Last year, after Black Lives Matter protesters demanded that cities “Defund the Police”, San Francisco Mayor London Breed announced that her city would cut funds from police budgets.
Breed cut $120 million from the budgets of San Francisco’s police and sheriff’s departments, despite warnings that defunding could impact crime and emergencies.
This week, Breed went back on her support of defunding the police, announcing that she is making an emergency request to the city’s Board of Supervisors to increase the police budget.
“I’m proud this city believes in giving people second chances,” she said. “Nevertheless, we also need there to be accountability when someone does break the law . . . Our compassion cannot be mistaken for weakness or indifference”.
“It is time for the reign of criminals to end,” she added. “And it comes to an end when are we more aggressive with law enforcement and less tolerant of all the bulls**t that has destroyed our city”.
San Francisco has been facing an increase in crime this year. San Francisco’s Public Policy Institute of California reported that homicides increased in Los Angeles, San Diego, Oakland and San Francisco by 17 percent in 2021.
Property crimes rose 7 percent in 2021. Car break-ins and vehicle theft have also increased since 2020.
Former Philadelphia mayor Michael Nutter recently criticized District Attorney Larry Krasner for dismissing the city’s record high homicides. Krasner had said “we don’t have a crisis of lawlessness, we don’t have a crisis of crime, we don’t have a crisis of violence”.
Breed said she expects opposition to her proposals. “To be clear, what I’m proposing today and what I will be proposing in the future will make a lot of people uncomfortable and I don’t care,” she said.
“At the end of the day the safety of the people of San Francisco is the most important thing to me. We are past the point where what we see is even remotely acceptable,” she added.