eps had the case been a felony arrest. so in terms of the actual response to the crime it's really not anticipated to change substantially. really as we -- in conclusion, as we can see from the police department standpoint how this is going to affect us or how it is affecting us operationally, really the impact of how it affects crime is going to remain to be seen over the course of the next coming months and year and we'll be able to have a better picture. questions? >> thank you very much. i wanted you to go back to this previous slide. >> sure. >> it talks about potential issues and concerns. the third bullet point retroactive, the

impact of this portion of the law that has yet to be determined. are you or someone from the department figuring out what this impact would be, devoting a little more time and energy, possibly drafting a remedy? >> in terms of legislation i don't know the answer to that. i know it has been a concern for the department. obviously it would be a concern for many departments state-wide and i know that that is a concern that the chief would have. >> i'm just trying to figure out who's taking a lead on it. >> in terms of legislation? i don't have an answer regarding the legislation. >> so can you break it down for us in layman's terms about the potential of drug possession for personal use. saying drug court is an option was it a stronger option when you were facing a felony and

now when you are facing a misdemeanor, how do we begin to incentivize people? is that what you're saying? >> that's another concern that remains to be seen. the drug court was an option or is an option -- or was, i should say, for these felony cases and many people did take that option to avoid that felony conviction. it remains to be seen how many people are going to offer drug court on the misdemeanor cases. what those numbers are going to be, if there is going to be a substantial change, of course if there is a substantial change and you have less individuals opting for drug court then as you had mentioned it would be a situation where we would need to look at ways to incentivize folks to take drug court. >> so the point you are trying to make about property crime threshold, could you reiterate that one? >> so with the property crime

threshold, prior to prop 47 when somebody committed a property crime and they had a conviction for certain theft related crimes, that would automatically kick a petty theft to a felony theft, a felony crime. >> let me make sure i understand. it's an accumulation of --. >> correct. so somebody would commit a petty theft and they had certain prior theft convictions, those theft convictions would then kick up that petty theft to a felony theft, which would be a bookable offense. >> right. >> now, without that option, everything under 950 would be a petty theft, that takes the option for booking solely on that theft, booking meaning taking them to the station and making that arrest and then transferring them down to county jail, that takes that option off the table.

basically we go back to the misdemeanor citation requirement where we would have to cite the person out at the scene, release them with a citation on the arrest, complete our investigation, but we wouldn't be removing the person on a custodial arrest and taking them to the station and taking them to county jail. >> what's a custodial arrest? >> we are taking custody of the person. we do an investigate, we determine this theft is a prop 47 misdemeanor theft, at the completion of that investigation and we have good identification of the person, we know who they are, they don't have any warrants for their arrest or no other reason why we would be taking them to a police facility we would issue them a citation with a court date and we would send them on their way out in the field. the custodial arrest would be when the officers go through

the same investigation process and would have a reason to take that person physically into custody, transport them back to a police station and then subsequently down to county jail for processing. >> okay i think if i heard correctly in your previous report on this property crime threshold that it was at 450, but you, the department changed it, increased it before? >> it was state law. it was a state change. and that was prior to prop 47 so that threshold went from 450 to 950. really, the impact of prop 47 is really that petty theft with a conviction. >> any questions from colleagues? all right the next person we are going to call up is sheriff mercarini is here to make his presentation and then go on in order, so

after the sheriff will be adult probation. hello, sheriff. >> good morning, honorable supervisors. >> good morning. >> or good afternoon. close to it. ross mercarini, sheriff for the city and county of san francisco. thank you, supervisor cohen, chair breed, supervisor tang, who just stepped out, for holding this hearing. my office had distributed and i hope you have it, as soon as prop 47 passed we gathered together within the sheriff's department and issued a memo which is dated november 10, 2014 to best assess and predict the changes that implicate the sheriff's department in the process of the revisions of prop 47. that several-page memo is right here and was sent to your office. >> we have it, thank you.

>> so it's really my job to report to you per the purpose of this hearing is that there has been very really de minimus impact to the jail system because of prop 47. in a snapshot of looking at prop 47 bookings on any given day in december and/or january we're looking at maybe less than 12 or 10 and we're verifying that number because we think that actually is less. in total, anybody who had been incarcerated in our county jail since november 5th, the day after prop 47 passed, is roughly about 20 people. so in many ways san francisco has been a prop 47 type city for quite some time before prop 47 was passed by the state

voters. and because we have such robust diversion programs, alternatives to incarceration, depending if it is a first time offender or multiple offender, depending on felony or misdemeanor or because of drug court, which i'm a big fan of we have been able to use those reroutes to not incarcerate and then with prop 47 it's allowed us to reassess anybody who did not make those other diversions and to determine are they prop 47 eligible? and the population is quite small. and for a city of our size it's by far the smallest in the state of california. in talking to my colleagues in cities similar size, larger and smaller than san francisco. so that's my report. i'm more than happy to answer any questions. >> wow, that's it? >> pretty succinct

presentation. how do we begin to prioritize the spending of the anticipated savings right here on the local level? do you have any ideas. >> in some ways i think san francisco benefits from an important chemistry between all the leaders of the criminal justice system. i think you see the same outcomes because we share similar goals. focus on alternatives to recidivism but not subvert our primary objective of making sure public safety remains intact. and i think we're finding some better strategies between da public defender, adult probation, us, everybody else, if those are incarcerated it's turning out to be because we're so undercrowded in our jail system

in san francisco which is really well noted nationally that prop 47 really is barely shaving off -- it really isn't from our jail system. because we really have been going down the right track in san francisco as it relates to the intent of prop 47. i can't speak to the retroactive, i'm speaking to the present and future. and i think that we've been saving money translated through better public safety dollars if less people are resituated 78ing in san francisco because that had been one of the highest really ingredients that would continue to propel threats to public safety was our high recidivism rates. so by focusing on that i do believe that it translates into better use of taxpayer dollars on focusing on diversion, better diversion, holding them accountable, and trying to make sure that if somebody doesn't have to be incarcerated that they are not. >> all right, thank you very

much. i think that's it. >> well, thank you very much. >> my pleasure, thank you. the next presentation will be from adult probation. okay, you can load it up into the

computer. >> good afternoon, supervisor tang, breed, cohen. thank you for inviting the adult probation department to present on prop 47. my name is marty quiset, i'm the deputy chief of the adult probation department. chief still sends her regards, as we speak she's doing a presentation in sacramento on the state of the state

realignment. the adult probation department handles over 4,000 cases every year. we believe providing outstanding services in an evidence-based supervision model in our clients will deeply impact not only behavior change but reduction in recidivism over the long haul in over to maintain public safety. when prop 47 passed our department was prepared and proactive. we worked closely with the district attorney and public defender's office to quickly determine who on our active case load might be provided relief through prop 47. we shared our list of those cases that appeared eligible with both departments and the defense bar. we reviewed the statutory elements of the proposition as well as our own supervision guidelines in order to make

recommendations to the court regarding their probation status. we provided recommendations on 888 cases to the district, public defender and private counsel. we employed 4 or 5 supervisors over a period of two weeks that went through each individual case file and of that 888, we found that 650 cases were ineligible for relief under prop 47. there were 103 cases that we were actually submitting recommendations for reduction and termination and another 135 cases that were recommended for reduction and remain on perform supervision.

as i indicated, our recommendations for prop 47 fell into two categories, reducing the charge to a misdemeanor and terminate probation, and reducing the charge to a misdemeanor and continuing probation. we recommended that 103 charges be reduced and terminate probation and 135 charges were recommended for reduction while remaining on probation supervision. adult probation has a large variety of evidence-based services that we have shown to be effective. by allowing a client to continue to receive these services while on misdemeanor probation may be the best use of our resources over the long run for long-term public safety. at the end of the day we recognize that the conviction may change but the person's life needs stay the same. once a person is terminated from probation, he or she loses access to these life needs services.

this slide really gives more of a graphic representation of what i spoke to earlier and you can see that we, the most charges that we analyzed were for the charge of burglary but they were the least amount that were recommended for a reduction and that largely had to do with they just didn't meet the muster of the statutory standards which the previous speaker spoke to, the $950 threshold and a lot of these cases that were on our rolls were for car burglaries and that also was something that was a disqualifier. >> let's talk about that because we know there's been an increase in car burglaries. now that we've increased the threshold to 950, what do i tell my constituents in potrero hill who lament their one car

can be broken into 3 or 4 times in one quarter of the year? how do we remedy that? if they are charged it's a misdemeanor is that correct? >> i think we have someone in the room more qualified to answer that. >> miss deberry >> car thefts do not qualify for prop 47 so you can tell your constituents they are not eligible for prop 47. it will be treated just the same. >> thanks very much. >> to date, 102 of all of our active clients have been granted relief under prop 47. of these, about half remain on formal probation. this final slide shows the break down. these are actual court decisions that have occurred since the implementation of prop 47. as you can see the numbers are

actually very small. the adult probation department has 53 people fewer on our case load, which represents 1 percent of our clients that did not prior to the passage of prop 47. the impact of prop 47 on our clientele and our services has been negligable. this may change but at this point we do not believe our needs will change drastickally. thank you for the opportunity to address you this morning and i'll be happy to answer any questions. >> i want to know what will be the budget impact of prop 47? >> like i indicated, i think it's negligable. based on our recommendations, if those individuals go to court it

would be a total of 100 clients because of the nature of the charges and their reduction, they were probably low risk offenders to begin with, they were probably not receiving a whole lot of -- because we actually did a review of them, too, to determine they were meeting the demands of our supervision. >> ladies, you heard it here first, we can trim down adult probation's budget. just kidding, i know, i know. >> is that what i said? >> interjekting a little levity into the conversation, seeing if you are paying attention. what's the reentry strategy of folks, the 102 that are going to be -- i think it's 102 but never mind, you have people that are going to be re-entering. you have people who will be re-entering. >> the individuals who will be

off our rolls or continue on the rolls? re-entering the community. >> re-entering the community. >> so those 53 what's happening, what are the support services wrapped around them. >> unfortunately one of the unintended consequences of that we had people who were plugged into department adult probation funded services like housing. in fact, anecdotally, i recently heard of a story, someone who got relief, was terminated and he said, you know, do i have to go out and commit a new crime in order to get these services? we had that conversation. of course we don't want to promote that at all but san francisco is not short on top notch services. we will be making referrals to

other community based organizations that they can continue, it's just that we won't continue funding those. >> you won't continue funding --. >> we won't continue funding their services we can't allow someone who is not on super advice, we can't continue to fund them to be in that service. >> so based on what you are saying and the information that i know about the reentry community, it sounds like the person, once they are released, they are on their own with very little support to help them re-enter society. >> this is true. we have service through the reentry council but one thing i think some of these discussions have started to prompt us thinking is a little bit outside the boxes is should we be creating some sort of aftercare processes for people who

legitimately meet the demands of their supervision and the court has determined they are no longer on probation but they continue to have supervision service needs? how can we help them? >> so you've begun to study this? do you have an answer for that? because that's exactly the question i'm asking, what is the strategy, those folks who still need the aftercare support, what happens to them? from my understanding is they are kind of left on their own, maybe they go back to their family, they are going back in the community, many of them coming back to district 10, the bayview community, in some cases potrero hill, but there are, you know, there are nonprofits out there, the ones that i'm aware of that have beds and space are at capacity and also struggle with increased rent in particular if they don't own the property, most don't own the property,

they are renting or leasing it from the property owner. so is there some kind of idea --. >> like i said we have talked about a gap here with that individual that i spoke to of how do we fill that gap. everything that you said about someone going off on our rolls, they still have some issues and may need some reentry --. >> support, right. >> reintegration type support. unfortunately some people respond better when they have, you know supervision and encouragement from a probation officer that they will no longer have, but perhaps we fill that gap with, you know, we form an alumni group. this is just something i think is going to have to be brain

stormed, quite honestly, supervisor cohen, in order to somehow bridge that gap. >> thank you very much for your presentation. is that it? colleagues, any questions? the next presentation will be from the public defender's office. thank you. >> good afternoon, or is it still morning? >> it's after noon. >> good afternoon, there are countless nonviolent offenders who are going to benefit from the change in the law. i applaud the district attorney's

office for bringing this out to the voters because i do believe it will have a very positive impact on many individuals who need to find work that have actually finished their sentence years ago and now they will be able to obtain jobs. many people will be able to obtain immigration relief that have citizen members of their families so we can keep families together and many people will be able to qualify for student loans as well. these are some of the benefits many peel will experience after receiving prop 47 relief. what data exists on public defender clients who will be impacted by the law? we're still conducting further research to determine how many people because this is retroactive, may benefit from proposition 47. let's look at a snapshot that we have.

the san francisco superior court did a inquiry, an initial inquiry, and they identified around 6900 potential cases that might be eligible for proposition 47. we've been working very closely with the district attorney's office and the adult probation office also lists of people we believe are eligible and we stipulated to them and we have filed hundreds of petitions already in a very streamlined process so these people get relief. in addition the superior court of san francisco has also ordered the department of adult parole to furnish a list to both the district attorney's office and to myself so we can commence the review process for any adult parolees that may be eligible for proposition 47. one of my concerns is i've started to cross check petitions that we've actually filed with the lists the superior court gave me and many of those names are not on that list, which seem to indicate to me that this initial list, the

initial inquiry the court made, is not complete. i'd like you all to see that as of 2003, our office has represented we have had 128,000 felonies. and the majority of these felonies have been non-violent felonies. so we can only imagine, and i know we're speculating -- how many of those led to convinces, felony convictions, and how many of those may possibly be eligible to prop 47? so a review process needs to commence and it has already commenced and we're going to get --. >> question, how did you determine you are going to -- your bullet point says 128,000 estimated felony cases since 2003? how did you select 2003 as the benchmark. >> that is the data i was able to collect since yesterday. i would like to provide you with data from the 1980's but i don't have that information

now. this data collection process is on-going right now. >> what happens to a person that committed a crime in the 80's and now that we have new laws and prop 47 what happens to that person, are they immediately released if they are in custody? >> i don't think we have anyone who is eligible right now for prop 47 who are in custody. all the people in san francisco have been released. there are going to be many of these older convictions that are going to be coming to our attention. i just want to illustrate there is a former client of ours who contacted us with a mid-1980's possession conviction. that was his only felony conviction and he asked us if we could expedite a petition on his behalf because he needed it for employment purposes. that petition has been filed and i'm certain it will be granted. but it shows

you there are many people from decades ago who will be impacted by this new law. the data remains a work in progress. we are working with multiple departments to collect that information so we can provide this service to the people of san francisco. how is the public defender's office assisting those impacted by the law? one of our biggest goals is to reach out to the community and let them know that we are here to file these petitions for them if they are eligible. we have walk-in clinics in numerous locations all over the city of san francisco and of course people come into our office at any time to inquire about proposition 47 relief and we have application forms very simple that a person can fill out. my colleague or i will review them for eligibility.

we have also been doing media outreach. the public defender, jeff adachi, has spoken to the media and there have been numerous articles written in local newspapers regarding how people can seek relief through our office. we are also going to be attending a community forum on sunday at golden gate law school where numerous groups will be there to get information they can disseminate through the san francisco community. we also have our own public defender web site with a link to information regarding prop 47 and to the application form. we have been receiving innumerable number of calls. we have two phone lines specifically that people can call us to see if they are eligible. we have been receiving many calls from lawyers from other jurisdictions who have former san francisco defendants in custody there whose sentences may be very well enhanced because of a prior possession conviction here, a