>> i don't know about that. president mazzucco: not politically. [laughter] >> i am a community organizer with the coalition on homelessness. i am working with the department. i was thrilled to weeks ago when the commission voted unanimously to listen to the voice of our community to prevent needless death of our community members through the cit model. i was also pleased to see another overture, when the chief attended a meeting of the lgbt democratic club to discuss our views on pacers. -- on tasers. thank you for doing that. community engagement is the heart of effective public safety and needs to be a consideration in every step of every issue. there are two things you need to do to listen to the community. nearly every person in this room

who is now wearing a blue collar does not want -- who is not wanting a blue collaearing a b s not want tasers. the same goes for those that were in the community overflow rooms. do what the aclu suggested. medical experts, representation from the school board, and representatives from the community must work with you on protocol and tactical options for less than lethal force situations. this group must look at all options, not just tasers. consensus is possible. but consensus building will seriously take time. correct me if i'm wrong, but you said last night you did not want the department to issue recommendations until after cit was implemented.

is that right? if that is so, i agree. you need to give this process time to do its work properly. thanks. [applause] president mazzucco: next speaker? >> i obviously want you to vote no on tasers. if you're still in this room, two minutes is not a lot of time, but it has been given to you and you should take it. the public comment has been almost entirely that we do not want tasers. these are people who of and set a -- have been staying all night to make their comment. if you want any semblance of representation of the public, of communities you would like to serve, you need to vote against tasers, or at least postpone it

and have community engagement before you make any vote. in terms of deescalating, you have just adopted a program to try to do that. why adopt a second program at the same time? we need to try to train people to deescalate. it has been called into question whether any weapon can be escalate -- can deescalate a situation. i understand why a police officer would be scared and want to use a weapon. when people have more weapons available, they use more weapons. it is just what people do. i think bringing more weapons into this situation is in no way going to deescalate anything. we need to try using a different

method first. i have two minutes. i am going to use them. we were playing been go downstairs. what did we have left that nobody setbacks -- nobody said? did anybody get been kodak's 3, 2, 1 -- get bingo? three, two, one. thank you. >> i am the president of [unintelligible] and a member of numerous other organizations. you have heard various arguments here tonight, but we also need to look to the moral issues. the effect of the matter is it is obvious when somebody gets hit with a taser the become agitated and it leads to escalation. the fact of the matter is that tasers are mainly used against

homeless people, the mentally ill, and the poor. these are people who need help, not torture. i say torture because as amnesty international states, it is a torture device. a fundamental question we need to ask in san francisco -- do we want to be regarded as the torturers of the world, as those to permit torture? i do not think so. also, why is there a different moral issue? we also have a budget crisis. i do not think we should be spending that money in arizona. there are other ways things can

be used. if not, there are other alternatives. let us think about this. let us not steal our funds. but as come down and do it properly, and then make a proper, intelligent, informed decision. thank you. >> my name is nate miller. i grew up in san francisco. i saw you guys on television on a bar down the street, and so i decided to come. hello, buck cavern. was i just on tv? [laughter] >> though you have anything else to do? >> were there at ball games? >> there are half price drinks for everyone who does this

tonight. [laughter] [applause] >> go ahead. >> i grew up in san francisco. i think there is always an argument for more tools. maybe you need a bow and arrow if the guy is running far away. maybe you need non-chuck p is a kung fu masters. but ultimately, -- maybe you need nunchucks if he is a kung fu masters. but ultimately, we need deesca lation. the best way is to show compassion. i encourage you to vote against tasers. that is it. [applause] [laughter] >> we have our last speaker. last but not least. >> good evening. i am carl stark. i am a rider. i am not familiar with shooting

people. i am not really conversant with tasers. i guess it is called the wechsler study. it was done by our very own ucsf. it did not really nail down why, but it seems that first year after the department' gets its hands on a taser, the impact is negative in the extreme. it did not seem to have too many positive points for officer safety either, not that officers are not members of the public. one of the questions i wanted to ask is if public safety does not really improve with the issuing of tasers, an officer safety does not really improved, besides taser international's

bottom-line, what does improve backspin -- does improve? i am a little concerned about how some of the academics were questioned into giving an answer regarding a very specific incident under a very limited control set of circumstances, with a very specific set of training guidelines in place, could this will possibly be useful. they were giving the answer yes. i am afraid the sound bite is going to be "yes," taken out of context. it certainly could not happen from anybody who has been part of the extensive and time- consuming proceedings tonight. thank you all for your time and patience on this matter. i think we have spent enough time and government money on this whole taser thing, in my personal opinion. thanks. [applause]

>> one of our regulars. come on and. >> i was in the child care room with my daughter. thank you, commission, for allowing us the time to speak tonight. i would most like to reiterate some of the concerns that people have expressed tonight. tasers do kill. they are not always less than lethal. we cannot afford the liabilities they cause. we cannot afford the loss of life that are potential to cause. we cannot afford the increase in injuries to people that tasers would cause. people on the street are already afraid of the police. this was probably the reason for some of the escalations we see in the first place. tactics police use on the street

are very confronteive, and not deescalationary. i commend this commission for voting to put the cit model into place. i urge you to give that model a chance to work, so we can see what that looks like. maybe once we see what that looks like we will realize that tasers are the wrong way to go. i already know that tasers are the wrong way to go, but maybe the police force will also. thank you very much for listening tonight. [applause] president mazzucco: at this time, i think the commissioners need to talk a little bit about this. i think we probably should start with commissioner hammer and i, who put together the amendment to line item four.

we probably should start with what we are voting on. commissioner hammer: i am happy to, but i think some interesting things came out tonight. i would like to hear from other commissioners. i think we talked a lot about it. commissioner chan: first, i really want to give a huge thank you for everybody being here past 10:00 at night. that is extreme commitment. i want to thank everybody from the bottom of my heart. [applause] i rode done pretty much everything everybody said to make sure we take in this be back. i also appreciate the department presentation. i appreciate the commission's patience in listening to the presentation i put together tonight. i have a list of things i would like to make sure we include in our consideration. first, i should think president mazzucco and commissioner hammer for talking about this ahead of

time and how to frame it in a way that is constructive. what i heard in terms of the resolution put forward -- it looks like some of the pieces we heard tonight, commissioner hammer probably has the same thoughts. we heard from every person there needs to be community input. whatever we do, we need a timeline that allows a real conversation with all the different communities that were highlighted tonight. that needs to happen. it cannot be rushed through. i do not want us coming back in 30 days and saying we want tasers. that is not appropriate. we have a huge community we serve. we need to meet with is the pri organizations and experts. i think we need to spend more time researching and talking with doctors who are independent. i have spent so much time the last couple of weeks trying to read every study i could find on tasers. i had a hard time finding

studies that were as independent as we heard tonight. most other doctors have a connection to taser international. dr. sang one say this, but when he did this research, taser tried to bribe him. then, they sued him. he is still doing this research completely independently. i admire that. community stakeholder discussions need to happen. we also need to explain what ever research we do, where the money is going to come from. where is the money coming from? how much will it cost in terms of training, acquiring weapons, which celebrating the weapons, lawsuits, liability. we had two plaintiff-side lawyers who were talking against their interest. it would be in their interest for us to adopt tasers so they could litigate. we need to talk about that and

see where the money is coming from if we come up with any sort of intermediate device. we also need to talk about use of force, when you would be allowed to use this weapon. i am not clear when you would be allowed to use this weapon. it looks like when there is a deadly for scenario, you cannot use less deadly force in response. it does not appear tasters -- tasers are that effective. houston and los angeles reported that they are about 70% effective. memphis reported about 50%. when there is a dangerous scenario, i do not see realistically how an officer is going to use a taser when it is a non-deadly-force scenario. i still need to be clear about it but we're going to research this. we need to explain what scenarios you can use these

devices in. also, i am glad that the proposed amendments so far includes the two commissioners. if we do move forward, i would help put this in terms of communication if there is community involvement. i want to highlight this, because i know we spent many hours on this two weeks ago. this was unanimously adopted by the commission to weeks ago. the working group had our first meeting last friday at 2:00. we're having a second meeting next week. during our initial meeting, some any questions. -- so many questions. there are a lot of questions that can be ironed out. but it is going to take time. dr. dupont and major cochrane

from memphis estimate it takes from six months to a year to roll up a cit program. i want to make sure that program is up and running. i heard, and i do not know if this is completely true, that this commission adopted cit many years ago, and it was never implemented. i can see that happening again. if i can help it, it will get implemented. but it gives you a sign of how difficult it is to make reform, especially when it comes to a difficult issue involving our mental health community. i do want to make sure that whatever we discussed tonight, whatever program we come up with, that cit needs to be up and running. we need training in place before we give weapons. if you have new weapons and you have cit barely having our second meeting, you're going to use one of the other.

also, dr. sang came twice to tell us he would strongly recommend that we have defibrillators, automated external defibrillators, if we adopt any weapon that might stop or capture the heart. as an immigrant rights activist, i cannot let this go. we cannot give money to arizona. there cannot be money that goes to arizona because that boycott is still active and going on. [applause] arizona unfortunately is still passing laws that are anti- immigrant and racist. these are things i want to keep in mind. one must point on my list is to make sure that whatever research we do, we respond to this community of color. that was mentioned several times tonight. commissioner dejesus: i would

like to thank the experts that testified this evening. your presentations were excellent. i would like to think the public that we did so patiently through the discussion this evening and gave their excellent input into this conversation. thank you. it is indeed very helpful. but at this point i would really like to turn to the chief, who has been sitting through all of this as well tonight, and thank you to the department for its terrific presentation. but i am wondering where the department is at this point in time, before the commission proceed with our conversation. the agenda framed our focus in one direction. we came into this meeting and we started it with a slightly shifted, amended focus. now, after we have heard from experts, the community -- where

is your thinking at this point? -- commissioner kingsley: chief godown: when we went to los angeles and look at their model, and went to memphis, i think all three of us sat down collectively and meant the decision that was what we wanted to do. the argument here is the fact that we are still trying to implement the cit. i could of been an obstruction to this and tried very hard not to implement the memphis model. i understand the theory that we want the memphis model up and running. what i am asking is a proposal to go back and research not only the taser, but any less lethal options in the law enforcement community today. i am being told there are lasers? you can flash and disorient people that have weapons.

that is my request, to be able to go up there and research all less lethal options that are out there, plus obviously the taser. that is what i am asking for. like i said before, i have an obligation to the men and women of this department to give them another -- i know people hate to hear the term "tool in the toolbox." as far as the scenario today with the knife -- the suspect could have a broken bottle or a baseball bat. different scenarios could have occurred. i understand the lethal use of force. i understand the passion of this community and every speaker who came into this room. i respect everyone's opinion. but as chief of this department i have an obligation to keep my officer's life. there needs to be extensive training. the use of force policy needs to be looked at. there is a litany of issues i have to deal with in this

department. we will look into those, plus cit, plus where we will get finances to pay for this. i have not even begun to look where the money was coming from because i never got permission to research. i am willing to invite the community to participate in this process. i am willing to go out and speak to the community. i want to work closely with the occ and community members. a lot of people came up tonight and said "arm tasers." all we are asking is to go out and research the feasibility. i might come back in a month and say it is not the way to go and i have found another weapon. i might say that after looking at everything i am still looking at taser. i will come up with an option, it will go to public comment, and the commission will vote. i am not asking to arm at this point in the debate. i am just asking to research the

feasibility of a less lethal option that can be a substitute in some instances, under certain conditions. president mazzucco: thank you. vice president marshall: this is the second one of these i sat through. i was confused after the last one, and i am confused after this one. we did this a year ago. part of the confusion that day, it turned out, was the way it was agendized. we tried to modify it as we were going to this process. it looks like today, we started off with it agendized one way, and it looks like there will be a proposal to move something else through.

part of my confusion -- tonight, to me -- each time we have had this, it has been nothing but. counterpoint -- but point counterpoint. the department wants them. there were officers earlier who said they have been in life- threatening situations and that having a taser could help save their lives, and they would not have to use a gun. that is what i heard. then the other side said it would not be used in these situations anyway. i am confused about that. the scenario that was presented -- the officers were up there in those harrowing situations. they said we could have used those in the situations and there would help. then the expert on the other side -- i have to have some clarity on that.

that is very important to me. perf said other departments are using them and they are not bad. then the other side says that are horrible. i am more confused now than when i started this process. one side said the devices can be used properly. the other side said the cannot be used properly at all. i need clarity. at this point, i want to know what we are voting on, we are attempting to vote on, because i am not sure. but all of this goes into my pot.

when i heard the latino group, there is a lot of demarcation care. -- demarkation here. tgs

because you use a bunch of things now, i need to pull all we need to look at other devices. as part of this pilot program. we're authorizing the chief to start looking at the use of c.e.d.'s or tasers along with working with the o.c.c., along with working with the two commissioners, along with working with community groups to see if in fact that is the tool that we're going to have to -- that we're going to use. i think it's abundantly clear. we need something. there's something in the middle between they stop using their baton and pepper spray and when they revert to the firearm. we're leaving all the options for the chief if he does go

out. we've heard about flats, cattle prods, we've heard -- about flashlights, cattle prods, we've heard about a lot of things. if it comes become to tasers, that's where we're at with it. but it also has to deal with the implementation of the program. that's why we want commissioners to work with the chief. his proposal will include the ground rules. it's not my turn to talk yet but what we heard in the audience was concern. i'll get to that later but it's about putting together a proposal for the use of tasers and/or other devices. i'll turn it over to the commissioner. >> there's so many things here, some of the things were covered before. but we have to talk about a budget. last time i heard, we had officers retiring, we have a 10% deficit