which Scott credited with reducing the number of officers leaving SFPD for other agencies.

Additionally, Breed placed a successful measure on San Francisco's March ballot, Proposition E, which gave police more authority to conduct car chases and made it easier for them to use surveillance cameras and drones. The city has since rolled out new cameras and drones that police officials say will help them fight crime.

Breed has also tried to speed up the hiring process by, among other things, using her human resources department and controller's office to help police speed up hiring and signing a contract with a private company to expedite background checks.

“When you're dealing with a complex city and complex situations, you have to understand how these things work in order to deconstruct them,” Breed said.

Scott said it took time in San Francisco to implement the necessary reforms to speed up hiring and attract more recruits to the police department. He also said the nationwide downturn in law enforcement following the police killing of George Floyd in 2020 resulted in more officers leaving the SFPD and fewer recruits being hired.

“It kind of turned the other way,” Scott said. “Three years ago it was really, really difficult. Morale was low. There was a lot of criticism and criticism of policing in general… That has now changed.”

The San Francisco police union, whose president Tracy McCray also appeared at Wednesday's news conference, has supported Breed's re-election bid. Still, the other candidates in the mayoral race say they would be more effective at improving policing.

Farrell, the former interim mayor, has vowed to fire Police Chief Bill Scott and overhaul the police commission that oversees and determines the SFPD if voters approve City Hall reform Measure D in November. Farrell also wants to fund five police academy courses per year, compared to the three or four the city has had in recent years.

“Mayor Breed has engineered an incredible decline in our city government,” Farrell said at the last mayoral debate, before discussing how he would increase police staffing.

Daniel Lurie, a nonprofit founder and Levi Strauss' heir, has said he wants to build housing for civil servants and help pay for rent, child care and transportation. Farrell also said he would try to offer rent subsidies for police recruits.

Another mayoral candidate, Supervisor Ahsha Safaí, authored a ballot measure in November that would create a fund to finance outstanding student loans and job training for first responders, which he advocates for, among other things, bringing more police officers to the city. Like Farrell, he also wants to replace Scott at the helm of the SFPD.

Board President Aaron Peskin, meanwhile, supports providing forgivable student loans to college students who want to pursue law enforcement careers. And his campaign said he would “personally oversee” bureaucratic reforms to further speed up hiring.

Danielle Echeverria contributed reporting.

Reach JD Morris: [email protected]; Twitter: @thejdmorris