San Francisco’s liberal policies created a slum, and now the city has to take drastic actions to correct course. Two ballot propositions ahead of voters for Tuesday’s elections would expand police powers and require welfare recipients undergo drug screenings.
National Review reports the city’s embattled left-wing mayor, London Breed, put Propositions E and F on the March 5 ballot as part of an effort to curb the street crime and drug abuse that has plagued the city in recent years and been cited as a reason that many prominent businesses have fled the downtown core.
Proposition E would authorize the police to use surveillance equipment — cameras, drones, and even facial-recognition technology — without prior approval of the police commission, an oversight body, which Breed has accused of “prioritizing ideology before public safety.”
If passed, the proposition would also loosen restrictions on police chases and mandate that officers spend more time on patrol and less time on administrative tasks.
Proposition F would mandate the anyone receiving public-assistance benefits be screened for a substance-use disorder. If a recipient is found to be drug-dependent, they could be offered treatment. And if it is “available at no cost, the recipient will be required to participate to continue receiving” public assistance, according to the proposition.
National Review cites specific data showing city residents are desperate for a change:
“We’ve seen polling data as far back as 2021 showing that the electorate in San Francisco is fed up with the state of our city’s streets, the amount of crime, the amount of disorder, the homelessness that we’ve seen,” said Jay Donde, co-founder of the Briones Society, a conservative club that is seeking to grow San Francisco’s Republican Party by finding common ground with moderates, independents, and disaffected Democrats.
A recent poll commissioned by GrowSF, a moderate political group, found that 74 percent of San Francisco voters support the use of surveillance cameras to combat crime and 63 percent support the use of drones to follow criminal suspects. Voters were more suspect of facial-recognition technology, with only 48 percent saying police should be allowed to use it.
