>> rise please for the pledge of allegiance. >> mr. president, i would like to call the roll, please? >> please do. >> president mazzucco? >> present. >> vice president turman? >> here. >> commissioner marshal? >> here. >> commissioner dejesus is en

route. >> commissioner loftus? >> here. >> and commissioner wong? >> here. >> mr. president, we have a quorum and also, the chief of police gregory suhr. >> welcome to the wednesday, july 2, 2014, police commission meeting, you see that we have a pretty wide agenda and we are moving into the summer session and we actually may have some other days off due to vacation schedules and training schedules, but welcome. this meeting is going to be a very positive meeting. we are going to have after general public comment, a presentation by officer jason johnson, regarding a trip that the police department arranged and i will leave it for him to tell us more about it but it is something that the police department with be proud. >> without further adieu, call item one. >> general public comment. >> the public is welcome to

aaddress the commission. address the commission as a whole. on the commission rules of order, during the public comment, neither the police or the personnel or commissioners are required to respond to questions presented by the public. but may provide a brief response. limit your comments to three minutes. >> it is time for general public comment. >> >> good evening, president mazzucco, and commissioners and chief suhr and director hicks, i am the president of the san francisco police station. and i wanted to appear before you tonight, basically to

comment on an article johna, lamb, and he was granded a list, and the officers who have fired their weapons and who have been involved in officer involved shooting since 1990. in his article he makes references to the number of sfpd officers, who have fired their weapons in the past 24 years. and he intends to betray our members as being somehow trigger happy, nothing could be further from the truth. what he does not touch on in the article, some of these discharges were accidental or unintentional and tragically some of these were officers who had taken their own life due to depression, or ptsd. >> he also does not touch on the fact that the vast majority of these discharged were by officers who had put themselves in harm's way and were performing heroic acts, protecting the lives of the

residents of this city, or, simply protecting themselves, from suspects who had fired first responsible them or who had assaulted them. >> my name is on this list from an incident that occurred in 2002 while he was serving on a federal task force and i can tell you that this is the last thing that a san francisco police officer or any police officer wants to put themselves through. it should be noted that they are investigated by criminal and administrative investigators and also, the district attorney conducts a thorough investigation, independent of the police department. the review process is thorough, and each incident gets reviewed by the san francisco police department command staff up to and including the chief and the commission is kept advised of

the product of these investigations. in the vast majority of these incidents involving a criminal suspect, the members of the sfpd act $within policy, for the size of our department and the size of our city, for the date, time and population that exceeds over 1 million, the number of officer involved shootings in san francisco, is below the national average. that is due to the professionalism of the members and the training that each one of those receives. >> i wish that mr. lamb had touched on any one of those issues. >> thank you. >> next speaker. >> good afternoon, i am here before you as a resident of san francisco and also a former officer in the 146. i am employed by the fire department, as a fire engine paramedic. and i worked for the city as a paramedic, since 1976, i am not

here as a representative of the fire department i am not speaking on their behalf. we have a situation where the ambulance service is arriving at a critical point, i would call it, and that is we don't have enough of them and it is more important, what is called the medic to follow which is the situations that effect both the police department as well as there are no vehicles available. each of you has a document which i have prepared in advance and so you have it. >> yes. >> just to be as dramatic as possible and to drive home the point is that, if somebody a police officer, shot, stabbed or suffers some short of internal injury if you get shot in the arm i can control it and stabilize you and you probably will do fine, if it is internal

injuries, there is very little, that the paramedic can do in the field in an immediate sense there are a few things that we can do, what we need is a rapid immediate transport to a trauma center, with a trauma surgeon and that is the bottom line. and so the problem that we have and the reason that i am here for you is that your appointees of the mayor and i want to ask you on our behalf, the paramedics of the city and the fire department and if you have any influence over the mayor, to lobby for us, because, we presented a plan, to solve, some of the problems, with the lack of ambulances. we asked for 9.8 million dollars, along with the comprehensive plan and we got 3 million, and it is simply not going to get us to where we need to be and hanging over our heads is a sort of that we are not meeting certain mandates by

the state of california for example we should be doing 80 percent of the total 911 calls and we are barely making it past 71 or 72 percent to the extent that you have the input for the mayor of san francisco if you could lobby on our behalf for the additional money above the 3 million that he is giving us. we would be in your debt, thank you very much. >> thank you very much. and i want to thank you for the packet and thank you for the hard work with the paramedics that serve the fire department and you are true heroes out there we do appreciate it. >> thank you, it is very kind of you. >> any further public comment? >> hearing none, the public comment is now closed. >> the chief's report, and and chief, good evening, >> very quickly, jason has a presentation that i think that

everybody is interested in, and i made the report on the violent crime is down 13 percent, and part one crime is down one percent, and we are still experiencing difficulties with theft, auto theft is up, 12 percent burglary is up seven percent and grappling what we believe to be issues with 109 and the early release of pretty much property of the criminals from the jail and then the folks refend and we are aware that the violent crime is down and i can't say enough about the partnership and the community and the jobs program from the mayor's office and the work of the unified school district and the drop out rate, that has us on a half year paced that if we did, do as well with the second half of the year, it might leave us

with the lowest homicide total since we have been keeping track since 1950 and we are at 14 homicides for the year and we did percent one last friday. and in the station, valley, actually on a playground and a playground that we had schedule to start taking on the officers as we have, at garfield playground, in ashley, and modeled on jj who is going to speak shortly in being in the willie maze clubhouse and we are going for go forward with that and obviously there were children present when this shooting occurred, and this city is putting a ton of resources in there through the department of public health. and to see if we can't get the kids to a better place and certainly any playground in any community will be a safe haven and so we will work with the mayor's office and other folks to make sure that we climb that playground for the kids.

the officers were doing the best that they could and this is over the whole weekend, 70 intoxication arrests and another 75 went to centers and felony arrests and assaults and violations and we did have a shooting at one of the venues of one of the out lying stages and that, young person was hit in the hand, and that suspect is in custody, and there were 11 misdemeanor arrests and we recovered three firearms. and so, and the entire command staff and some of the members of the commission, participated in what was possibly the biggest pride parade that i remember, so, all in all, a lot of police work got done, and a lot of fun was had by a lot of people working with the mayor's

office to make next year's pride that much safer. >> with that i will close out my report and invite up officer jason johnson and his able assistant. to do a presentation on a pretty spectacular trip. >> i would also apologize in advance for officer johnson, not being in the uniform but he is here on his own time, as he is a new father. so he is off on family leave. >> the information with the boy's club. >> he better not be. >> i was actually had my newborn son and i kind of hurry to make and... >> just today? >> yeah. >> no he was born on march 10th. >> okay. >> and i understand. >> yeah. >> and i have been there. >> congratulations. good evening, everybody, and we are back from the trip. the trip of a major success.

i knew that it would be impactful, but not to the extent and i did not know that it would be coming back and doing what we are doing now. and so, some of the kids like, i believe that i told you before, have never been on a plane. and not even really been out of san francisco. and so, we flew from here to germany. and we got to germany and you know the kids, be in germany and calling everybody and we are in germany and we were there for about 6 hours and then we flew from germany to ghana in africa. and when we first got there, it was, it was kind of late, it was real hot, and dark, and you could not see too much and this is a little bit and so, a lot of kids were excited.

and you know, to the and adequate, and debrief, and we woke up early and hit the road and first we start off and i went on a small safari where they got to meet ba baboons and we went into a bat cave and so all of the kids were like really in awe. and after that, we headed to another city called kamatzi, the home of the ashansi kingdom, the most powerful tribe in north africa and they are rich in tradition and they actually have it there today and still have a king the country itself has a president and they had a king, the kamatsi, the santi king, they had a chance to see him walk in, and you can't approach him

or anything like that. he has crazy security. but we got to do that. and they got to experience, going to a village, seeing what it is like to not have running water, you have to pump your water. and getting down with the kids and playing with the kids, and going into a village where there is no electricity or anything like that. and they were all excited at this point they were having a lot and a lot of fun. we go to a market and as soon as we get out of the van, all of these people just approaches everybody, hey, hey, buy this, we got this, and where are you from? you are from america? see what i got, see what i got. and the thing that really got them, that like really got to them is when they got into the market and all of these people are coming up to them and you say no, i want to see what she

has. or everybody else that was trying to get a sale from actually helped that person get a sale from me and not really asked for anything in return, and it was like, wow. why are they helping this person and they need to get, you know, they need to make a living and so while aren't they trying to get me to go to them? and to see them work together. was like mind blowing to them and they had a really good time. and from there, we went to cape coast. it was the main reason why we went out there to see the historical part as far as slavery. and on o way to cape coast we stopped at a village where at the time it was just a forest, and after at this particular village, they have a place called the slave river. and they call it the last bath, but it is a place where before

slaves were had to walk from that village all the way to cape coast, they were cleaned, with bamboo leaves only in this river. and they had to go to the cape coast and they actually got to walk in the same path as the slaves did and they walked down these, they walked down this forest w no clothes on and the hands shackled to their feet. and it was pretty intense and the kids, you know we got there and it was like this and everybody is having fun and exciting and then, we hit that part. you know, and everybody gets quiet and they start to think and from there we go to the slave castles and it was really intense and they could not go into some of the dungeons because they were so intense and we were fortunate enough to have steve, do the tour, he is the guy, and he no longer does tours, and he is like a legend,

like when obama went, this is what he brought out to do the tour. and so we have fortunate enough to get him and it was deep. and you know, after they got to experience all of that seen and see how this slave well they don't like to be called slaifsh they liked to be termed captives. and the things that took place in the dungeon and the thing that was really was big, and each night we have a reflection and that particular night the reflection was it was it was very powerful and i gave each student a chance to talk about how they felt.

and what they spoke about is forgiveness, and you know, you know, he said that you are a people but you have to forgive and they can understand that concept, and and some of them could not talk and they could not understand it. but, it was a good opportunity to help them realize that a lot of the kids that i deal with don't have a concept of their heritage and their culture. it is kind of like, if you take, like if you take some of your kids that like i work with on a daily basis, and you put them say somewhere like ghana and it was only the thing that you might see sooner is the way that they look and in terms of wait that they act and their motivation is completely

different. and the wholly live in oak dale, or i can't go to harvard and it is all separate. but you are all of the same people. but in africa, you have all of these different tribes, and they all work together. and they also have pride in who they are, but at the same time they don't really knock anybody else for who they are. and so, it ain't like, oh,, you know, it is okay, to represent who you are and you don't have an issue of somebody else representing who they are. and so for example, if you are irish and you have an irish and number one cool, that is good and it is not like no, africans are better, it is none, everybody will get along and proud of who they are and without knocking anybody else, really and it was, it was huge and they understood that. and a lot of the kids did not, some of them did not go to school. and the ones that, some of them that did, they were always late.

and the grades was bad. and some of them disrespectful to their parents. and had an excuse for everything. but when they see what took place the whole walking from and getting captured and walking through this hot forest and being put in a dungeon and put on the ship and ship to the americans for months and they realized that like, you know, africans are really strong people. and it kind of, it was a trip because they all and they figured it out on their own, man what am i doing? i am not taking advantage of all of these opportunities that i have here in san francisco, and the free education. and we go to a school, and the kids are and i mean that it was. it was, and first of all it is not free for everybody, they have to pay for their education and when they are in school, for cell phones and nobody is sleeping and everybody is

looking straight and pay attention to instruction. and everywhere is like tripping out like i be in class and i go to sleep and i waint go to go half of the time. and but, the long story short, they came back, one of them that was not even in school, she is actually enrolled in school. she is doing what is necessary for her to graduate. and one of them is not going to graduate she is a senior and she met with the counselors and just graduated. and one of the students, he loves basketball and loves it more than anything, but he does not really take school serious but he came back knowing that in order for him to be able to play basketball, you have to take school serious and so he actually stopped, and he put himself off of the basketball team so that he could get the grades up so that next year he could go in. and one of the young ladies had a son and i had no idea, i had been around this young lady for four years and she was kind of, she was not in school and she was not really taking care of

her son. and now she is taking care of her son and she is in school full time. and i mean, it was impactful in talking to the parents, and all of them had everything, and all of them have positive things to say, but this one particular parent, i met with her and i was like, how is she responding? she is like, i would say jj, my daughter, you know, came back and told me, she loved me and she cared about me. >> that is cool. >> no you don't understand. >> my daughter is 18 years old and has never told me that in her entire life. >> and i was like, wow, it was interesting. >> and it was to do it again, and they actually, it was hard getting the kids to go and now they came back and shared the experience and the kids are coming up to say that can i go next time? and so, yeah, that, and that i it, and she is one of the

students that went and she can share what she learned from her trip. >> i know that you are not shy. >> hi, everybody, my name is iesha. i went on the trip with officer johnson. and just kind of bouncing off of what he said this experience was life changing and i think that it was amazing because the entire group of kids that went were kids from bay view hunter's point, and you know, anyone who has been in that neighborhood, you have seen the kids and you know, it is very hard to be motivated in this neighborhood and it is very hard to a lot of kids have a hard life and it is hard to appreciate, if you will, what you have, because a lot of times it seems like you you don't have much. and you take a lot of things for granted. and, going on this trip, you know, coming from myself and a lot of my friends that went, you know, it opened our eyes to

how much you have to appreciate even when it feels like you don't have anything at all. and so going to ghana and seeing these kids who have nothing, bare minimum, you know, working, walking miles, just to get water. you know, not even being able to go to school and looking at all of the opportunities that you have here in the states. and it is just a whole, it opens your behind to everything that you take for granted and makes you appreciate your family, having a roof over your head and having running water and just the bare necessities and essentials that we take for granted every day. so, if there is anything that i really took from this trip, it was, just appreciating my mother, you know, saying thank you. you know, just for a meal. or having a great education, and being able to have a full scholarship to such an amazing school and you know, really applying myself because i can think back to when i was in africa and i was sitting there looking at all of these students, who some of them, you know, are working early

mornings and still walking miles to get to school. and you know, i complain about taking muni. i am in school and i am going to go to college and not a lot of the kids in africa have the same opportunities and it was powerful and motivating and it is just something that i will never forget and i am forever grateful for everyone who made it possible. thank you. >> so, iesha is being a little modest. she was one of the outsing of the year for the boys and girls club in 2012. >> yeah. >> so she is pretty spectacular kid too. and so just to give everybody the background and i know that a lot of people know the story, this was entirely jason's idea. and so i was all ready to blame it on him if he did not go well but it went great and he deserves all of the credit. and he got all of the money and private money and no city dollars spent on this at all, and the kids went and the other

officers that went, lieutenant danger field, and i don't want to miss anybody. leon jackson out in the bay view and l*in went and did a lot of the pictures and it was a complete volunteer army and everybody came back changed and it was one of the kids when we met him at the airport he was saying that there was a young guy that he connected with and was trying to find him but he was hustling so much in the day he could not catch up to him, he could not believe that how hard this one guy that was a regular kid in ghana pretty much hustled the entire day and was still up beat enough to entertain all of these folks and tell them their story. and so, i would imagine that this will not be the last time that jj is going across the water, but it was a great deal for all of the kids and jj was perfect. [ applause ]

>> officer johnson, i should thank you so much for your presentations. it really brought the experience to light. and i actually think that it is easy for us to see that you are one of the youth of the year of 2012. >> and how many kids did you end up taking over all? >> 7 kids. >> 7? >> yeah. >> ages 14 to 18. >> 14 to 18? >> yes. and >> i heard that you are thinking about a second trip, when is that planned for? have you thought about that yet? >> spring break of next year, march 28th, i think. >> and i understand that you had to rig all of these funds and approximately is that going to run you there, the money to do that? >> $50,000. >> okay. >> well you can count on me for your first $1,000. >> thank you. >> and i also want to say you said something here that really struck me. and africans are strong people, they are very strong people.

and so, are the people that ascend from them. and i want to thank you for your demonstration of that and providing a lifetime experience that will shape their futures it is a wonderful program and thank you so much. >> thank you. >> dr. marshall? >> you know i had you guys on the show and it was great and it was so great and i know that this is limited to san francisco and the bay view, but you know i have a bunch of calls from people all over the bay area who want to go on this trip. you naturally made an impact. why don't you say about the process that they went through, and you just picked yours out of, you know. >> right. >> why don't you talk about the process and the selection process and i thought that was really fascinating. >> yeah. >>