meet with the labour to try to understand their concerns. i mean, i'm glad you take that approach. but often times what i find is even when you try to look at other perspectives, there might be another perspective that is compounded with a labourer. we need to change something so it is safer for the community. not everything becomes hunky-dory and you can work everything out with everybody. if there is a situation where labour or poa is not wanted, because it impacts us in a certain way, but the community is saying to you, please support it, a particular issue, because

if you don't, then this will be a negative impact on the community and the residence. how would you handle that? >> well, i think i would listen to the residence's concerns very strongly. and, yeah,, i think i would listen to the residence views and, you know, i know there will be times where the unions may not agree with decisions, and sometimes it is hard and difficult decisions that need to be made. and, you know, as a policymaker, they may not always agree with some of the policies that i would make. but i think it's very important to listen to the community, and their concerns, and to see what we could do to address those.

>> supervisor stefani: what's your answer -- >> supervisor yee: and what's your answer around the use of tasers? >> the use of tasers? well the city of oakland has been using tasers for quite some time, i support less lethal forms of force, but i think that we need to do everything we can to train our officers to de-escalate incidents, and to have crisis training so that it doesn't get to that point. but, i support less lethal options, for sure. >> supervisor stefani: there was a second part to my question, which is what is your policy around things like tasers and taking to the voters? >> no, i don't think so. >> supervisor safai: supervisor stefani?

>> supervisor cohen: just a clarification. specifically to supervisor yee's question with the use of tasers, you support the use of a less lethal form. so you do support the use of tasers? >> yes, i do. >> supervisor cohen: all right. thank you. >> supervisor safai: miss everhart, you answered a lot of questions, we know again we had conversations. for the record, i met with every single applicants that put in an application and spent a lot of time and we have followed up if there was additional things, and we made ourselves available to an additional information. we did meet with every single applicant that what their application in in a timely manner. that is everyone that's in front of us today. so i appreciate the conversation that we had. in terms of -- just a policy reminder question, you are a san francisco resident, but the majority of your work has been in oakland. this position is all about the work in san francisco, and

effective policy and san francisco and police department in san francisco. how do you respond to that? >> sure. well, the majority of my family is from san francisco. i live in san francisco now. as i mentioned, with my work at part, i was in san francisco on san francisco issues pretty regularly and with san francisco stakeholders. you know, my time in the mayor's office, i was offered a position in the oakland mayor's office and i thought that we had an opportunity to make great changes in the city of oakland. but i also would like to mention that i mentioned in the sentences -- i worked in the san francisco district attorney's office when i was in law school, and also, when i worked on haley's presidential campaign, that was also in san francisco and i worked a lot in the community at the northern

california director. i have done work in both cities. >> supervisor safai: right. i guess what i'm referring to, this is something that is applicable to all of the folks that are in front of us today, the issues in san francisco, although some of them are universal, some of them are also very specific. and so being able to draw from community experience, but also experience in the workplace with the way in which policies have been implemented in san francisco, we have a whole to seven he do department of justice recommendations as upturns -- pertains to san francisco. that's very specific, right? there is munich -- work in the community that is very specific in terms of trying to guide the process. the relationship and the history of the san francisco poa is very specific. this commission, i guess i will

refrain from making any comment about this commission, but this commission has been working on some issues for a very long time, and in some ways, it's been tripping over itself, in my opinion. so, these are very specific to san francisco. this is not to minimize any of the work that you have done, as the supervisors have said, the work that you have done in san francisco in terms of working on police reform can be very informative, and in this position, you know, it could be very helpful to have fresh eyes, but how are you going to approach that specifically if you are selected to this commission? >> sure. as you stated, i think it's important to approach these issues with a lot of fresh eyes, and i have experience doing a lot of this type of work. i know what the challenges way for the city of oakland. and how we overcame those challenges, and what some of the successes were and i would like to see, you know, us, here in san francisco, do what worked.

for example,, partnering with stanford, i think would be a good thing to do, particularly to address bias. as one example, but i certainly would want to make sure that my work was representative of the community and san francisco. i would certainly meet with a lot of community stakeholders, and better understand what their issues are. i've had a lot of conversations with san francisco police officers so that i could learn more about the issues that they say, and i would want to make sure that my work on the commission was reflective of the values of the san francisco community. >> supervisor safai: great. any other questions from the committee members? >> supervisor cohen: yeah,, i just wanted to touch on something you said in your remarks, and he said it again

and kept highlighting stanford university. that's an interesting point because it's a larger contextual issue. one of the recommendations that came up in the department of justice, and even when i was doing the work around revamping the department of accountability, had to do with having a specific expert that would be able to analyse and process the data. and we were looking foran entity that would be independent and unbiased. there is a professor that is located at stanford they did a tremendous amount of work around police departments across the entire country. and so, in the last year and a half that we've been working with chief scott, we've been implementing very systematically, quite frankly, the 272 recommendations that the doj had given us two years ago, just about. and we've already solidified, and find an mou to be working with the professor.

so that is already afoot and underway. it is quite frankly, very exciting to know that we are moving in the direction. with that said, i think sfpd has made some considerable strides, particularly under the leadership to incorporate the recommendations from the department of justice, given the newcomb political climate with president trump at the white house, and jeff sessions, and i will close there. thank you very much for your interest. mr chair, i turn the rest over to you. >> supervisor safai: thank you. any other questions for miss everhart, right now? we will take a five-minute recess. please, thank you. >> supervisor safai: the meeting will come back to order. please call the next applicant.

>> the next applicant is and erwin. >> supervisor safai: please proceed. >> thank you. supervisors, my name is and, and i will help write a new chapter, a new future for san francisco public --'public --'s police foe communities it serves. i was born and raised in this city. i'm a proud product of a san francisco's public schools. i am now raising my two little girls here. i have dedicated my life to building a justice system that acts with humanity, with empat empathy, with fairness, and with equity. i wake up every day, and try to build a system that nurtures communities, instead of tearing them apart.

policing is grounded zero in this struggle for justice. my story begins with my father. he served five years an in solo debt state prison for armed robbery. he then went to college, got a ph.d., became a professor at san francisco state university, and a prison reformed activist. my father spent three decades, the eighties, the nineties, and the 2,000, trying desperately to stop our impending imprisonment -- imprisonment binge. it was a lonely and unsuccessful struggle, but he persisted, until the day he died. i learned two guiding principles from my father.

first, stand up for what is right. even if it is unpopular at the time, history will be on your side. don't dehumanize. every person is worth fighting for. every person deserves empathy, no matter where they came from, no matter the colour of their skin, or the mistakes they have made. these are the principles that led me to the public defender's office here in san francisco, where i had a daily portal into the complicated and often painful relationship between officers and communities. supervisors, i watched so many officers do their jobs honestly, fairly, and effectively.

and i watched some officers get away with lying, bias, violence, and harassment. as a police commissioner, my priorities will be building trust between the forests and fe communities that are the most impacted by what police officers do, stopping unwarranted police violence. not just reducing it, stopping it. we have to have a goal of stopping unwarranted police violence, and robust and swift accountability for officers who behave badly. with godspeed, we will implement robust implicit bias training, and there are important parts to

implicit bias training. cultural competency, empathy, training around to th sanctity of life, and around tronnor. officers need to learn about trauma. we will update our use of force protocols regularly, and not just update the general orders. we will have a really high quality training for officers so they are well-versed in the new use of force protocols. and, we will meaningfully engage with the community. i have hope that we n collaborate with the department in these reforms. i believe the rankin file has a willingness to introspect and grow. but if the department's leadership is recalcitrant, i will stand up to them. i would be honoured to bring my

guiding principles to this police commission, and continue to serve this city that i love. thank you. >> supervisor safai: thank yo you. supervisors? >> supervisor cohen: thank you very much. excuse me. all right, thank you, i just wanted to get my bearings. so, if i'm not mistaken, i think you have published a couple of articles. are you published? >> i'm not published. >> supervisor cohen:, i'm sorry, i have you confused with someone else. what do you consider to be your area of experience? >> i was a public defender for about seven years here in san francisco. so, you know, that incorporates

a broad broad set of skills that you have to develop to have be really good at what you do and effective as a public defender. i am a trial lawyer by training. i am a collaborator by training. i am a creative thinker by training, i am a persuader, i can get folks from a place where we are in disagreements to a place where we are all agreeing. i had to do that daily with prosecutors, judges, that the probation department. so i'm thankful to my work as a public defender because it did cultivate such a broad set of skills. my current role, i founded and i now direct an organization that works to elect and educate a lol and state policymakers so that they feel emboldened and inspired to embrace criminal justice reform.

that's kind of a complicated way of saying that i am working to build political muscle for the movement around criminal justice reform, and i work with a pretty broad coalition to educate policymakers at the local and state level, and then also to help elect local and state policymakers. >> supervisor cohen: how do you define successful reform? >> i think there is empirical, as well as anecdotal success. so i think we could say that we have implemented successful reforms when we get to a place for a sustained period when there are no officer involved shootings. particularly ofarmed citizens. i think that would be a good measure of success. i think another good measure of success, this would be hard to capture empirically, but i think you could capture it anecdote gently, is to get to a place

where the community begins to trust the officers that serve them. i think those would be twoeddi stars for us to work towards. >> supervisor cohen: do you have any experience leading or participating in disciplinary hearings? >> i've been listening closely to this question, and i had to smile because there is a way in which the entire work of a public defender is in disciplinary hearings. so, yes, i have been in a format where someone is being disciplined by a body that has authority to discipline them, and is deciding whether or not they have broken any rules, and i just sort of the first sets. and weighing the evidence and the facts and deciding what evidence and facts to way. and then the second step is if

they decide, it's important part of the police commission job, if that body decides that yes, this person actually did break some rules, what's the proportional punishment? or what's the proportional response? so thoscest discipline is a daily part of my work as a public defender. >> supervisor cohen: so the role of the, you know, police commission is a powerful one, and has authority, and i'm not looking to necessarily here from a person that considers himself overly as an advocate. what i am looking to here are from the independent thinkers. people that have the ability to make an analysis of people who are able to make public comments, process that and apply it to policy, recommendations

that are being discussed, and i also want the police commission thepolice department can feel comfortable with. that they know that when they are going before this body for a disciplinary hearing, it is not stacked up against them and a whole bunch of people that hate to the police. can you talk to me about your statement earlier about restoring police trust? because i think that it has over emphasized there is a mistrust and under emphasize that there is trust. some people do trust the police. how would you work to bring that balance into and onto the commission? >> so a couple of thoughts. first, you know, there comes a time and a lot of advocates' careers when they step out of an advocacy role and into an adjudication role. a lot of judges began as

prosecutors and public defenders or lawyers in litigation, and i think those are some of the best judges because they have been an advocate in a courtroom or in a tribunal typesetting. so i'm ready to step into that role. it has been about three years since i was a public defender. in the interim, i've worked in much more of a policy-setting, so fitting with groups of policymakers, as well as advocates, and figuring out what is a smart policy, how do we negotiate with adversaries, so, you know, it's no secret then when we are trying to craft a criminal justice reform legislation in california, you won't be surprised that the bodies that are coming together to try and figure out what sound policy are the policymakers, the advocates and law enforcement groups? and we sit together and we collaborate and we see if we can

find common ground without sacrificing some of our basic guiding principles. >> supervisor cohen: is that a theory? or is that something you have actually been a part of? >> that is something i am actively a part of. for example,, ingon sena bill ten which is a major overhaul to bail and cash bail in california. we are working every day with a broad group to try to craft a bill that can get the votes that it needs to pass. this is coalition building, but also maintain some integrity around our basic guiding principles forgot -- bail reform. so yes, this is something i am actively involved in. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. what is your understanding of the commonality of police misconduct? >> as i said, you know, i think

i was exposed to so many officers doing their job well honestly, and ethically. i was also exposed to the officers who felt like, routinely, breaking the rules. whether those where-- >> supervisor cohen: this exposure was during your time is a public defender? >> it was. the way i approach my practice as a public defender is i really got in there. i, you know, went always to the place where the incident happened. i spent time with my clients' families and their communities. i can tell you that, in any community, my clients, the community, can name the officers who they feel are repeat bad actors. they are not trying to name a list of 20 officers. it is a small group. >> supervisor cohen: what kind of policies would you be able to manifest -- manifest based on that anecdotathe anecdotal expee

stories that you have their? >> i would rely on heavily on the department of police accountability and their investigations and recommendations, and the facts and evidence that is presented at hearings in front of the police commission. but what i can say, in my experience as a public defender, they were not -- there were not swift or robust accountability measures for officers who were bad actors. what i can also tell you, and makes the job of honest officers so much harder, because, to solve crime, especially violent crime, you need communities to cooperate, and so the bad actors are making it so much harder for the good officers to keep community safe. so it's in everyone's interest for us to have sound, robust accountability for officers who are not behaving well. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. i want to move on and ask a

question about tasers. not so much about how the supervisors question was, but i want to talk more about th policy. have you been following the policy discussion around tasers? >> i have. i will say, i very closely follow it it when i was a board member for the coalition on homelessness. because as you can imagine, we were very, very vocal about tasers. i started to follow it to then. that has been seven years. >> supervisor cohen: talk to me a little bit about your level of understanding about the policy, not to went officers should be armed or not, that boat has already set sail. >> so my understanding is that the policy that the police commission enacted, is pretty narrowly tailored and sets out

some narrow circumstances when the use of tail -- tasers is appropriate. that's my basic understanding of the policy. some things that i would want to see in that taser policy, is something like a trial period. so if we found out, after a certain period of time, long enough for us to understand how tasers on the streets are affecting violence, if we found out that, in fact arming officers with tasers increased the amount of violence rather than decrease the amount of violence, we would have, we could rely on a policy to roll back these. we would troubleshoot and say maybe we are not training in a robust enough way. may be we need to have supplemental training. >> supervisor cohen: that seems like a reasonable policy position to create a policy, and then still maintain the authority and the power to make the adjustments.

>> that is why proposition h. been so dangerous. it would tie the hands of the police commission at tinkering with a policy that should be revisited, and looked at, and thought critically about, regularly. >> supervisor cohen: right. described to me your understanding of the department of police accountability, particularly focusing on the audit function. >> so it is my understanding that the d.p.a. is, right now, auditing policies, trying to gather as much data as possible, and all my hope, is that after a comprehensive, deep audit where they are given access to as much information as they asked for from the department, without violating any officers' deep rooted privacy rights, but barring any of that, given as much information as possible,

that they can then turn that data, what audit and that analysis over to some sophisticated academics or thought leaders who can analyse the data, and come back to us with proposals. >> supervisor cohen: what's your opinion on restoring voting rights to felons, former felons, exfelons who have already paid their debt to society? >> i think that would be a dream come true. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. what are your thoughts around -- what would trigger a item, an issue, a matter, a situation, did i do that again? we will come back to it. [laughter] >> supervisor cohen: sorry. >> supervisor safai: no no. i am just trying to get some humour into the meeting. [laughter]

>> i don't actually recall if i put this in my application, but i serve on the municipal attorney's association board directors when a i was a public defender for many years. i have union experience representing a union. and i have quite a bit of meet and confer experience here in this building, as a matter of fact. so, what triggers a meet and confer, my understanding on my experience as a change in working conditions. i understand that right now for the police department it is contract -- interpreted quite broadly and that has made it difficult for the police commission to spearhead changes to general orders. >> supervisor cohen: it is on your application. >> thank you. >> supervisor cohen: as well as your coalition for homelessness. my question is rooted in the american constitution society. you are on the board of

directors for the area at chapter. talking about your work on that society. >> american constitution society is an organization that brings together progressive lawyers, judges, and law students. and it's a place where we can chew on legal and policy ideas. it was an answer to the federalist society which is a conservative group that has been a stepping stone for many conservative judges including supreme court judges in this country. so my main role, when i was in law school, i was actually on the national board of the american constitution society, is a chapter leader here in san francisco, and my main goal was to bring awareness around mass incarceration issues and... to acs members.

>> supervisor cohen: you have a lot of policy understanding and i want to get a better understanding into your ability to interact with all different types of communities. talk to me about intersection analogy. i feel like if you are a well read and well understood standing up policy, but yet, it would be concerning to me if you weren't rooted in the community. you say you are a native san franciscan, a public school kid, and a mom raising her children here in san francisco. i'm sure you probably have an opportunity to go into various neighbourhoods, experience different parts in different neighbourhoods and you probably you see at our processing a lot of information. you hurt my questioning earlier before we took our break. i think you have an idea. i want to get a feel for your familiarity but most importantly your ability to be comfortable in communities, diverse communities. could you talk a little bit

about that? >> yeah. you and i spoke about this a little bit on the phone. but, you know, i grew up in san francisco. i rodesse ac rosown to get to school. i went to public school. i was in a school in a beautiful melting pot environment. my friends were not all, or very many at all, actually white. i love this city because i love that vibrancy. as a public defender, i hit the pavement. like i said, for all of those years, i went to the homes of my clients, their families, their communities, witnesses, even victims, you know, it's not

ironic, but the truth is that i would have clients who work, at one point, my clients as defendants and then the next point, they were victims so these were often the same communities and the same households were who were both defendants and also victims. i feel comfortable -- i feel comfortable in all parts of this city. you know, as i said, this is a guest my font -- gift my father gave us. we grew up surrounded by ex-convicts from all walks of life. my father was convicted of armed robbery. i mean, that means my father like pointed a gun at someone. >> supervisor cohen: i maybe making an assumption here, but was your father white? >> he was white. >> supervisor cohen: maybe can talk about the double standing that exists in our system. >> my father would be the first

one if he was standing here to say that his ability to get out of prison go to college and get a ph.d. and become a professor was because of the colour of his skin. so, you know, but for the grace of god, so, you know, i was called to be a public defender and to work around criminal justice reform, not because i wanted to help white people, i was called to do that hard work because i care deeply about african-american, latino marginalized communities, generally. >> supervisor cohen: what have you accomplished in this body of work? >> i think there were, i hope that there were many times in at someone's life when i popped in as their advocate where i was able to stand between them and the great weight of the criminal justice system.

and somehow help them come out of it ok. i think, i hope there were families who were back and supporting them in communities that wanted to return home who i did a service t to, because i me that possible. now, i am working very, very hard to bring sanity back to the california sentencing laws. we had some victories last legislative session where we were able to repeal two archaic sentencing enhancements so it low-level drug offenders cannot go to state prison for double digits any longer. >> supervisor cohen: what was your role in this? >> i was part of a big coalition. my role was getting on the phone with legislatures and convincing them that what they are, the scare tactics of groups in their district were not true.

so i worked the phones for quite a long time last summer to help get these two bills passed. i planned to work the phones for quite a long time this summer because we've got some great reform proposals that are up in front of the state legislature. a number of them are having to do with police accountability, as a matter of fact. one of them that i am working really hard to support his by assemblywoman, dr weber, that will limit the instances where it is lawful for a police officer to use lethal force. she drafted this in the wake of a tragedy. and other by senator bradford that deals with data. it has been so hard -- what is happening here is happening in the state level. it has been so hard to get police departments to agree to collect data, just information. there are actually two bills

that will hopefully make it easier for us to capture more data about what police are doing. >> supervisor cohen: it is admirable that you're engaging on the state level with our legislatures to make important strides to change laws. a lot of the laws we have been able to implement here, data collection, i alter that ordinance and got that passed a few years ago for data collection. of various types of data collection, also paying attention to fines and fees. we pass that on tuesday as you know. no longer criminalizing poor people for their inability to pay. that's what we've been doing at the local level i've noticed on the state level that people are paying attention. i authored other legislation that surely weber is carrying and that feels really good because i believe on the local level that is where a lot of the change happens and it builds up. have you done any work on the local level? >> my work has been focused on the state level. it's been deeply informed by my

work as a public defender. one thing i will tell you is often in these rooms of these coalitions of folks who are working on the state level, policy change, there will be, sometimes i'm the only one in the room who has actually been in a courtroom doing the work. so much of what is informing state change is coming out of local where. >> supervisor cohen: so you are saying that in san francisco you are the only one that has done the work? >> no. when we are drafting, sorry if i wasn't clear. when we are drafting state-level legislation or tinkering with it? strategizing around it, sometimes i will be the only one in the room who has worked at the local level and a superior court courtroom, actually doing criminal law on any side. >> supervisor cohen: mr chair, i have to watch what more questions and they are quick and easy. i don't need a long answer. do you have time for this work?

because this is a serious commitment. >> i do, yeah. i appreciate that you asked me that on the phone. i've given a lot of thought to it and talked with my husband with about it. i had two young daughters but i've the time for this. i am passionate about this. >> supervisor cohen: are you bringing any new policy ideas to the police commission? >> one place that i think we can borrow from or learn from some of the work that's happening around the country, is when we talk about implicit bias and community engagement. i think we often imagine that we will just do more community forums where folks are, you know, yelling at each other, i think those forums survey very important purpose. i would like to see smaller settings where officers are coming together in a smaller

environment where they felt -- facilitator to make with community members and really here they are stories of what daily life is like for them. it's almost like a restorative -- restorative justice model. rather than yelling at each other, folks are hearing each other and at the same time, community members are hearing from officers about some of the fear they experience showing up for work every day. both sides are hearing each other and this gets that bias, it gets that cultural competency and empathy and then ultimately that trust. so that's a piece i would like to explore. >> supervisor cohen: thank you. mtwo i.mr chair, i have no other questions. >> supervisor safai: supervisor yee do you want to answer any -- ask any questions? just a follow-up on some of the line of questioning, she asked a lot of good questions and stole a few of mine in the process, but i'm very happy to see that.

i guess, -- i guess but i want to drill down on a little bit more, i've said this now, publicly and you still have a few more applicants and all of the applicants have been touching on this, i think there's four or five areas that really inform this position. i think working with community groups locally that have been impacted by violence and care deeply about this police commission and police reform and/or policand/or police measud policy going forward, experience working with organized labour, right? we talked about that today. and have you been active with this commission? have you interacted with this commission? have you attended meetings? have you seen how it has evolved over the course of time over the last few years? and then do you have experience working with the sfpd? so i've heard you talk about a few, but in terms of having been actively involved in this commission, and you talk a little bit about that? i know you were a public

defender up until 2013. these last five years you've been working on the state level, but a lot of the stuff that's been under the microscope for this commission has happened in the last few years. what is your interaction been with this commission and/or the communities impacted by the policies that are effected -- affected by this commission in the last few years? >> that's a great question. as we spoke about when we met, you know, i've started to candidly, the first time i tracked the work of the commission, was when i was on the coalition of the board of directors and jennifer was sharing with us this new taser. at that time, it was at least, if not a new proposal for the commission, it was a renewed proposal for the commission, so i started to track and i can recall watching s.f. gov of t.v. while burning the midnight oil at work and i was still a public defender and trying to track

that taser debate. so, that is the most, the issue that i followed the most closely over the years. while i was a public defender, i had a case that has some notoriety because we caught some police officers, plainclothes narcotics officers breaking a number of laws on video. and it was in the news. the officers, several of them were federally indicted and prosecuted. i didn't get a call from the occ about that case for at least six months after it happened. you know, i can recall getting that call and i think i actually said to the woman, where have you been? this happened 6-8 months ago. so, you know, does have been my interactions, talking about the taser itasers and also through n

misconduct case with my work as a public defender. >> that work ended in 2014. in terms of the last five years, have you attended any meetings? have you been active in the conversations? those are the same questions. >> in the last five years i had to watch little girls and was quite present with them for the first couple of years, you know, now, i have been back in a policy arena and working, as i've described, and so much of what i am doing is about how police do their jobs is about a broad set of issues within the criminal justice. as i said, policing is where the rubber meets the road here. this is ground zero for that justice and equity work. a lot of the bills that i'd try to touch and to work on relate to police issues.

>> supervisor safai: thank you. i don't have any other remaining questions to ask. i mean that, seriously. thank you. >> supervisor stefani: have you, yourself, had implicit bias training? >> no, you know, but as you and i have talked and i have learned more about cultural cult -- cultural competency and implicit bias, and empathy based training, i think it would be a great thing for the whole commission to participate and. it would be a great thing for the commission to participate in together with doa leadership and other top brass and the department, as well as community members and community leaders. >> you think any of the negative experiences you had with police officers while you are a public defender could affect how you would go into a disciplinary carrying? do you think it might colour your ability to be impartial in any situation? >> no. is a great question, no. like i said, the overwhelming

number of interactions i have with officers were officers who are doing theiwere doing their y and fairly, and well. that is what i lead with. i also am a defence attorney at heart. so when, you know, i will take that hat off and become an b what that means is whenoner, someone is accused, no matter who they are, when someone is accused, i want to hear the facts, you know, i want to make sure those facts are solid. i want to hear all the stories, and that same sort of presumption applies for police officers as well, and as i shared with you, i was a former prosecutor for three years, and as, you know,, i had the same experiences as you, you know, i had, when i was prosecuting cases, i worked with many police officers, many incredible people that, you know, were great

members of the community and , of course, there were a few who would be more difficult to work with. and the same were true that the prosecutors in my office. the same was true at the public defender so they worked with. i worked with some incredible defenders. there's always that one that, you know, or, you know, it's an adversarial relationship when you are part of the criminal justice system. but i really think it's possible and an adversarial relationship to still hold yourself with integrity and to still hold yourself accountable in those situations, and i just want to make sure, a someone has been at the heart of that adversarial relationship, and as a shared with somebody else too, even though it is an adversarial relationship, when people, a prosecutor or a public defender go into it, really wanting the best outcome, they are able to view the facts in a way that is going to benefit the defendant. like as a prosecutor, i would work with a public defender to see if we could get a defendant

the help that he needed to, maybe on his third dui and maybe get him instead of into jail, into a treatment program. based on your experience, how would you -- how would you apply that to a situation of discipline with a police officer? i know you kind of answered it, but i want to make sure that the adversarial relationship you might have had with the police in these commission -- positions as a public defender does not affect anything going forward on the police commission. >> i don't recall whether i shared this with you when we talked, but i work now to elect and educate policymakers and prosecutors are a big piece of that work, you know, i have less of that adversarial relationship and i worked very closely with a lot of really great prosecutors. and ici to eye on so many things with them. so much common ground.

you know, i understand the concern. i think it's good i've been away from the public defender's office and that adversarial role for a handful of years. i think what it has done as given meme perspective and some distance from the heat of that, as it's no secret that things are quite contentious at the hall of justice here in san francisco, as maybe they should be. but i think me being on this commission after a few years away from the hall of justice is a good idea. you know, i am raising two girls in this city. i am -- safety is of utmost importance to me. i rely on police officers and trust them and to protect me in other communities. you know, i walk in with a call, a myriad of experiences, and they bring all of those to the

table. many of them are about really wanting a police force that is strong, robust, honest and equitable and i believe we can get there. >> supervisor safai: supervisor cohen? >> supervisor cohen: i think, i will take issue with the last statement, it was so almost like a fairytale. how do we get there. i'm looking for concrete steps. how do we get to that utopian place that you just described? >> persistence, persistence. my priorities, and i think one of the most effective things we can do right away, and as you so aptly noted, this is a matter of

life and death. we cannot delay here. we have got to get that unconscious or implicit bias. and i think there are implicit bias programs within the program now but those have just been rolled out, not even every officer has been trained. i think we make sure we are doing those across the department and we are at doing them in a meaningful, not displaying lipservice to that kind of training, and it needs to include, as i talked about, trauma awareness. because, you know, officers are policing in communities where folks have experienced so much trauma and that affects the interaction between civilians and police officers. the sanctity of life. de-escalation. i think if we really commit ourselves to these kinds of innovative training programs, and do it in collaboration, not shoving it down the throats of the department, but do it in collaboration with the epardent, i think we will get,

you know, a bit closer to that utopia i described. >> i just had one more question. with regard to sexual assault cases, we had a hearing a couple of weeks ago and a lot came out in terms sexual assault victims and how the city is tailing them in a lot of ways. you might... what policies do you think we could pursue as a city, and in the police department to protect sexual assault victims, and see that they are cases are basically pursued and prosecuted in our criminal justice system? >> i think that sexual assault victims, the first responders are really important in a sexual assault case. we need to take a look at who is responding first and if 911 gets

a cal911 getthe call and a stata call, perhaps they are specially trained folks who have gone through particular kinds of training and awareness who can respond so that from the very beginning, the victim's interaction with law enforcement is healthy and supportive. and, you know, ideally, sexual assault victims can have an advocate and can be with them throughout the course of their case. i think that kind of support, not just when they show up at the d.a.'s office for arraignment, but someone who will begin the journey with them and stay with them and help them navigate the different city bureaucracies that they often get kind of chewed up within, and don't have a special sensitivity -- sensitivity training around sexual assault. >> supervisor safai: thank you. any other committee members that have any questions? if we do we will call you back

up. >> thank you. >> supervisor safai: please call the next applicant. >> thank you. i would like to use the audio. is it set up? >> if you are ready to go. >> i can be. >> okay. i am going to restart it. >> hello? hello? >> good afternoon chairs and supervisors. what you just listen to was the

sound of a woman being murdered. the sound of a life ending and domestic violence and a too easy access to guns. it was also the sound of what happens when we fail to act. when we fail to have a sense of community and don't embrace it -- embrace the challenges of 20 century policing. on october 20 -- tenth, 2014, she lay dying in a hospital, and i got a call. her brother was put in touch with me and he thoughti can help -- could help. she was a first-generation chinese immigrant living with parents and having come here when she was only five years old and had grown into an exuberant and vivacious young women. the horrible injustice had been done, a beloved daughter and sister was taken away far too soon. if that was the end of the story, i would consult the brother, explain how the ex-boyfriend had taken his own life immediately after killing her and there was little i could

do. but then he explains that she had called the police eight times that night. they came out three separate times and they calmed the boyfriend, told him to leave, walked him from the apartment and scent him on his way. after the second call, they took him into custody for public drunkenness and held him for four hours. he returned again. this time, at 4:00 am saying he just needed to get some clothes and the police returned and let him into the house to gather his things and he left. he was searched and taken into jail, and again before he entered the department. after he gathered his belongings, he walked away and the police left. minutes later, he returned, kicked in the door and killed cecelia lamb. we later found out from a roommate that he had already been given close that night since, ultimately, what we believe is he entered the

department with the police -- the apartment with the police with a gun that he used to kill cc. i spent a lot of time talking to the family about what they wanted to see happen. we wanted to make sure that this never happens to another family again. the officers that responded that night did so without the proper background training to handle the call. at first i wanted to lamed the officers. how could they let this happen. eight kolstad 911 and a prior history of domestic violence and one more thing, during the second call, cecelia, like most domestic violence victims, she tried to minimize her partner's actions which we have a new policy that cautions against. the roommate pushed away and told the officers what her partner had done that night just minutes before. the young man held up a can of pasta sauce with little green pellets in it and showed it to the officers and said he tried to poison her and he put rat

poison in her food. the officer shrugged, asked her if she felt ok and decided there was nothing he could do since he couldn't prove that it was rat poison on the spot, which was wrong both legally and procedurally. the city finally turned over the results and found out it was rat poison. the gunshot was a second attempt to take her life that night. this did not have to happen. she should still be with us here today. and that is a burden that rests not just on the killer, not just on the police, but on all of us. on october 8th, 2014, two days before this murder, the police commission enacted a bill which addresses police response to potential domestic violence situations. it's a far and vast improvement and covers a lot of the issues

that were problematic with this response. but as we know, the policy is only good as the training, the oversight and the instruction that guides the officers. they had not received the training. we end up in situations that had been addressed in the report about shortcomings and failings in the department. for the most part, those are the decisions that her mood being made by the pretour -- patrol officers on the streets. we hold them accountable but the responsibility has to start with us. we have to decide we are ready to put politics and special egos aside, the people of san francisco deserve it. our officers out there every day in the streets are trying to keep our community safe and secure and deserve the best training and support and oversight. i am over my time. >> supervisor safai: you can finish your sentence. >> thank you. >> supervisor safai: supervisor cohen? ok.

supervisor stefani? >> supervisor stefani: just to start, thank you for that. and, you know, i've done a lot of domestic violence prevention work and i think that can be very triggering to lot of people. and i understand where you are coming from. i am wondering, i mean this nation is a wash -- awash in guns. i don't know how that individual got the gun, especially after the circumstances you just -- just described. it sounds like he was in and out of custody that night. i don't know how he ended up with a gun in his possession. but i am going to have the same question that i have to you as you are a public defender and i and the prosecutor and i asked the same question to others. in your experience that you have had with police officers and in the story that you just told, whether or not that is in disciplining officers, you can be impartial