At a community meeting on Thursday evening, frustrated residents asked for advice and more action from police to reduce pimping, prostitution, violence, and drug dealing in two local hotspots.
Residents of Capp and Shotwell streets between 16th and 20th streets asked for increased police attention to prostitution and violence they say stemmed from disputes among pimps. Others who live near Parque Niños Unidos at Folsom and 23rd streets wanted to know what would be done about a group of individuals they said use and sell drugs, threaten passerby, and camp on the sidewalk.
Mission Station’s Lieutenant Carlos Gutierrez and Assistant District Attorney Justine Akiko Cephus fielded questions, many of them emotional.
“Our neighborhood is fed up with all the excuses you guys are giving us,” said resident Reynaldo Aparicio. “You get paid well beyond blue collar and yet you are not providing us the priority we were looking for.”
Gutierrez said a team of plainclothes officers had been shifted from a 2 p.m. to midnight shift to a 5 p.m. to 3 a.m. shift to better address late-night and early-morning crime. He also reported that officers had been focusing traffic enforcement on areas known to be frequented by johns, who often cruise through stop lights.
The police presence, he said, “sends a message that we’re here.”
But in both areas, tenants seemed unconvinced that something would actually be done.
“More patrols need to happen,” said one resident.
Cephus referenced previous neighborhood meetings and a survey she had distributed in the hopes of identifying and being able to prosecute specific individuals who cause trouble at the park, but said only one survey had been returned.
Cephus and Gutierrez both encouraged residents to continue to make calls to police about illegal activity. The high call volume would demonstrate a need for officers to higher-ups. Reports to police, both said, would also help support the cases necessary to actually apprehend criminals.
But neighbors weren’t thrilled about being told to simply continue to do what they have already been doing.
“It’s exhausting to have to keep making calls,” said one. “Neighbors are moving.”
“How many phone calls do you get on an area before it gets flagged?” another wanted to know.
Some also wanted to know about enforcement of San Francisco’s sit-lie ordinance, which allows for citations against individuals sitting or lying on city sidewalks, as a potential method of discouraging the tents. Some of the latter, they said, harbored the individuals they suspected of crime. But Gutierrez said sit-lie citations rarely, if ever, lead to arrests or serious consequences for not being paid.
Others disagreed with targeting the encampments.
“Some of these people rob, some of these people steal…but I think criminalizing homeless people is a mistake,” said Molly Hankwitz, who coordinates the garden program at Parque Niños Unidos.
As for prostitution and related problems on Capp and Shotwell, Gutierrez said a specialized prostitution abatement team had been working in the area a few months ago, but after one of its officers was injured, their assignment was suspended while the officer recovered.
Union rules and for safety prohibit stationing one officer alone, he said.
But he also said the ability to send officers to calls for service depended on the priority of the call, and with robberies and other violent crime, calls for prostitution might be a lower priority depending on manpower. The captain’s absence from the meeting, for example, which some residents felt snubbed by, was the result of a last-minute notification about an impromptu rally in the Castro that officers responded to.
“My son is eight months old, and since he’s been born two people have been killed on my street,” said a resident. “How can we advocate for you to get more resources?”
“Be aware of what and who you’re voting for and are they going to support more [officers],” said Cephus.
Joshua Arce, a civil rights attorney and laborer’s union liaison who is running for District 9 Supervisor, echoed that sentiment and pointed out that strong controversy over policing has led to disagreement over how to fund the police.
“Until we have the de-escalation policies in place and get back to a level of trust…that will be the challenge at City Hall,” Arce said.
But the attention to prostitution along the Capp Street corridor already goes beyond Mission Station officers. Special Victims Unit officers and law enforcement from other regional organizations are assisting with identifying with and prostituting regionally active pimps. Cephus also said she had participated in ride-alongs with police on night details to the area to speak with prostitutes and offer them ways to escape prostitution, which often comes as the result of exploitation and sexual trafficking.
“We do treat prostitutes as victims in San Francisco,” she said.
She also asked residents with security cameras to contact her to assist with identifying repeat offenders.
“I think what we want is the magic bullet that’s gonna solve the problem, is regular foot or bicycle patrols,” said resident Ira Woodhead, emphasizing the chilling effect he had observed unexpected uniformed law enforcement presence has on johns.
Gutierrez did agree to suggest to the Captain the possibility of having a two-officer team at spend some time in the area during their shift.
“There’s a lot of frustration, and a lot of what sounds like there’s nothing we can do,” Woodhead said after the meeting. Nonetheless, he added, “I’m hopeful that we’ll see something happen. It seemed like they were listening at the end.”
Even though it sounds like the majority of resident support the enforcement of existing laws, such as sit-lie and adding additional police, the progressive contingent of board of supervisors (camps, Avalos, etc) insist on following their own narrow agenda. Neighbors need to wake up to the fact that these so-called progressive candidates’ philosophies and anti-police policies, as well as their outright disregard for enforcing existing laws (they claim it’s a “war on the poor” to enforce certain laws) is responsible for making enforcement impossible. The only way to really change this dysfunctional political culture long term is to vote them out of city hall.
Nailed it.
The laziest police in the country are in San Francisco. They operate more like a private of frat boys……..
Making more calls to the police, getting them to have more patrols, etc., won’t solve these issues. The Big Government/get tough law enforcement approach with regard to drugs and prostitution has already been tried, and it has failed. Decriminalization is the answer. And for those who don’t like seeing people camped on the streets, support building more housing to bring prices and rents down, and you’ll see less of that.