San Francisco to fight crime by ordering Tenderloin businesses to close earlier

(The Center Square) - The San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a measure to impose a curfew on businesses in the city’s Tenderloin District over concerns that open businesses are hotspots for crime, drug dealing and drug use. The legislation also noted how the city’s police officers are typically outnumbered by large groups of “people engaged in illegal activity,” suggesting crime in the area's disarray has grown past law enforcement’s ability to control.

“Large groups of people engaged in drug sales and use in the Tenderloin Public Safety Area generally form and congregate in the vicinity of retail businesses selling food and tobacco products that are open to the public during those hours,” wrote Mayor London Breed in her legislation submitted to the Board of Supervisors. “By being open so late, these retail food and tobacco establishments in effect facilitate the late nighttime drug market by providing a lighted gathering point for drug users and dealers, by enabling drug user and dealers to take cover indoors to avoid police patrols, and, in some cases, by selling tobacco, tobacco paraphernalia, and other retail goods used by people engaged in drug use and sales.”

The legislation orders bans “retail food and tobacco establishments from being open to the public between 12:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m” and businesses with an active liquor license from the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control to close by 2:00 a.m, as already required.

The city’s report to the Supervisors further detailed how police and local residents are overwhelmed by “large groups engaged in drug use and sales.”

“Residents living closest to congregation points for these groups, especially seniors and families with children, have expressed that they are so anxious about the hostile conditions they encounter on neighborhood sidewalks that they feel fearful to walk outdoors during the nighttime and early morning hours, when they are likely to encounter these groups engaged in drug-related activity and the debris generated by the groups,” wrote the mayor’s office. “Large groups are difficult for the police to control and pose safety risks for officers, as the people engaged in illegal activity typically outnumber police officers on patrol.”

Businesses that do not adhere to the rule can face fines of up to $1,000 per violation and can be found to be a public nuisance.

Business leaders say this ordinance is unfair to business owners, and that the city should instead focus on getting crime under control.

“Instead of enforcing the safety of these problem areas and holding the criminals accountable, city leaders have chosen to penalize and even blame already struggling small business owners for fanning the flame of the City’s crime epidemic,” said John Kabateck, California director of National Federation of Independent Business, a national small business advocacy group, to The Center Square.

As of July 1, the San Francisco Police Department reported it has 1,862 officers. Earlier this year, city leaders proposed Proposition B, which would have required SFPD to have 2,074 officers if voters pass a measure creating a new tax or bond to fund more officers.

“Originally conceived as a five-year plan to solve San Francisco's unprecedented police understaffing crisis, the Charter Amendment I co-authored with Mayor London Breed would have promptly funded expanded police recruiting. And it would have made needed progress on public safety challenges robbing too many San Franciscans of the safe enjoyment of their neighborhoods and hamstringing our economic recovery,” said San Francisco County Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who helped draft the proposition before it was amended. “But then, late in the Board of Supervisors’ process, an aspiring mayoral candidate added a poison pill that renders the whole plan ineffective. Now, instead of being a public safety measure, Prop B Is just a ploy for new taxes.”

The ballot measure failed last March, with 72% of voters siding against the measure. However, San Francisco voters will have the opportunity to vote on policing yet again in the November election, when Proposition 36 is on the ballot. Proposition 36, endorsed by Mayor Breed, would reform the state’s reduced prosecution of drug dealing and theft to more strongly prosecute serial thieves and drug dealers, and create the "treatment-mandated felony" crime class that allows individuals to get treatment for mental health or behavioral issues and receive shelter instead of going to prison.