you also have to remember, during the short term transit plan during the period, the puc was quoted as saying the only way to alleviate traffic congestion on geary boulevard is an "light railk not a bus rapid transit. before you consider brt on geary, read those three documents. remember about the central subway at the union square station, and do your homework. you have two months to do it. i do not know when we will be coming before you again for discussion and passage, but you have plenty of time to do it. enjoy the two months off, enjoy the reading. it was good reading for me. commissioner avalos: thank you very much. any other member of the public that would like to comment? seeing none, public comment is

closed. next item please. >> item 14 is adjournment. commissioner avalos: we are adjourned. thank you very much.

on may 12, sf posted a benefit for project insight. canadians supported the recreation programs are too sick

children. >> learn more >> good morning and welcome to the public safety committee. my name is supervisor john

avalos. joining me to my right is christina olague, the vice chair, and to my left, and supervisor eric mar. the clerk is here as well as we said miller. we have sfgtv folks who are hoping as well. madam clerk, could you share with us your announcements? >> please make sure to silence all cell phones and electronic devices. completed speaker cards and any documents should be completed as part of the file and submitted to the clerk. items submitted after today will appear on a july 24th board of supervisors agenda, unless otherwise stated. supervisor avalos: thank you. if you could please call number one and two. >> item number one is the hearing regarding the impact of california's public safety and realignment policy on the city of san francisco as well as the county. item number two, a resolution approving the post-release

community supervision 2012 implementation plan. supervisor avalos: thank you very much. i appreciate it. i want to thank supervisor eric mar for britain these two items before us. -- bringing these two items before us. and of course, the group and executive committee for their report as well. since the sponsor of this hearing is supervisor mar, i will yield the microphone supervisor mar: thank you -- a yield of the microphone. supervisor mar: thank you, chair of a los. i want to start with remarks by saying that a number of community-based advocacy groups from the aclu to many others have been working on this issue for decades. i think, seeing issues of crisis

as an opportunity for a really important thing. a recent study by the aclu released in march called "public safety realignment california at a crossroads" analyzed 53 different programs within the state and gave sound recommendations for policy changes. i would like to say it has been a pleasure working with our law enforcement and criminal justice organizations in the city. it has made me understand what a great model san francisco and other counties, like our media, are for -- alameda, are for the rest of the state. fresno county, for example, have been getting twice as much money, when their programs are not geared toward turning people back to their communities and keeping communities safe, but also, reducing recidivism in our communities. recent changes at the california state association of counties and various criminal justice groups, we have been able to

change funding allocation. it is a little bit more fair. but much more work needs to be done. to those who do not know what is happening, this hearing is about california's new public safety realignment policy and how that impacted san francisco programs, again, as an opportunity to improve them and show them as a model to the rest of the state. as of october 1st, 2011, the public safety realignment app has required individuals in state prison for non-island, non-serious, non-sex offender felony offenses -- again, non-a violent offenses, will be released under the responsibility of our san francisco adult probation department. and our chief, when he still, and her staff. this allows us to better understand the impact on the

public of san francisco. and also, the additional responsibility that has pushed onto -- it has pushed onto our counties and various local agencies to address the program issues. i do want to say the aclu work, aside from saying it is an opportunity, also talked about the challenges of funding in the state. and in some ways, the recommendations of increasing data gathering, and changing funding formulas to give incentives to good programs like san francisco that reduce recidivism and incarceration and give great alternatives to incarceration are really key. i also think the aclu report and other criminal justice advocates point to the crisis of the criminal justice system in our state. i am looking forward to good comments from the public and our agencies about how we address

san francisco, but also california's terrible statistic that california is the highest state -- let me see. let me just read this. california's recidivism rate as a state, which is the rate at which people are released from prison and then return, california's percentage is among the highest in the nation at 67.5%. how do we as san francisco help to be a catalyst for other counties, and the state as well? and there is the biggest financial crisis that we're seeing right now in our state. how do we use the money that comes to our state wisely so that we are being a model, but also being fiscally responsible and also keeping our communities safe. with that, we have great presentations and we are hoping for good public comment as well. i would first like to introduce our representatives from the community corrections partnership executive committee. they will be giving presentations. the first one is chief wendy

stihl of the adult probation department and then cindy derrick from the district attorney's office, the public defender's office, the department of health, our sheriff, and the san francisco police department. also joining us today as resources are a representative from the comptroller's office and their supporting tracking data. and also, tracking the outcomes of the realignment implementation. also, the committee will provide a presentation on the impact of ab 109 or the public safety act realignment within san francisco. they will also be presenting on our city and county's realignment and reaction and

implementation plan. and on june 12th, i already introduced to the board of supervisors a resolution to approve this plan. hopefully, we will move that forward positively today. the committee of each county prepares its annual plan with recommended strategies in response to a realignment. last year, our 2011 plan was approved by the board on september 29th right on time for the re-enactment, or realignment on october 1st. 2011 in san francisco with the first county in the state to approve our plan. and we're the first board of supervisors in the state seeing the plan for 2012. i think we are ahead of the curve. i know how great our programs are and hopefully we will highlight them today. i would like to invite the chief to begin the presentation. >> thank you very much, supervisors. it is a pleasure to be here before you today and to talk about public safety realignment. at first, i will start off by

saying i'm proud to be in san francisco. i have been here only a little over two years, but the spirit of innovation and collaboration amongst the criminal justice partners is what has made a very difficult, challenging situation, such as realignment, the most historic reform in california's history related to criminal justice. i would like to recognize all of the criminal-justice partners for how hard they have worked together, collaborated, negotiated, and it has been an absolute pleasure. with that, -- prior to public safety realignment ab 109, there was another piece of legislation by our own senator leno. what that really did was start the whole evidence, research- based criminal justice realignment process going. what the legislation did is

created a community correctional partnership. and it is the criminal-justice partners for each county. the role of the partnership was to advise each county, implementing community corrections, using evidence- based preparation practices. all that means, evidence based, is looking at proven methods that have worked throughout the country, throughout the different counties, and taking those and implementing them within our probation system so that we can reduce the state's prison population. that was driven by the state prison crisis. they were facing a lawsuit, and overcrowding lawsuit. and in fact, the supreme court did way and two years later and found the conditions of confinement to be unconstitutional. that is what started this whole process rolling. and also, through -- probation drop the day was seen as an untapped resource. that is really where the answer was. if you could think of it as --

as a hub to a wheel where all of the partners could come together because probation touches court, police, the d.a., public defender, and all of that. and basically, community corrections, as the legislature sought it, was not being used as effectively as it could be. they basically -- to speak to the supervisors earlier point about creating formulas for behavior that works, sb 68 was a great example of that. every probationary that was not failed on probation and not sent to prison, there was a fiscal incentive. i am proud to say that san francisco, even though we send, we have one of the lowest car -- incarceration rates of all of the counties in sending individuals to state prison. we were able to reduce that even

more. we ripple to reduce that by a total of 40% -- we were able to reduce that by april 48% since 2009. that provided the funding to enhance the services. we decided how we would spend that money and it was 100% on services. we on housing issues, treatments issues, employment needs of education needs. a lot of the county's took that money and spend it on additional staff. we trained it on -- we train our staff on how to use better motivational techniques so they could work better with the clients. we also worked on training within the department so we could shift our culture. we have a culture within the probation department of supervising from a law enforcement perspective, not rehabilitating we were happy to teach many staff new skills and new concept, because evidence based probation, it is cutting edge. it is not like we have all been

doing it for 20 years. there was cultural training and operational changes, many that had to be made. i am proud to say that we went from spending an average of $256 two years ago, to an average two years later of $133. and even in the first quarter of 2012 as compared to the first quarter when all of these efforts started -- when we started the efforts, we were sending 62 on average in that quarter. quarter one of this year, we sent 14 probation failures. and it is not that we are just not sending them. our successful probation termination rate is up, and are unsuccessful provision rate is down. and also, these efforts have contributed to dropping our prison opera -- population from 8000 individuals down to the first time in history -- well, for many years -- to under 6000.

those are all statistics that are moving in the right direction. many counties are successful across the state. in fact, 6000 fewer probationers were sent to state prison. the legislature said, it is working. we were right. what they decided to do too -- was to create this realignment between the governor and the legislature. the key elements are that it is -- an executive committee corrections partnership so that the ecp, as we call it, as it was created, basically, it took a subset of those individuals, which is the sheriff, the chief of probation, the public defender, the police department and the board of supervisors locally within each county identified each type of social service agency. and ours was the public health

department. and the courts. and it's -- this created the ccp committee. as we mentioned earlier, we were the first county in the state to actually develop hours and have it approved. but being first is not necessarily always the best. but in our case, it was. [laughter] and the reason that it was is because san francisco took a balanced approach. we did not take all our money and say, we're going to activate this. basically, we said -- we invested a significant amount of money in service dollars. and in creative and aggressive and innovative things within the public defender's office and the district attorney's office, which will be talked about mayor -- later. the sheriff will talk about those programs in her department later.

basically, investment in all of these services allowed us to start realignment out with the perspective of needing to build the plan with the services. we were really successful on sb 68 we wanted to continue that success. basically, we created a plan that was a model. a lot of other counties did not know where to start. it helped other counties throughout the state take a more balanced approach. not all jurisdictions decided to invest as heavily in services as we did. but in fact, many of them did and we received many letters of approval from many counties. and did redefine many felonies. many felonies now under penal code 1178 that weapon punished -- punishable by serveing priso,

now they will be served in county jail. they can be served in all jail sentences, or split between jail and mandatory supervision. we have, in fact, created a third way that they could be served, which is totally allowable under the law but was not really thought about in the first place, where basically we are using all aspects of the law. 100% of it can also be spent on intensive committee supervision. the other elements of the law was that it established a post- release community supervision and this population that was supervised by parole, in essence. non-serious, non-violent population. and only on their first offense. we will talk more about this later in the presentation, but in fact, we have 67 of our current roughly about 310 that have 11 or more prior felony

convictions. on average come the population that is coming from -- on average, the population and is coming from state prison have prior convictions. and the majority of others have very serious convictions. the state was not just looking at incarceration. we have a very high risk population. and san francisco have a high- risk population, whether you're talking about probation or mandatary -- mandatory crs because we do try to do so much to rehabilitate an individual and keep them on probation lager and make more intense than would, let's say, a county like fresno. and what that does is increase the risk level. does that are released from state prison that are the non- serious, non-ryland, non-sex are subject to -- a non-violent,

non-sex are subjected to provisioned by a probation officer. one of the great aspects of allies that it finally began to give the probation department tools to use in lieu of a very lengthy, cumbersome, ineffective processes. one of those tools was incarceration. if eight -- an individual violates by either absconding or some other violation, it gives the local department to the opportunity to take immediate, swift, and serious sanctions. that is what all the research tells us to do. if somebody violates and the punishment is not for three weeks to six weeks down the road and all this time they are sitting in an expensive jail bad, we have done nothing to change their behavior. the flash incarceration is a wonderful tool. and for those individuals that

are successful, the post-release cases, for six months and they have not been arrested, and they have met all of the terms and conditions of their supervision and the goals that we have set for them in their individual treatment and rehabilitation plan, the chief of adults rehabilitation can terminate at the end of six months if there has been no incarceration. many charlie, this population is terminated -- mandatory early -- mandatorily, we have created a population that response to rewards and sanctions. you want to have a four to one ratio. the evidence tells us this. and you want to rev two hundred hours of a treatment modality and the -- you want to have 200 hours of a tree limb a gaudy and beyond that, you have diminishing returns. we are taking all of that science and we are taking all

our policies and our practices into our supervision model. other key elements of the public safety realignment is parole revocation. those are now served in county jail rather than state jail for up to six months. that is significantly impacting a share, which she will talk about, in terms of the population. perot has complete control on who they violate and who begins to -- parole has complete control on who they are valid and who begins to fill up the county jail. in 2013, the parole violations will stop being heard by what they call the board of prison hearings. they will be heard by the local court. that is another shift of workload and resources to the local level. custody credits, under the new law, those serving sentences in county jail, they're getting a date for date. the college four to two days in

terms of credit. but it is really a day for a credit. if they are sentenced to six months for whatever reason in jail, in fact, they will spend 50% of that time. they will spend three -- three months. alternative custody. it authorizes the use of home detention and electronic monitoring for the shares discretion. our shares department has very successfully been using electronic monitoring for a very long time. that is why they have so successfully manage their jail population, that and many other innovative programs. it also allows probation to utilize electronic monitoring and some other alternative sentences so that we basically, are not just incarcerating individuals, by changing behavior. supervisor mar: electronic monitoring is an ankle bracelet, or what is used these days? >> that is correct. it is as you would think of it,

an ankle bracelet with a signal that ties back to a sort of black box, as you think of it, or through the telephone lines. it gives a minute notice if an individual goes out of range of where they are supposed to be at. there is an automatic notification that happens. law enforcement is notified and respond accordingly. in terms of the impact to adulterations is a berkeley, -- of the old probation specifically, our caseload are those who would have been parolees under the old law. our case load is 110% of what ccp projected. as of today, we have received approximately 306 clients. that was as of the end of june. we also anticipate that we will be up to within about a six month time frame, four hundred

56. that is where the range of our supervision cases will be, somewhere between 450 to 500. and that is just on the post- release cases. other cases that we have under the 1170 h sentencing, and is another thing san francisco has to be proud about, is that there are a lot of jurisdictions that are just getting straight jail sentences. what is unfortunate about that is that community supervision -- if a gimmick -- an individual is to be successful, they need to be transferred out of the community. that is where a lot of the needs are at. if they serve all of their time in jail and and are released, they have completed it. there is no way you would consider any type of supervision tale. that is not just important for supervising, but to give access to these individuals to the

services and programs we are creating. our program has taken a very balanced approach. basically, we are seeing about a 50%, maybe a little under that when the report was made, 44%. but it continues to grow. out of the 197 street jail sentences, 56%. what has skewed that number of a bit is that when a lot first went into effect in october, there were many cases that were pending. they were not approved in court because they wanted it passed and sent many of these individuals resentments. it built up a lot of -- individuals every sentence. it built up a lot of credits within the jail. the average length of time the street jail sentences, about 23 months. the jail time between these splits in his -- split senses

about 14 months. and in the average time in jail is 24 months. this is the park relation i'm concerned about. the reason i am is that they are -- this is the part i am concerned about. the reason i am is because they initially had so many said its credit. but the high sentence length, the splits and says, we are seeing from 55 months and then mandatory supervision, 78 months. this population will grow. if they are on supervision for 78 months, it will continue to grow and grow and grow. we do not plan on a supervising. we will treat this population like we do our probation population, and also like realignment gave us the tools for the post-release supervision. we will develop an individual treatment and rehabilitation plan based on an individual