abc news. >> hello, i'm kristen today we will talk about universal basic income. a san francisco supervisor pushing to make that happen here. we can begin with the challenges in keeping america's big cities safe, including oakland. like many other cities, oakland has seen protests, violence and rising crime and it's all happening while policing standard are changing. the woman whose job it is t create a department that's safer for all is interim oakland police chief susan manheimer.

thanks so much for joining us toda today. >> you have been interim chief since march. how would you describe these past few months? >> i would say this is one of the more transformational moments in policing. >> no doubt. for so many reasons. one in the spotlight, is, of course, the death of george floyd. our heart broke. we seen a lot of protests, including in oakland. we saw it last week when people were out if your city for jacob blake, chofs shwho was shot by n police. you have discerned that they're not. right. can you break down the different groups out there? >> you know, i think what's happened in the past several weeks, particularly, is that what we're seeing now is the

demonstrations are differentiating themselves and that those who are sincere and out there to demonstrate peacefully and carry their message forward of the pain, the hurt, the social injustice and the racial lens that is so much a part of the first amendment activities we've seen in oakland and throughout the country, rightfully so. those have become mostly day time, we create safe places and for those very important demonstrations and protests. what happens after dark, frankly, is another matter. and in the past month or so, we saw a piece of those demonstrations emerging, which really was intent on harm and destruction to our community and others. and so those demonstrations end up being after dark. they are definitely advertised on social media differently. they are extorting folks to come

down and burn down the city and do damage to our vulnerable spaces and places, especially the merchants in downtown oakland and china town that have been suffering under the pandemic have been suffering under the lack of business and now have been suffering under multiple vandalism. so those demonstration now that have differentiated themselves as really those out to harm and destroy are going to be policed differently and really, i think the movement has really denounced that undermining of their message. >> all right, so, it's clear that you take a different approach towards the different groups, based on what their intent is. i got to ask you, though, some people do think and they say that it's the police who are out there inciting violence first which then causes a response from protesters. what do you say to people who think that? >> we are very pleased and delighted that we really don't have to even facilitate our peaceful demonstrations.

we are looking. we understand that a lot of the angst is around police and some of the activities that we have seen across the country that we all are quite upset about with some of the incidents that have taken place. but, frankly, we do not even facilitate those demonstration and we different them those safe spaces and places. the ones in which we did really hold back, because there was still a level of first amendment activity and these other really lawless demonstrators, who were bent on destruction and were focused on doing harm and damage actually used to be folded in with those demonstration and as those other demonstrators lift the movement and the message differentiated and pulled away from that, we had to take a different stance, because for about two or three weeks, we saw some of these demonstrations that did massive destruction and damage to our federal building, civic facilities and to our vulnerable downtown area. we had several nights where the

damage, arson, destruction, they set fire to a starbucks the other night. we have one wonderful black-owned entrepreneurial business that has been vandalized very, very expensive cost to them three times. that is when we, as the police, need to step up. we as the city need to step up and ensure that we are not facilitating damage and destruction throughout our city. so, unfortunately, then, as we start to police and to provide a level of protection for our vulnerable infrastructure and for our residents, who are getting challenged, then they turn their ire on us and it becomes confrontational. unfortunately, it's certainly not our desire to create any kind of confrontation. but it is our responsibility to enshoo ure that our vulnerabili areas and safety in our community. >> the safety includes the

safety of officers. we heard that at these recent protests. there were people chanting "kill the cops." did you hear that? did your officers hear that? >> listen, the last three or four night, we had some wednesday, friday and saturday by some of the same group and i, myself, was shocked and saddened to hear 30 or 40 minutes of inciting be every they marched to the police building, "kill cops," you know, "burn the city down," and fought taking into account that, you know, we understand sometimes the ire is against us. but to have lasers pointed, which can actually cause officers to lose their sight, to have rocks and us to actually train and we've seen them training with these -- [ inaudible ] that our officers in our line and use them as a defensive mechanism against us. we've seen all of that in the

last couple of weeks. it's been very, very troubling to us that, you know, here we are trying to protect and defend the city and residents and that is turned that destruction towards our officers. and, of course, we have to represent them and protect them as well. >> yeah. i know some of the things have you on the officer's body cameras. we have video of some of the things you talked about happening, including the laser. i think one of your tweets spelled out very specifically on august 29th. you talked about lasers pointed at officer and our chopper was over that. i don't know if you can see our screen. that's what we are talking about. you explain that cur officer, otu explained it is a i th tweet and you explained the personal code. why so specific in the messaging? why is that so important? >> you know, i think in lots of ways we want to be a window in helping our community understand, number one, what is going on. so that when we do take these actions, we are not out there

looking to be in an offensive mode. we don't want police demonstrations. what we are trying to do is to protect them to ensure that the safety of our community of those traveling in buses and you know transportation downtown sort of where the danger is and what the danger is. so that we can provide those public safety messages for our community and also sort of to share the story. we had two news crews that were threatened. one actually individual had a laser pointed at their eyes and had to go to the hospital. so we have a dual purpose out there. one is to ensure we had demonstrators running through residential areas and challenging residents. we had demonstrators marching downtown telling merchants to close down your business or we're going to burn it down. so we have a dual message and one of those is to really broadcast to our public where the danger is and to stay away.

>> all right, chief, susan manheimer, we'll continue this conversation over on our facebook like stream while we take a short brake on air if you

and we are back with the interim police chief of oakland, susan manheimer. chief manheimer, i want to address the fact that crime is up since the pandemic began and for that we want to share with our viewers some key statistics in the city. so we'll put that up for you so you can kind of digest that and explain what is going on. in terms of homicide, there were 11 in the first quarter of this year. that's the first three months, 23 in the second quarter. that's a 109% increase.

and then assault with a firearm, that's also up. 69 in the first quarter and 114 cases in the second quarter. that's a 65% increase. what is going on? >> you know, we are just really troubled by this. we had seen five years of decrease in gun crime and we decreased our shootings and homicides by over 50% in five years. and other cities also saw some of this. our fire program has been a model across the country in reducing fun crime. so we entered the first quarter of this year. we had a little bit of an uptick. but remember the second quarter of this three months since the shelter-in-place has hit, we have seen almost a 70% increase. and you know, it goes up a little bit in the summer. but year over year looking at the same quarter last year, we are still seeing an astounding

increase of about 60%. so we are seeing kind of across the country major cities are seeing this type of an increase and it's everything from gang and group conflicts to the level of sort of anxiety and frustration around the challenges and the fiscal crisis. and when you think even just about so many of our individuals, really, seeing a level of challenge with the pandemic and not knowing what the future brings, changes and patterns, so our bars, our restaurants, the regular places people gather are not available so these gang group conflicts. these tensions, we saw a situation the other night where two brothers got out of a car, they were arguing. and they started shooting at each other. i think because the shooting versus gone up, i'm on a monthly call with the major city chiefs across america and we are seeing

this in most of the cities that everyone has a short temper, that people are having anxiety. it's two things. i call it the no bail and no jail. as a peace event. i don't want to oversell that peace. but when you think about the fact we have had a lot of early releases because of the pandemic and trying to clear out some of the level of the population, then when you look at it, when they're released and they don't have any services and re-entry programs, they're coming right back to a situation that did not serve them in the first place. so that's one piece of it. and you couple that with the strategies around the cease-fire i told you about where we would use a cooling-off period maybe to go to jail for a gun crime or something along those lines. we don't even have those strategies. so, what we're trying to do here in oakland is use different strategies and callouts and recognizing that there are so

many pressures in our challenged communities, those same communities that are seeing the desperate pressure around the pandemic and the deaths and the disease that they're seeing as well as that lack of services. we've gone out with our opd chairs initiative even to just provide that reassuring presence, to distribute masks, to be a part of our city's efforts to ensure that these challenged areas perform more services right now. because they're not just seeing an increase in crime, an increase in joblessness, but, you know, this lack of education, the increased disparity around the way the disease is even getting during the pandemic are all challenges. >> yeah, no, the social component is, no doubt, a big part of it. as you said, there are so many factors. somebody wants to know about property crime. i will throw up another number

for insight there. vehicle thefts way up. i want to show between last year and this year. take a look at that 2019 you had 2,983 total. this year so far carjacking to 12003 this yea 12 right now the conversation is also surrounding, you know, de-funding and i prefer the term diverting some police funding to social services. do you think these numbers of rising crime suggest that the reliance on traditional policing is not working and, therefore, we should divert or do you think they actually suggest the opposite, that it's time to step up policing and maybe through a different model but step it up and address these issues? >> right. you know, i think there is so much in that whole thing. i actually prefer imagining

policing. because i think where we're going and i am very grateful that our city leaders did not just sort of bend to the diverting, de-funding, abolishing policing rhetoric, but really dug down and i think are working not only with our department but clearly within the community and our political leaders to say what are those things in this transformational motel in policing that could be better done by an alternative service delivery. i will tell you that there is not a cop that really understands or believes that we are the best to respond to some of the things we become the default in mental health calls, homelessness calls, those things that are safety net service calls. we don't because we have been the default. so we fully encourage and hope that there will be alternative services stood up. but i will tell you something at least about oakland pd, i won't speak for any other agency at this point, but in oakland,

[ inaudible ] they are already being de-funded. we have the lowest number of officers per violent crime in the country. i can tell you and it pains me to see that low level calls for service sometimes have a three-to-six-hour wait. and so my hope and my hope for this moment is that we are taken away and diverted, alternative service for several of the safety net services, which would be better served with clinicians and others, more trauma informed, so that we can get to the crime fighting and the other things that our community depends on for us. those numbers, each of those crime stats is actually a person, a victim, a loved one, a family member. and that is really where i believe that at the end of the day, my hope for opd and for -- the city is that we will get to be able to spend more time out in the community and with these calls for service. so i don't see that we get cut down in our numbers, but my hope is that the right alternative

services come to the residents that need them. >> all right. interim oakland police chief susan manheimer. thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and some of the insights into how the department is evolving. i really appreciate the conversation. take good care? thank you so much. take care. bye-bye. >> we'll take a short break. when we come back, we'll ask the question could the guaranteed income pilot trance to san francisco? money in your

all right. we are working right now at this very moment to connect wanancis hane w is talking about launching a universal bake income pilot in the city. until we get connected, i want to show you this, my colleague reggie and i talked to a hair salon owner in hill valley that just reopened indoors. the inte

everyone could be impacted if more salons don't open soon. >> this is a moment a lot of small business owners have been waiting for, the ability to reopen their barber shops in some areas especially when it comes to indoor services. so to talk about that roller coaster these business owners have been on. we will bring in a woman from milvali salon. jessica, great to see you. >> thank you for having me. >> so this has been quite an emotional and financial hardship over the past few months and you have been basically open/closed. opened/closed again, what a whiplash. >> it's been crazy. you know, 18 years i've owned this business. it's my livelihood, my life. this is my hometown. these people that work here are my family. to see them go back and forth and be yanked around is just

heart breaking. >> well, i'm happy to hear it's reopening again, that must be quite a relief for you. >> it is, we are opened pash usually, 25% capacity. no es at the timeticino esthesth >> all right. given how times are really difficult for a lot of people. what would you think if guaranteed income was given to you by your city? that idea was actually put into practice with a pilot program first in stockton. now in two other cities, including oakland, working out details and possibly san francisco now. supervisor matt haney is in support of a guaranteed income. supervisor haney, thank you so much for joining us. >> thank you for having me. >> so this proposal has taken on many forms, as we know, andrew

yang's proposal was $1,200 a month for every american. tell me about your proposal, who would get it? how much money? how does it work? >> so we're still working out a lot of the details. you mentioned stockton where 125 families got $500 a month. oakland is moving forward, st. paul just announced theirs very similar to stocktons. there have been federal proposals that offered $2,000 for the length of the pandemic. the bake idea is very simple. that people who are struggling, people who are low income, simply need more money to get by. when you give them cash directly, they use it on food, on education, basic necessities and the reason why this is getting so much momentum now i think is because we have more people than ever in our country who are struggling to pay for basic necessities at a time when it's harder than ever to work.

>> that part is certainly not in doubt. however, do you envision the money for this coming from san francisco's coiffures or would you simply be urging the federal government to fund this? >> so we are urging the federal government to implement a guarantee income program for the length of the pandemic, but also i think cities didn't need to step up, too, there are now over two dozen cities all over the country that are implementing local version of this and francisco needs to be a leader on it as well, what i'm proposing is for us to have a pilot program here in san francisco funded privately by philanthropy, by foundations and many folks are interested and implement that program here locally and be able to create a model similar to other cities that is then extended and made more sustainable. >> do you propose that this is something that everybody would get, such as andrew yang

proposed or only families who were socioeconomically disadvantaged as i think is the case in stockton? >> this is only for folks who are disadvantaged or under a certain income level, guaranteed income basically says the best what i to lift people out of poverty is to actually do it directly, to give people the funds that they need. i represent a district that has price the poverty rate and half the median income of san francisco as a whole. many families are struggling to get by with basic necessities. what we know is that over 40% of americans during normal times don't have $400 if faced with an emergency to be able to cover for that. so, by giving fund directly, we're actually fighting poverty in the most direct efficient way. we have a social safety net. much of that is still needed. but at the end of the day, you can have so many people living on the edge and other margins

living in poverty and expect your society to function. >> all right. we only have 20 second left. but if there is a person out there interested in funding this, should they give you a call? >> yes, please give me a call. jack dorsey has funded a number of these programs. we need to get this done. this is something that people are recognizing. many people got a $1,200 check from the federal government and they put it to good use. they know getting money directly is the best way, most efficient way. most democratic to make sure folks have what they need to get

and thank you so much for

joining us today on this interactive show "getting answers." we will be here every day at breaking news as we come on the air. new developments in the deadly police confrontation involving a black man in rochester, new york. the major late today suspending at least seven officers following the death of daniel prude. the officers pinning him down. he stopped breathing minutes later. he died days after that. the mayor saying the police chief had told her he died of a drug overdose in police custody. the medical examiner ruling it a homicide. the family demanding the officers face charges. the race for a coronavirus vaccine, after the cdc alerted all 50 states to be ready for a possible vaccine by november 1st. dr. anthony fauci on the reality of having a safe and effective one before election day. tonight, the alain