Foot patrols could help beat crime (Sept 2006)

By Amy Kniss

The Board of Supervisors is slated to vote this month on a pilot program to strengthen police presence in some of District 5’s high-crime areas via mandatory foot patrols––a far-sighted measure at a time when many locals are shaken over recent shootings close to home.

D5 Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi drafted the legislation in order to combat crime more strategically and improve relations between residents and police by establishing regular contact along certain commercial/resident corridors. If passed, the pilot program would last one year. But Mirkarimi has his sites set further into the future.

“My ploy is that officers will make us so proud that voters will put pressure on my colleagues and the mayor to do this city-wide, and hire more officers,” said Mirkarimi at a meeting of the Haight/Divisadero Neighbors and Merchants Association last month.

Ordinance 10A.1 would require both Park and Northern District Stations to assign at least one officer to two of the three daily shifts (days, swing, nights). Mirkarimi postponed the August 15 vote––although he says he had at least six votes to pass the bill––and hopes to use the extra time to campaign and educate for additional support from citizens and city officials.
“Foot patrols are nothing new,” said Mirkarimi at a separate meeting last month with Lower Haight neighbors. “It’s been done for decades...but we drifted away from it. This is not meant to sacrifice the police’s ability to respond to an emergency [off their beat].

“I want to see this city-wide and it hasn’t materialized fast enough,” he said. “I want to compliment the captains; they have done a very good ad hoc job of adding foot patrols. This is very awkward and highly irregular, and quite frankly it borders on arrogance. But we’ve all become creatures of habit.

“This is a no lose,” added Mirkarimi. “This is beyond politics; it’s pragmatics.”

Capt. Gary Jimenez, the commanding officer at Park Station until Capt. John Ehrlich returns later this month, expressed concern that increasing foot patrols would necessarily hinder the force’s ability to reach crime scenes via cruiser.

“If you want the luxury of foot beats, you’re going to have to pay for the officers the department needs to staff them,” said Jimenez bluntly yet gently to attendees of an Aug. 21 North of Panhandle Neighborhood Association (NOPNA) meeting. “We just can’t strip the cars for the foot beats.”
Mirkarimi strongly disagreed with Jimenez’s characterization of foot patrols as a “luxury,” but did admit beats are just one piece of the puzzle.

“I don’t think this is going to cure the epidemic of gun violence,” said Mirkarimi. However, he says it will “help restore a sense of dignity to the residents and merchants living in the afflicted neighborhoods” and may help establish trust between the police and witnesses to crimes––whose reluctance to identify perpetrators is a main reason so many killings are unsolved or unsuccessfully prosecuted.

There were 95 homicides in San Francisco in 2005, and a five-victim day of bloodshed in southeast San Francisco at the end of August pushed the 2006 total to 62. Mirkarimi says fewer than 20 percent have resulted in arrests.

Much of the NOPNA meeting (see picture, page 1) focused on the August 14 killing of 17-year-old Aubrey Abrakasa, whose family was in attendance and graciously accepted condolences while simultaneously pressing for police accountability. “I want to know why it took investigators two days to come to our house,” Aubrey’s father asked Capt. Jimenez.

Abrakasa was slain by a hail of bullets from an automatic weapon in front of the laundromat at Baker & Grove, close to where he lived.

Sgt. Rick Schiff of Park Station told meeting attendees that many details of the case are under wraps, but that a Western Addition gang, the Knock Out Posse, may have been involved. Abrakasa is not thought to have been in a gang, as he was a busy student who was involved in constructive activities, such as camp counseling for the Rec & Park Department and playing basketball at the Page Street Boys & Girls Club. Over 50 students and Boys & Girls club members and staff staged a vigil on Thursday, August 17, walking from Page & Stanyan to Baker & Grove, where a ceremony was held in Abrakasa’s honor.

Together Park and Northern Stations cover seven beats, three staffed by Park Station officers and the remaining four by Northern Station officers. The beats cover much of District 5 and include Western Addition, Upper Haight, Lower Haight, Upper Market/Panhandle, Inner Sunset, Hayes Valley and Japan Town.

The July 22 murder of John Brown, 23, in the Western Addition sparked the outburst of violence and corresponding retaliation in the Bayview that bled into August. It became clear that this eruption of bloodshed would require more than the usual band-aid of police pressure and some rhetorical salve to stop the bleeding.

“Police aren’t making arrests because witnesses are afraid to come forward. They’re afraid of the criminals and don’t feel like they can trust the police,” said a Western Addition resident during a community strategy session sponsored by Mirkarimi.

Foot patrols could help ameliorate this problem, if it works in San Francisco as well as Mirkarimi says it has in Chicago, New York and Boston.
A 2005 report by the Office of Legislative Analyst shows findings that supports what Mirkarimi says we “feel in our collective gut.” According to the OLA report, as residents get to know their local officers, trust between them grows and, if successful, regular beat officers will open communication and information sharing lines between the SFPD and the public.
Mirkarimi has also authored legislation to reexamine the boundaries between police station territories, in response to concerns of high crime near “the seams.” For instance, much of District 5’s violence occurs in the Western Addition and Lower Haight, near where Park and Northern police districts meet.

Police department redistricting hasn’t been done in at least 15 years, according to Mirkarimi, who points out that the city charter requires supervisoral redistricting with every census. The same logic should apply to police districts, he said.