Good afternoon, Vice Chair Campio.

Would you like to do a sound check really quickly?

Great, thank you.

We can hear you.

And welcome to the special public safety committee meeting of January thirtieth, twenty twenty-six.

Our committee liaison, Sarah Jordan will provide information and instructions for the public to participate in today's meeting.

Sarah, please proceed.

Thank you, Chair Von Wilbert.

Well, members of the public are able to attend the meeting in person.

This meeting is being televised and live streamed on the city's website, and the council administration will continue to make arrangements for the public to comment using the Zoom webinar platform.

Members of the public who wish to provide testimony via a call-in or an internet-based service option must enter the virtual speaking queue within five minutes after the conclusion of in-person public testimony or before the virtual speaking queue is exhausted, whichever occurs first.

This will allow allow for better meeting management between the two platforms and ensure the committee is able to manage and conduct city business.

We appreciate the public's cooperation.

Chair Von Wilbert.

Thank you very much.

I will now call the special public safety committee meeting to order.

Sarah, please call the role.

Vice Chair Campio.

Here.

Committee member Campbell.

Here.

Committee member Whitburn.

Here.

Chair Von Wilpert.

Present.

And Vice Chair Campio, if you would like to provide your virtual declaration at this time.

Yes, thank you, and good afternoon, everyone.

I'm informing the committee and the public under the rules of the Brown Act that I am participating virtually today through just cause exception related to child care.

Very, very new child care.

And there is no one over the age of 18 in the room with me.

And I will update that declaration if it so changes.

And thank you very much.

Thank you.

Also attending today's meeting is Daniel Orla from the Office of the City Attorney and Baku Patel from the office of the IBA.

If you are in person, please complete a speaker slip located at the entrance of chambers and place it in the box indicated at the table at the front of the room.

Please do so in a timely manner to ensure proper meeting management.

In-person testimony will conclude before virtual testimony begins.

And members of the public can join the webinar by computer, tablet, or smartphone by accessing the link which is listed online in the preamble language of the agenda on the city's webpage.

To join the Zoom webinar by telephone, please dial 1669-2545252.

And when prompted, input webinar ID 161-398-0144 pound.

This information is also available on the agenda and it will appear on the screen during the public comment period for each agenda item.

Please note that if you are watching via City TV 24 or online, there may be a delay.

Please participate via the audio on your phone and mute your TV and computer when it is your turn to speak.

If you wish to speak to a particular item, please wait for that item to be called and then raise your hand to speak by tapping the raise your hand icon, or if you're a call and participant by pressing star nine on your phone.

If you raise your hand during a non-comment period, your hand will be lowered.

Chair.

Thank you very much for reviewing the instructions for the public's participation today.

A quorum is now present, and uh I'm gonna go over the agenda items that we the order of the agenda today.

Um we are going to go out of order.

We'll take um our consent agenda and uh then we will jump to item four, then three, then end with item five.

So we'll go to item one and then uh two and then four, three, and five.

And we will be taking non-agenda public comment at the end of today's meeting.

Um so why don't we start begin with any committee mayor, city attorney, or IBA comments today.

Um, I have two.

Uh one I'd like to wish uh council of Campio congratulations on a brand new baby uh with his family.

That's why he is home.

Uh so when he said that there's no one under the age of or above the age of 18 in his uh office, he might have somebody under the age of 18 days in his office.

So uh congratulations.

You took my joke, Chair.

Well, we miss you here in City Hall.

Um, and also I wanted to let everybody know that on um Monday, uh coming this coming Monday afternoon, the city of San Diego will be taking up a resolution to uh join the litigation with the city of Minneapolis against some of the unlawful things we are seeing uh uh the federal agents do in that city, and we are gonna hopefully join them in in pushing back against the chaos that we're seeing in that city.

So please join us on on Monday afternoon for that resolution.

Okay, do we have any requests for continuance?

Hearing none, uh, we'll now go on to our consent agenda.

Do we have any requests to pull from the consent?

Hearing none, Sarah, please proceed with any public comment on our consent.

Thank you, Chair.

The consent agenda includes item number one, the approval of the committee minutes from December 12th, 2025.

Each speaker will have one minute.

We've not received any speaker slips here in chambers for item one, but we have a couple hands in the virtual queue.

We will begin comment with Andrea Ebbing.

Please unmute and provide your comments on December 12th minutes.

Uh hi, this is Andrea Ebbing.

I I'm just gonna make one quick request.

Um, it's just that we can get a little bit um uh more thorough on the public comments.

Um moving forward.

That really is all I have to say.

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

Our next speaker, Blair Beekman.

Please unmute and provide your comment.

All right.

All right, Blair Beekman.

Hi, thank you.

Uh thank you for this special meeting today.

Hi to everyone.

Congratulations to Council Person Campillo and his family also.

Um I am uh boy, I'm sitting in a park station in the Bay Area, and this noise is really loud.

Sorry.

Um I will be in San Diego next week.

This is my last days in San Francisco uh Bay Area.

I wanted to comment on the previous December item.

Uh items four and five.

So one minute each, I guess, uh, for those items.

Um I wanted to speak to uh you you had uh surveillance things for your fire department.

It's really important that our future of uh surveillance technology often falls under uh fire department purview, I think.

Quick reminder of that importance.

And there was also one other quick item I wanted to, if I have time, I I might run out, but uh to quickly offer I had one more item, but I think I'll just save it and good luck in today's meeting today.

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

Hand chair with no other hands in the queue.

This concludes comment on the consent agenda item number one.

All right, thank you very much.

I will now have a motion from Councilmember Whitburn and uh second from Council Member Campbell, and uh please take the roll.

Councilmember Campia, if you can please register your vote.

Yes.

Thank you.

And the consent agenda passes 4-0.

All right, thank you very much.

Now we will move on to agenda item number two.

Uh Sarah, please introduce item two.

And can our speakers please come up to the uh podium?

Thank you, Chair.

Item number two is prosecution of anti-Semitic felony hate crimes committed in San Diego.

If you're watching on City TV or the live stream online, and you'd like to dial in to speak, please call 1669-2545252.

Inputting webinar ID 161-398-0144 pound.

Chair.

All right.

Thank you very much for being here today.

And please introduce yourself.

Oh, you have to turn on your microphone.

Do you get a green light?

There we go.

Perfect.

All right, please uh introduce yourselves to the record and let us know how much time you'll need for your presentation.

Yes, good afternoon.

Thank you very much for inviting us here.

My name is Stephen Marcourt uh with the district attorney's office.

I believe 10 to 15 minutes should suffice.

Okay, thank you very much.

Uh I want to thank you again for inviting uh our office to speak on the issue of hate crimes.

I'm gonna be speaking generally about hate crimes, and then we have some examples of some anti-Semitic crimes that have taken place in the community that we have addressed.

San Diego is a very diverse city, a beautiful city, a wonderful place to live, and it's a place that we need to preserve.

We need to protect every member of this community.

The district attorney's office is very focused on protecting every member of the community here in San Diego.

What that means is that hate crimes are a priority.

I'm the chief of the special operations division at the city at the excuse me, at the district attorney's office.

One of the matters that we house within the special operations division is the prosecution of hate crimes.

Hate crimes are of particular interest to our office and to the community because when one individual is targeted as the victim of a hate crime, it is not just a sole victim crime.

It is targeted against entire communities.

It is tired, it is targeted against entire populations, and it has ripple effects that affect all of us.

It endangers the safety and the ability to live a free and open life of all members of our community.

So what I'm going to talk about uh today briefly is the general idea of what a hate crime is, because there is oftentimes misperception in the community about what is actually a hate crime and what the district attorney's office can do.

I before I get started, I want to say that first and foremost, our office is very victim-centered.

We are always uh focused on what we can do to support victims.

That has been Summer Stefan's goal, and that is certainly all of the prosecutors and investigators and victim advocates in the team's goal.

Hate crimes are prosecuted by trained prosecutors who have been at the forefront of this for years.

Our office provides training locally.

We provide training statewide and even nationwide.

We have collaborative working relationships with local law enforcement and community organizations.

We have given training in just over the past year to attorneys statewide, uh, to law enforcement agencies, two 911 dispatchers regarding how to sensitively uh talk about uh what's happening in real time with individuals who are reporting crimes.

We have met with student groups, including Hillel at the local universities.

We have also partnered and given trainings at local community organizations to help explain to them how best to report and address hate crimes and hate incidents.

So to clarify what a hate crime actually is, a hate crime really is made up of three different elements.

The first being some sort of bias, a bias against the identity of an individual or a group.

And that bias leads an individual or motivates that individual to commit an action.

Not every action is going to be criminal, but when that action is criminal and a crime is committed based on that bias and a victim is targeted, that is what will lead something to be classified properly under the law as a hate crime.

Hate crime is defined in the penal code, and I'm going to walk through some of the straightforward parts about what may appear to be very complicated definition.

A hate crime is a criminal act that is committed in whole or in part because of one or more of the following actual or perceived characteristics.

So first I'd like to talk about what some of those characteristics are.

Well, what does association mean?

Association means that the victim of the targeted hate crime does not necessarily have to pertain to one of those enumerated groups.

It can just be an individual who is perceived as pertaining to that group.

So for example, uh, if an individual advocates for or identifies with one of those protected groups, that person can also be targeted.

So if an individual takes part in a uh pro-Jewish rally, and that individual is not Jewish, but they are targeted because they are present at that rally or at that demonstration, the person who committed that targeted act that is criminal, that person could be prosecuted for a hate crime.

So to explain a little bit further, the characteristic doesn't have to be an actual characteristic, it could also be a perceived characteristic.

And again, the defendant or the person who commits the act doesn't have to get the characteristic right.

They can misidentify somebody.

But if that bias against an identity or a person is what motivates them to commit a criminal act, that criminal act will be recognized as a hate crime.

For example, if uh somebody lives next door to a center that is representative of a protected group, and that person is very frustrated with the amount of traffic that the center generates, but this person also has a biased against the group for which the center exists.

If that person one day uh commits a crime against somebody coming or going at that center because jointly they're frustrated with the traffic congestion, and also they just have a bias against that group, that would also be a hate crime.

It does not have to be wholly because of dislike or a bias against the group.

Partial bias is sufficient for somebody to be prosecuted for a hate crime.

Well, oftentimes we are told, well, the person doesn't hate the group.

Well, the law defines bias very broadly as a pre-existing negative attitude toward the identity identity characteristics.

So it is not equated with hate.

We call these hate crimes, but it doesn't mean that the person who commits the act has to be holding this high degree of hate against the group.

It is simply was the action motivated by the bias.

There are limitations, of course.

We live, as I said, in a very diverse and rich community.

We all have different perspectives, we all have different backgrounds.

And what makes uh our community so great and our nation so great as we have the First Amendment, that protects our ability to say and express ourselves as we believe.

Of course, there are limits to the first expression, but broadly speaking, much of what we are told uh is a hate crime is not actually a hate crime under the law because the actions are protected.

The hate excuse me, the First Amendment protects our right to gather to demonstrate and protest.

If we are not in agreement with what the government is doing, we can criticize the government, we can protest against the government, we can demonstrate.

We can protest against the government, we can demonstrate.

But if we are simply expressing ourselves, it is not a violation of the law.

Where this may have some overlap with hate crimes is that sometimes there are individuals who do things that are highly offensive and highly disturbing to some of the protected groups, but that behavior is protected under the law.

This is something that we might classify as a hate incident and not a hate crime.

While it may not be a hate crime and it cannot be prosecuted as a hate crime, it's important that people document these things and report them because hate incidents often lead to hate crimes.

I'm going to give a couple examples, or at least one that uh was in the news locally.

Um but first, just as a general list, that might include insults.

So if somebody is uh spewing out epithets or yelling from a car window at something, that is highly offensive, that is degrading, that is certainly problematic, and that may infringe upon the safe safe feeling that an individual has.

However, it may not be necessarily criminal.

We still want those incidents to be reported to the district attorney's office and to law enforcement because when we have a record of that aggressive behavior, sometimes we see that it develops into a pattern, and that helps us understand what somebody's doing when and if they eventually do commit an act that is targeted that is a violation of the law.

Derogatory comments, displaying hateful material on your own property.

People have the right to put what they want on their own property.

When it's on someone else's property, then we have an issue.

But if somebody wants to fly an offensive flag or banner on their own property, that is protected by the First Amendment.

This is a local incident that many of you uh may remember from 2020 in Santeed.

There was an individual who uh went into the Vaughn's grocery store wearing a KKK hood.

This it was highly offensive and uh could be uh understood by many people as threatening and justifiably so.

However, this is the kind of uh display of behavior that would be protected by the First Amendment.

This individual has a right to walk around and do this.

Is this a hate incident?

It is certainly something that is a cause of concern and something that uh local officials, local law enforcement, the district attorney's office would want to be aware of.

There may be other uh other factors that would help to lead to the discovery of a greater picture here.

But as far as this act in and of itself, while this is a hate incident, it would not be considered a hate crime.

I want to give an example of uh of documenting of hate incidents that did lead to the discovery of a hate crime.

Uh we were notified of an individual who was just at his work, and he would oftentimes bring gun components to work and talk about those gun components.

Uh after the PAWA shooter shot uh shot up the synagogue in PAWE, uh this individual praised that individual as a saint.

Obviously, that was very concerning to the individual's co-workers, and they reported that this individual had praised the PAWA shooter as a saint and that they had been bringing gun components to work.

They called law enforcement, law enforcement uh obtained a search warrant based on probable cause that this individual may be in possession of weapons, and lo and behold, when they went to that individual's house, this is what they encountered.

They located an entire uh armory of weaponry, and this was only uh discovered because of the community response, because people saw something that raised the red flag, a hate incident, as we would call it, and contacted law enforcement.

And so together the district attorney's office and law enforcement can work together to help commute keep the community safe by going through and detecting what was happening beneath the surface.

The individual had multiple AR-15s, AK-47s, and also disturbing content on their phone and computer.

A gun violence restraining order was obtained, and this individual was charged criminally and was convicted of multiple weapons offenses.

And that person uh was eventually, due to a variety of factors sentenced to six years in prison, uh, which would then enable the community to uh be safe from an individual who would express those sentiments while harboring uh high degree of weapons.

So when we are uh looking at a hate crime, people often ask, well, what does it matter if uh somebody's committed a crime and they did it through a bias or motive, what happens?

Well, if it's just a simple misdemeanor, but it's been done on the basis of hate or motivation, that will elevate it to a felony.

And if it is a felony as a standard crime, but there is also that bias motivation, that will convert the potential sentence into something more severe.

And these are these are statutes that were passed by the legislature after very thorough back and forth about uh what is necessary to uh deter individuals and to protect the greater community and to strike that balance between freedom of speech and the ability to protect and keep everybody else safe so that people can live as they see fit in California.

There are specific penal code sections that prohibit uh nooses, hate symbols, burning of religious symbols, but again, some of these things can be done on your own property, but once it infringes on somebody else's property, that's when it may become an actual criminal act.

I have a couple of anti-Semitic case examples that I'd like to go through briefly so that uh the committee as requested can understand some of the specific work that we've done in this field.

Uh we had a case in the very recent past where there was an individual who was sending multiple threatening messages through Instagram.

They're sending it to the Friends of the Israeli Defense Force.

It's a nonprofit organization, and one of the employees there was receiving the these messages again and again.

Uh the organization was terrified because the individual indicated that they were going to carry out these threats against the against the the organization.

The organization canceled numerous activities.

Uh they were not able to conduct themselves as they would because of the sustained fear, the lasting fear that they had that they would be assaulted and victimized.

We were able to, with the help of our law enforcement partners, identify who that individual was, uh, gather evidence, file file criminal charges, and prosecute that individual.

That individual pled guilty to stalking as well as a hate crime.

Uh that individual, though, in working with the victims, as we often ask, excuse me, as we always do, is we will consult with the victims about what would be an appropriate sentence here.

Of course, we have the ultimate discretion, but it is critical to us, especially in a case like this, that the victim be heard, that the victim be able to say what they believe would be appropriate.

In this situation, uh it was through collaboration with the victim organization deemed that a very appropriate approach here would be to have this individual complete anti-Semitic prevention education.

The the individual went through an extremely intensive course.

It was over the course of several weeks, if I remember correctly, there were essays involved, and it was a uh a very drawn-out process.

And at the end of which uh that individual uh really appeared to turn a corner and have a different perspective, have a broader view of the world, and so it it's it was a real success story, and thankfully, with the cooperation of the victim in this situation, we were able to come to a resolution that made everybody feel safer.

Another example uh we had a case recently where there was an individual who was dressed in military-style clothing.

They were wearing an iron cross.

They approached an individual uh in the central San Diego area who was wearing a Star of David necklace.

The uh defendant walked up to this person, spat directly on the person at close range, and threatened to kill that individual.

Obviously, this would be a terrifying experience for anybody, but to have this individual targeted because of their status as a part of a group was particularly terrifying.

And for this individual to feel like uh they might not be able to freely express themselves by wearing their Star of David necklace in the future is also something that's not only damaging for that individual, but for our entire community as as a whole.

Pled guilty to a felony strike and was sentenced to two years in prison.

So, in summary, as as I stated, our office is very much focused on victim safety, on community safety, and on supporting all members of our diverse community and allowing people to live freely and express themselves.

We cannot do our job without the collaboration with the different community groups.

We work closely with ADL, the Anti Defamation League.

We work closely with JDF, we work closely with a whole host of organizations and with our law enforcement partners and different community organizations.

We also encourage the public to report these hate incidents.

If people know of something that's happening, if it raises a red flag, it doesn't mean if you feel like, well, this doesn't warrant calling 911.

It's still important that those things be reported.

We have set up through the district attorney's office a direct line with our office, with our hate crimes prosecutors in my division.

If you go to sgcda.org slash helping slash hate crimes, you can make a report of what is happening in your neighborhood in your workplace, whatever the situation may be.

And we will collaborate, we will reach back out to you, we will collaborate with our law enforcement partners.

We will follow up and see if this is something that needs to be further investigated so that hopefully we can prevent something from escalating.

We also through our victim advocates provide a great network of support with statewide services, local services.

So if somebody is suffering from being victimized or is in fear, we can connect them with the right resources, the right counseling, and we can provide any support we can.

With that, um I'd like to say thank you very much to the committee for inviting us today.

Thank you very much for the presentation.

And we want to make sure we got your name on the record as well.

Your colleague.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

You need to press the yep.

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Christina Aralado.

I'm here for agenda item four.

Okay, I always want to make sure.

Okay, we all right.

Well, you pre-introduced yourself.

Uh well, thank you for the excellent presentation.

And now our protocol is to take public comment first, and then we'll have the council members ask any questions and more comment on the dais.

So um, Sarah, please invite members of the public to comment.

Thank you.

Um, our first speaker will be Rabbi Lieberman.

You have been seated timed by Shelley DeLeon.

If Shelley can just please raise her hand so that we know she's present in the room.

Thank you.

Each speaker will have two minutes, so with seated time, you'll have a total of four minutes.

I will put it on the clock here in front of you so you can manage your time.

Honored members of the council.

A few weeks ago I received a phone call that no clergy member of any faith should ever have received.

The call came from a teenage student at a local public school who was reporting an attack that occurred during the graduation photographs.

A group of eight students surrounded a Jewish student, shouted the anti-Semitic slur kike, and proceeded to physically assault him by striking the back of his head and forcibly harassing him.

This was not a misunderstanding.

This was not youthful misbehavior, this was a hate crime.

When the student who witnessed this incident, an act of clear anti-Semitic violence was later questioned by school police by himself.

He was instructed not to speak to his rabbis and to keep the incident quiet rather than immediately addressing the severity of what occurred, the school attempted to suppress the incident before rabbis and other leaders of the Jewish community became aware of it.

I ask you to pause and consider this question seriously.

Can you imagine this happening to your own children?

As leaders of the city and of our respective communities, we have a moral obligation to confront hatred wherever it appears.

No individual should ever be targeted, threatened, or assaulted because of their religion or race.

Silence and minimalization only embolden hate.

We must be unequivocal in our response.

We must demand accountability, and we must ensure that our schools are places of safety, dignity, and respect for every child.

Let us work together to reject hate in all its forms and to lead our city toward a safer, brighter, and more just San Diego.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Our next speaker is Liat Cohen Reese.

And Leah, you have been seated time by Liza.

If Liza can please raise her hand, thank you.

And Yavin.

Sorry, I can't read the writing.

Um, Reese, another reason.

Thank you.

Okay, so I'll put six minutes on the clock here in front of you for you to manage.

Good morning, counsel.

And thank you, Chair von Wolpert, for calling this meeting.

I am Liat Cohen Reese, the director of the anti-Semitism Task Force that stand with us.

I'm here to wake us up to a pattern that we can no longer ignore.

I'd like to share just a few examples of the anti-Semitism we have had to face in San Diego in just the last year that I could squeeze in in this short speaking frame time frame.

In January and February of 25, or Shalom Synagogue was defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti.

In February, a Jewish fraternity at SDSU was attacked.

Windows broken, fireworks thrown, and anti-Semitic slurs screamed.

In March, an Israeli man was beaten downtown for speaking Hebrew.

Bloody and assaulted.

He was the one arrested for throwing a rock at his attackers as they ran to his to their car.

That same month, agitators infiltrated a church hosting Jews and Christians, disrupted from within, and then harassed us outside.

In April, the Jewish Community Center described playgrounds defaced with messages saying, calling Jews baby killers.

In May, students formed a human swastika over San Diego Academy.

In September, more than 400 peaceful worshippers were met with violence, vandalism, trespassing, and intimidation, and no arrests were made.

And two weeks ago, Rabbi Lieberman, who just spoke, was uninvited to speak and pray at a Martin Luther King celebration for being a Zionist, an identity held by most Jews worldwide.

This is all I could share in the short allowed time frame.

I was told I only had a minute.

Sadly, there are many more examples we don't have time to address.

Must we wait for Jews to be murdered before we take something take this seriously?

Thank you.

Diana Rosenstein.

Hi, my name is Diana Rosenstein.

I am next door user and a volunteer moderator on next door.

I'm here because what I see on next door reflects what's happening into Jews locally.

When I post about local Jewish events or anti-Semitic incidents in San Diego, my posts are reported by my neighbors and removed as non-local.

My post about Holocaust remembrance day was removed and I was suspended for a month over it.

A post warning neighbors about anti-Semitic flyers in my neighborhood was removed as hate speech.

Even a post about Matza Bull soup was removed as insensitive to Palestinians.

Jews wine a lot, Zionists aren't real Jews.

From the river to the sea, I don't talk to genocide supporters.

Jewish community posts are removed while anti-Semitic comments remain.

The silences Jews and Schultz neighbors who engage in true hatred.

It's not the beautiful day in the neighborhood if you're a Jewish in San Diego.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jacqueline Schneider.

Thank you.

On September 7th, I attended an event at the Legacy Resort in San Diego.

It was advertised beautifully as a solidarity event with love and unity, featuring soul stirring music, inspiring speakers, prayer, peace, and light.

It was hosted by the Christian Jewish Alliance and Stand With Us.

Instead, we were met at the entrance by protesters carrying signs with anti-Semitic symbols, including swastikas.

I watched someone jump on the hood of the car in front of me and scream at the driver, baby killer.

Once inside, we hoped we could at least hear the program, but protesters blared siren sounds so loud from megaphones, trampled through private property landscaping, and positioned themselves at the patio wall where we were seated, making it impossible to hear the speakers or the singers.

This was not protest.

This was intimidation designed to silence peaceful assembly.

I'm here today because what happened that day, it was traumatizing.

It was terror.

And it just wasn't wrong.

There was failure.

A failure to protect people gathering peacefully, a failure to draw the line between free speech and targeted harassment.

I am asking this committee, what will you do to ensure that residents can attend events in our city without facing these anti-Semitic acts, symbols, physical intimidation, and the complete disruption of their right to assemble.

Thank you so much for caring.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Romy.

And Rami, you have been seated time by Alexandra.

Thank you.

So I'll place four minutes on the clock.

Thank you, and it's Romy, and I appreciate you hosting us today.

Um anti-Semitism hasn't been theoretical for my family, and I am just one of thousands of Jewish families who have been subjected to ongoing hate that is escalating.

So I just were painted on the sidewalks in our neighborhood and on the bathroom wall at my daughter's school.

A classmate told her that she should go back to Germany so Hitler can finish the job.

A grown man called my son a kike after seeing his star of David, and then followed him around UTC.

His mazuza was stolen from the frame of his dorm room twice.

I personally receive anti-Semitic hate all the time online.

I'm called a dirty Jew, and worse.

People post not to buy my books because I'm a Zionist.

When Jew hatred isn't taken seriously, it's enabled and enabled hate as we are seeing now escalates.

We've seen where that road leads.

Brooklyn, Bondi, Powway.

Anti-Semitism doesn't stay rhetorical, and it tells Jewish families that our fear is acceptable, collateral.

How hate crimes are identified, investigated, and prosecuted matters so very deeply.

Accountability tells our children that they are protected.

We deserve to be protected.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Tammy.

Tammy Little Pronounced Litki, but that's okay.

It's my writing.

Growing up in Australia, we did have some anti-Semitism.

Basically, things being screamed at you, not to the extent that I'm seeing now here.

I was at the legacy center that day.

I don't have to repeat everything that's been said.

It was horrific, not being able to drive in, being impeded by people walking continuously in front of the car, throwing themselves on the car, sticking things in your face, and to my dismay, the police did nothing.

They watched, they only moved when we were done and we were leaving.

And it was for me, it was a really traumatic experience to see that.

Being Australian, I was very aware of what happened in Bondi in December.

And one of those rabbis could have been one of my cousins.

And if we don't address what's going on, not just here, but everywhere in the world and speak out against what's happening, it's gonna happen again.

And I do believe in the right to free speech.

However, when your free speech impedes my free speech and my free movement, and my full grandchildren in San Diego go to a preschool that has three on guards at the door.

They've just built an extra fence to monitor people going in and out.

This is not how our children should be raised.

So the more you speak out in support of any kind of hate speech, the better off we'll be, and this will be better.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is John Sorentino.

And John, you have been seated time by Elizabeth Gray Dunn.

So Elizabeth, president of the room.

Thank you.

So I will put four minutes on the clock for you to manage.

Hello.

My name's John Sorentino.

I'm a pastor here in San Diego.

Um, not Jewish, but I could tell you how much anti-Semitism has affected our church as Christians who support Israel and the Jewish community.

I myself have just returned from Poland and Israel to witness the horrific atrocities that happened during the Holocaust.

Words can express it, a museum can't portray it.

But one of the things that I've noticed is that the Holocaust didn't begin with mass murder.

It began with words.

It began with desensitate.

Desensitive.

That word.

It began with ideas that it's okay to dehumanize the Jews.

And after returning, uh our church is very pro-Israel.

We are not just the church that has uh Israeli flag or Jewish flag in our we want the Jewish community to know that we stand with them, that we support them.

And in doing so, we have received threats.

We have people gone on our social media and called us all kinds of horrific names.

This weekend we're doing an event uh where we're bringing in uh one of the hostages that spent over 500 days in captivity in Gaza, and we have received so many disturbing responses to what we're doing.

And it it's I don't want to say funny, but some of the kids in our youth who support Israel are African American, yet they're called racist.

Hispanic, yet called racist.

Uh just because they themselves support the Jewish community.

Our church has had to hire security.

Many of our members have legally gone and got their concealed carry permits to carry in church because they don't feel safe.

Church attendance, uh, not in our church, but in the general area, has gone down because of the fear of the threats.

Uh we personally have done active shooter training in our church.

We've had to remove some people physically from our church.

And uh the idea that this is becoming an acceptable or tolerable attitude in our community is not acceptable.

And it does take work, it takes work on our behalf as leaders in the church community to speak out.

It's your responsibility and the police's responsibility to protect and serve.

And uh I'm thankful uh Lieutenant Bizzotto, I believe that's how you say her name, uh, from Western has reassured me that the event that we're having this weekend is going to be fully uh protected, and I am thankful for that.

And I I appreciate the Jewish community and their resilience that no matter what they put up with, no matter what has come against them, that the young people, the parents who have to hear the things that they hear, yet they continue on as if they deserve a normal life.

Go figure.

When someone in my church who's Jewish uh turns to someone and says, you know what?

You guys really do care about us.

That doesn't make sense to me because it shouldn't be in anybody's mind on who does and who doesn't care about you, love you, stand with you, and believe with you.

Thank you.

I appreciate your time.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Wendy Batterson.

Hi, everybody.

Hi, Royal.

Congratulations to you and Nadia for the baby.

Um Good afternoon.

My name is Wendy Batterson.

I'm a Jewish resident of San Diego and a volunteer at House of Israel, one of 42 international cottages designed for learning and connection.

House of Israel is the only cottage that requires armed security because of ongoing threats and targeted protests.

I have personally experienced anti-Jewish hate shouted on bullhorns, inflammatory anti-Semitic slogans on posters, dozens of bloody plastic dolls placed behind our cottage, and even a fake bomb.

Incidents that reflect a broader rise in anti-Semitism and the silencing of Jewish voices in our city.

These threats are not limited to our cottage.

While waiting for a scheduled meeting at Congressman Scott Peter's office, we were screamed at by anti-Semitic protesters while we were trying to speak to our own congressmen.

People from our Jewish community don't try to silence other communities.

Jewish multi-faith and public spaces across San Diego are often targeted, making safety and security an ongoing concern for the Jewish community.

This ongoing campaign of hate affects the ability of Jewish residents to live, learn, and worship in safety.

These are not things any community should have to accept as normal.

I ask you all to take anti-Semitism seriously, protect your Jewish San Diego community, your San Diego Jewish community, and actively stand against hate.

Your leadership matters.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Our next speaker is Stephanie.

Stephanie, you have been seated time by Jose.

Jose can raise his hand, please.

Sose still present in the room.

Thank you.

All right, so we all have four minutes.

Please begin.

Um, first of all, thanks for having me.

And actually, the incident that you spoke about with FIDF, that was myself and Oz Laniata, who's in this room as well.

And we had proposed that we wanted him to have a rehabilitation.

We wanted him to be educated.

We didn't want him to just be punished because we wanted him to learn from this and hopefully recognize his wrongdoings, and he did.

So it was, I didn't know you were gonna bring that up, but that was um interesting, so I just wanted to mention it.

Um my name is Stephanie Nissan, and I'm a San Diego native, and I'm a resident of Bankers Hell.

I am also the president of the House of Israel in Balboa Park.

I want to give you a small window of what it's like to be Jewish in San Diego right now.

Whether we are planning an event, attending a holiday gathering, or simply walking into a Jewish space, our first thought and question is always, is there gonna be security?

What is that security gonna be?

That determines whether we will feel safe attending that event or not, and whether we will attend or not.

But as of now, it's the norm.

It doesn't stop at public spaces.

In my personal life, something something as simple as hiring a new vendor or service provider now means that I need to research them first.

I can't, I was just trying to get somebody to clean the lint out of my dryer, and I had to go through extensive research to make sure that they weren't, they don't hate me or Jews just for existing.

It's not this is something we have to deal with in every single day.

Getting in an Uber, forget about it.

It's terrifying.

You never know what's gonna happen when you're in there, especially as somebody who is very outwardly Jewish like myself.

Um as a Jewish mother with a son who's about to enter school, I'm faced with the decision of do I send my son to a Jewish school where the school is the target, or do I send him to a public school where he's gonna be the target?

No parent should ever have to face that decision.

Um at the House of Israel in Balboa Park, um, like Wendy had just said, we are a part of the international cottages, which are 42 cottages meant to celebrate culture and unity of being part of the House of Pacific Relations, which means peace, um, which we should be able to do freely.

Um, yet we are the only house that requires an armed guard.

We are the only house that faces regular harassment.

We've been vandalized multiple times.

Some of those times have been extensive, which required the bomb squad, and a partial closure of the park, which also drains city resources.

We've had repeated anti-Israel protests directly outside of our cottage, stickers placed on our walls, graffiti in and around our space.

Visitors are sometimes confronted for simply walking in.

This is a cultural center, not a government building, yet we are treated like a political target.

We should be able to educate freely about Israel, just like all the other cottages, but instead we have to operate under constant threat.

People often say, I'm not against Jews, I'm just against the Israeli government.

But then why are we the only house that gets harassed?

People that have a problem with American government policy aren't going to the House of USA to protest them, nor are they going to the House of China, House of Iran, etc.

So why are we the only house that gets harassed?

Has little something to do with the fact that we're Jewish.

Walking through Balboa Park without people knowing my connection to the House of Israel for simply wearing my stars of David.

I've been called a baby killer, a genocider, the whole gamut.

I've been told to get back in an oven.

Hitler should have finished us all.

Am I still okay?

No.

That does conclude the four minutes.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Our next speaker is Tamar.

Pastor Sorentino.

The Jews are tired.

Resilient, yes, tired, exhausted.

Thank you, Council members.

My name is Tamar Caspi.

I'm a co-founder of Pure K-12.

We advocate for Jewish students, parents, and teachers, civil rights in K-312.

And I want to speak today about the intersection of K-12 schools, anti-Semitism, and public safety, and why police reporting matters.

This is not theoretical.

Recently at a local school, a group of students formed a human swastika targeting a Jewish student on campus.

The school administration did not report it to police despite the fact that they did label it a hate crime, and it did meet the legal threshold for a hate crime.

And therefore it did require law enforcement notification.

And that gap matters.

First, schools are not separate from public safety.

These acts are tied to real-world violence, extremist ideology from both the left and the right, and copycat behavior, as we saw a human swastika then be repeated in Northern California.

How institutions respond sends a message, not just to students, but to the broader community.

Second, anti-Semitism is a policing issue.

Jewish students are one of the most frequently targeted groups in hate incidents nationwide.

Stephanie's line really resonated.

I choose between a school, a Jewish school where the school is targeted, or a public school where my kids are targeted.

I have three kids in public school.

My kids are targeted.

So cool.

So when acts like this are handled internally and never reach law enforcement, evidence is not preserved, patterns are not tracked, victims and families are left without protection, and police lose visibility into those emerging threats that involve minors.

Raiba Hanan told you about police's illegal interrogation of minors.

One of those kids was my kid, illegally interrogated about the anti-Semitic hate crime at Patrick Henry.

Cool.

Another one.

I have somebody ceded their time to me.

I did not have the slip.

Did they turn in a slip?

Who seated the time?

I think you're at my time.

Okay, my colleague will get a slip from you.

Thank you.

Okay, so I'll put two more minutes on the clock.

Thank you.

Are you sure?

Okay.

So systemic enter reporting is a problem.

Hate crimes, especially in schools, are routinely mislabeled as pranks.

Immature behavior are handled internally.

Families are often discouraged from filing police reports because nothing ever happens about it.

This result is that official hate crime data is dramatically understated about what actually happens, and that has consequences.

The research allocation for police, threat assessment and prevention, community trust, and the safety of Jewish students are left feeling invisible and unprotected.

Police involvement does not adequate like automatically mean that they need to be arrested or criminalized.

It just means documentation, threat assessment, and it means that schools must follow the law.

The question for the council is this.

It's not whether schools should discipline students because they should.

It's whether the system should ensure that hate crimes are recognized, reported, and addressed consistently.

So we need clear, standardized reporting, protocols between schools and police, training for the educators on recognizing anti-Semitism from both the left and the right, the legal thresholds, strong messaging that hate crimes must be taken seriously when they happen on school campuses.

Anti-Semitic acts are not can no longer be minimized or unreported.

Because when we do that, we do not just fail Jewish students, we weaken public safety for everyone.

Thank you.

Thank you for your comment.

Julie Sorrentino.

And Julie will be followed by our two final speakers, Bill and Craig.

Hello, thank you for having me.

My name is Juline Sorentino.

I am a Christian woman and pastor in Chula Vista.

And I am a Zionist, which means I believe the state of Israel has a right to exist.

I attend numerous peaceful events bringing Christians and Jews together.

Most of the time there are protesters and signs shouting hate speech against the Jews and against Christians who support.

This is now beyond the point of freedom of speech.

Thank you for having me.

Thank you.

Bill.

Yes, Bill.

Good afternoon, Councilmember Von Wilpert or Chair Braun Wolpert.

Thank you for coordinating this and having us here today.

My name is Bill Ganley.

I'm the community security director for the Jewish Federation of San Diego.

And I just wanted to give you after hearing some of these stories, I just want to share a little bit more.

In the last 24 hours, my day started yesterday on the phone with detectives from the Sheriff's Department and then from the city police department coordinating extra patrols of all Jewish facilities in the county based on what had occurred in New York City the night before.

Then before I left the house, I received a phone call from a member of the community whose child had been threatened with death in in a school.

That's that's not even one that's being discussed right now.

That's still uh just happening now.

And when I went to work, I had to uh file a suspicious activity report with an incident at our federation, and I just got a phone call from the detective while I was sitting here.

So I did want to make uh one uh plug for other reporting and put it put it on the record.

The San Diego Law Enforcement Coordination Center will accept um input from people reporting hate incidents that don't rise to the level of crimes, but you can report and it the address for that is SDLECC.org.

And I just wanted to get it into the record, and it's on the city's website as well about reporting suspicious activity.

That way we can get it in the hands of law enforcement quickly, no matter what jurisdiction you may be, because there are people here from all over the county.

So I just wanted to put that on the record.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

And our final in-person speaker is Craig E.

Good afternoon.

Um, in the past 27 months, I have seen and experienced more anti-Semitism in downtown and Balboa Park than in 40 years of my previous life.

And that's in living in big cities in New York City, you know, major metropolitan areas.

Um, one incident occurred in uh December of 2025.

I saw hundreds of anti-Semitic, anti-Israel posters and flyers pasted to the bridge to Cabrillo Bridge in Balboa Park.

I decided to start removing them.

Somebody came up to me, a guy fully masked.

I found out his name was Zayd Gitsitani.

Um, thankfully, he was um his house was raided by the FBI this summer.

I don't think he was arrested.

But when I reported the hate crime, the threats that came from a video he posted.

I received a letter from a detective asking me to give them the birth phone number and addresses for the people that sent me the death threats.

Why didn't the detective investigate these people?

They had screenshots of the threats they made, they had the names of the of these people, but I feel like we were really let down.

The community was let down.

They didn't protect, you know, when somebody's sending me uh threats, and on top of the threats, I was stalked.

People came out to the park and followed me around and made threats against me.

And after after this happened, when there was really no investigation done, I didn't see any point in filing complaints because they weren't going anywhere, you know, or they didn't seem to be going anywhere.

And like I said, I've seen and experienced more anti-Semitism.

Um thank you for your concluding remark.

That concludes testimony here in chambers.

So I will begin the five-minute timer for anybody in the virtual queue to indicate if they wish to provide comment on item two.

And as a reminder, each speaker will have two minutes.

We will begin testimony with Andrea Ebbing.

Please unmute and begin.

Hi, this is Andrea Ebbing, and I would like this on the record, please.

Um, the reason they didn't prosecute and look into those things, and the reason there is no representation is because there's an anti-Semitic movement at the very top of our criminal justice system.

Simply Google the words Summer Stefan, who is our district attorney, Summer Stefan's anti-Semitic racist race uh to BDA.

Uh she also is um she must accept apologize to the Jewish community.

Um that's example one.

Example two, she accepted money from Dallas Marston on 126 21, 526 22, and 428 2022.

Dallas Marston is the guy that sold the gun for the Power Synagogue shooting.

Um she allowed the abduction of my children.

My grandfather uh was a paratrooper to come to the United States.

My mother came, she was born in a displaced persons camp in Germany.

We survived everything.

My uh grandfather, we I didn't find out I was Jewish until I was almost 18 because my grandfather never spoke about it.

It was a family secret because his blind brother was shot in the head by the Nazis when they approached my grandfather and his brother and said, uh are you Jew?

And he didn't have time.

Obviously, he couldn't see him, and they shot him and killed him.

And we came here to the United States.

I was raised in Massachusetts.

I have never been more unsafe in my entire life.

I was almost murdered on video.

It's on video.

There's blood everywhere.

My ex doesn't deny strangling me.

My children were abducted.

My ex admits to drugging me on the record.

The detectives omitted my children from the report.

Summer Stefan isn't is not protecting and serving the community.

That's why the Jews in San Diego are living in this level of fear.

This is an outdated level of like unbelievable hate being permitted and allowed by somebody who should not be in office.

Her husband is federal judge Dana Sabrow.

Thank you.

This does conclude your time.

Our next speaker is Kathleen Lippett.

Please unmute and begin.

Good afternoon, public safety committee.

My name is Kathleen Limpet.

Pardoning any population, specifically based on the constitution's preeminent constitutional right, freedom of religion is of course wrong.

However, the PowerPoint that previously focused on hate speech was a little concerning because of its lack of specificity.

Speech laws must be narrowly tailored to ensure that free speech is not compromised.

It mentioned that a partial bias could be categorized as a hate crime.

And that definition seems to bleed into the belief of the idea that one human can read another one's mind.

Hate speech deserves the animus of the greatest social stigma.

We all need to speak up when we hear a speech that is targeted toward an individual because they are a member of a religion, race, or sexual orientation.

Billings, Montana, though, had a wonderful way of responding.

They reacted to the anti-Semitic Act that had a woman had put a menorah in her front window and someone threw a rock through it.

The incident led to the support of that family by placing menorah's in other residents' windows as a display of solidarity, unity, and resistance to hate.

Billings residents now have an annual event that they mark this campaign for tolerance as a reminder of the importance of standing up against hate and intolerance.

But we really want to make sure that we are not getting into the laws that that characterize the Nazis and their ability to be able to target people for generalized comments that they didn't like.

Thank you for letting me speak.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Blair Beekman.

Please unmute and begin.

Hi, thank you.

Uh Blair Beekman.

Um I um I think all most all religions and cultures feel they have something special about them and unique and makes them uh special and unique.

I grew up uh my best friend growing up was Jewish, and I learned a lot of important lessons at that time in my life.

And uh it's been really disheartening uh the way Israel has acted uh illogically to use that word I feel in the past few years.

Um it's disheartening.

Uh it survival is important, but to to use survival uh to use brute force in that survival is uh hard.

I wish there were other there can be smarter ways to work.

And I've always been a part of Jewish community for how to be smarter, basically.

And so um it's it I think a lot of people feel that way.

And uh Israel is different than Jewish people themselves.

Um but I I hope that uh as Martin Luther King has often talked about uh the fact of creating laws is a good way to create a standard of belief systems.

Um good luck what we can be doing with this item.

I think uh we're definitely we'd be working in the right direction.

We are working in the right direction with this sort of item, and what we can clarify and make clear it's just a matter that we have to be uh patient and decent about it, and it hurts to have to do that, and we end up being so patient and decent.

Uh we get run over a lot of the time.

And uh so good luck, how you can be working on this and and what you could be developing, and uh that a clear message that uh we can solve our issues uh peacefully and with laws, with with with dialogue and understanding and not with brute force, not with violence, and uh it's no way to ever work.

Uh good luck how that can be an uh an important message that we learn to share with each other as well.

Thank you.

Thank you for that concluding comment and chair with the five-minute timer having gone off and no other hands in the queue.

This concludes testimony for item two.

Um, thank you very much.

Uh for everyone who participated today.

Thank you very much for uh the presentation from the district attorney's office as well.

Um I'll start off as chair, and then I think Council Marc Campio has his hand raised too.

But um, you know, we've seen some pretty horrific things happening around the world and here at home recently, including the examples of the horrific violence on December 14th in Bonday Beach in the mass shooting.

Uh, we've seen local tragedies here at home, um, just down the road in Shibata Power, where I grew up in 2019.

Uh during the pandemic, we saw an alarming rise in hate crimes against our Asian American community.

We saw a rise in hate crimes against the LGBTQ community uh two summers ago at Pride here in San Diego.

Um so if we could just start with a moment of silence for everybody that we've lost recently to hate in the world.

You know, hate crimes don't just harm one person or one family, they send fear through entire communities.

And that's why we are all here.

Um when someone is targeted because who of who they are, how they worship, where they come from, it tears at the promise that all of us have that we all deserve dignity and respect in our community.

And that's why we're here today.

I called this hearing to make sure that we stand up against hate in all forms in all counties and all uh corners of this county, and that we celebrate every member of our community, including celebrating and protecting our Jewish community.

And I want to thank you for being here in voicing the experiences that you've had.

Um I also want to thank the district attorney for prosecuting crimes, and I wanted to give you an opportunity to respond to anything you've heard or are ways that people can report.

You know, if people are worried, oh, this is just something small, I shouldn't report it.

Please encourage them to do so.

Thank you very much for the opportunity.

First, addressing those who spoke, I want to extend my deepest heartfelt honor and respect to all of you for taking the time to come down here and voice what is happening in your lives and in your in your community.

And I also want to equally express my honor and respect for those who I'm sure would have come here as well and provided their countless additional stories, but for the fact that they probably don't have the opportunity or the luxury to come down here right now.

We are your partners.

It is so important that we hear your voice.

It is so important that we have the information that you have.

Certainly there are deficiencies, whether they be in the local schools, which I'm very well very much aware of.

I've worked on a lot of issues dealing with mandated reporting.

Uh, and so I'm very familiar with some of the things you're talking about.

Hate crimes obviously they affect all of us in ways that are deep and permanent.

Our office is 100% committed to that.

That is why I'm here.

That is why we have constructed a specific hate crimes task force.

That is why we work closely with people like Bill Ganley, and we work closely with other individuals and other community organizations.

I encourage everybody here to report everything that they're aware of, uh, whether that is to law enforcement, if it happens at a school, you can go online.

We set up a direct reporting method on our website because we recognize there are deficiencies.

That's not a criticism.

I'm not going to criticize a particular school or law or law enforcement agency.

SDPD works very hard.

And whatever letter somebody got in the mail, I can't answer for that.

But what I can say is the detectives and the individuals that I have worked with care very deeply about these issues.

You can go on our website that was uh posted there earlier.

You can directly contact us if you Google uh our office and hate crimes, it will come up.

Any sort of incident, any sort of crime, any sort of suspicion, we will follow up.

I just want to make it 100% clear how valued your voices are.

We are your partners.

There is absolutely no asterisk to that.

This should not be tolerated.

It is not tolerated.

We are working constantly on making things better for the entire community.

That's why we have set up direct reporting.

That's why we go out and do things as uh simple as meaning with student groups uh coming here today, going out to community groups.

If we get an invitation, we will come and we will do a conference.

Our office also set up the first statewide for prosecutors around the state.

First uh hate crimes uh conference, and we're gonna be doing it on a biannual basis.

Uh this is a high priority.

And I want you to understand that, and I want you to spread that through the community.

We will support you, victim services, uh, law enforcement contests, et cetera, et cetera.

And this is something we will not lie down on.

This is not something we will tolerate.

San Diego is a wonderfully diverse place where we should all be free to express ourselves, live our lives, and we will 100% stand up for that every day, every night, without ceasing.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um, you know, we here in the city and county of San Diego, we have unique jurisdiction.

You know, this board does not have jurisdiction over the schools, the school board trustees themselves do.

However, we can encourage them to have a similar conversation at the school boards.

They should be having this exact conversation at the school boards.

And I'm happy to reach out to the folks who represent my communities and the school boards to say this needs to be happening there as well.

Um I'll turn over to my colleagues to continue.

Um, I just uh want to thank you so much for being here, all of you for being here.

This is why I wanted to highlight what's happening today.

And we have um a lot of our San Diego police officers are in the back.

So if anybody does want to talk to anybody, we have people available here to speak as well.

Um, and I have two uh announcements going forward about action that we can take in addition to fully funding our hate crimes unit here with San Diego Police Department.

I intend to advocate during the budget process to expand a project I have been supporting out of my office called uh Ruth Remember Us the Holocaust, which is a project being done to have local San Diego County families who have experienced the Holocaust who shared their own history.

So it's not so far away, it's here here in San Diego County.

And uh I helped fund the exhibit that's currently at the Ridford Library in La Jolla, but I would like to see this become a traveling exhibit so that students from out the county can see these um remember us the Holocaust exhibit here in San Diego.

So I'll be calling for that in the budget.

And then Councilmember Campio and I are also um writing to the state of California to renew a grant that ended in 2024, the California State Nonprofit Security Grant Program, which provided security grants to support uh targeted communities, including the Jewish community, uh, for security enhancements.

And nobody should have to put up metal detectors and hire security guards just to have a community event, but it also shouldn't fall on the burden of folks who are just working in nonprofit to have to fund that.

And so while we are currently experiencing a rise in hate crimes and anti-Semitism, uh we believe this grant should reopen.

Uh and so council member Campio and I are going to be uh advocating to the governor's office for this to reopen so that we can uh provide funding for security at folks who feel to be very vulnerable.

Um with that, I will turn it over to my colleague, Councilor Campio.

Thank you, Chairman Wilbert, and uh thank you very much to the district attorney's office for their prosecutions for holding people accountable uh when hate crimes hit our communities.

They don't just affect the specific victim.

They are crimes that are intended to terrify an entire set of people, and so they take uh greater weight.

And so I'm I'm glad that District Atomer uh district attorney Stefan uh puts as much time and effort uh and and staffing into getting this uh getting this done.

So thank you for that.

I want to thank the members of the Jewish community and the broader community really for their attendance and their advocacy.

Uh, many a phone call and many ideas uh discussed with folks who are sitting there in the room, uh Liyat and Tamar for sure.

Uh and indeed the original idea for our hate littering law, which is now uh state law with assembly bill 3024, uh, that came uh all from a Zoom call with Tamar.

So I want to thank her personally for that.

Uh and thank you, Chair Von Wilbur, for your support of the Ruth exhibit.

Uh, my office and I have supported Sandy Scheller for years.

She's truly amazing in her work to honor Holocaust survivors.

So thank you for that announcement.

Um, you know, as as I watch this presentation, uh, you know, seeing how uh hate crime is defined and then seeing how it's treated uh from an evidentiary standpoint, how we have to approach those types of cases.

Those that's all very, very um hyper specific and really, really important to have successful prosecutions.

Uh and so we have the experts in front of us who know how to do that and do it successfully uh to protect victims.

Um, but I think that our our constituents who are in the room uh spoke to something far broader uh because uh one prosecution uh it can be successful, um, but it really is something that's deeper in our culture.

Uh, as someone who attended and spoke uh the Jewish Christian Alliance event at the Legacy Center in September, uh, and as someone who's been to the House of Israel in Balboa Park, uh it's at once remarkable to me that the Jewish community members ever want to try and go outside in public to do anything, given how much hate they have to withstand.

Uh but then again, as a person who just this last year visited the Kabutsk Faraza and the Nova Musical Site and Yad Vashem, uh, I'm not at all surprised by the Jewish resilience we see here in San Diego.

Uh and as the council member of the original Jewish neighborhoods in our city, uh, I'm proud of that resilience.

Indeed, I'm inspired by that resilience.

And Rabbi Lieberman, I just want to thank you in particular for being a steward of our community here in San Carlos and at Teferith Israel for years and years.

Uh and I appreciate you.

You're an excellent example of that resilience.

Uh, I think what many non-Jewish people miss about uh hate crimes, uh, and in specific anti-Semitism is that the hate symbols in the speech uh are are really not simply dehumanizing, but that they are language of elimination of a group of people.

Uh it's not just that a group of people is less than, is that they don't deserve to be alive.

And uh, you know, when a lot of people see a swastika, they think, oh, that's about Nazism and the totalitarian regime.

Uh that's not what it is.

It's a symbol of extermination of mass murder.

Uh, and so I know that every Jewish person in the audience today, they don't just feel personally threatened when they see and hear this language and these symbols.

Uh, they feel their children and their spouses, their parents and extended family members are targets for termination, which is a whole next level of fear.

And so that's why I'm so so serious about advocating for my Jewish constituents who frankly ask for nothing more and nothing less than any other group of constituents ask for, which is to be free to live in their community and in this world.

And and when I say world, I mean because that that's why I care so much to advocate for Israel as a nation, as the ancestral home of the Jewish people to exist, because I met people in Israel who felt safe nowhere in the world, uh, even and especially in the United States.

And when they made Aliyah, they had a place where they felt at home, and who told me to my face they felt safe there.

Uh so every nation of people deserve that type of place and the Jewish community should be treated no differently.

And so as we acknowledge that hate crimes are rising across not just our city, our state, they are rising across the world uh because of how people are taking advantage of social media, taking advance advantage of social and cultural trends.

Uh we have to acknowledge that anti-Semitism right now is growing, and it is the fastest growing form of hate.

And it's becoming far more virulent.

Um, I believe it was Councilmember Whitburn who said late last year, along with City Human uh Human Relations Commission members of our city that we ought to take up the IRA definition for consideration.

Uh, I agree with him on that.

And I hope we'll do that soon.

Uh, thank you, Chair, for docking this item for us taking this so seriously.

I know on behalf of my uh constituents in District 7 who might not know and might not hear that this was uh a focal point for the city council and our public safety committee today.

I thank you on their behalf.

It really means a lot.

Thank you.

Thank you, Vice Chair, and now over to Councilmember Campbell.

Thank you so much.

I so appreciate you coming.

Everything you said and everything uh that you said and and that you helped us with.

I think it's very important that we again uh are able to immediately grasp the places where we're supposed to report, whether it's a hate crime.

I mean, it's hard for the average citizen to figure out is it a hate crime?

Should I report this?

I think when you said we should report everything, that seems hateful.

And um a gentleman gave the uh the website, S D L E C C dot org, uh, to do that if we feel it's not the hate level, but maybe you could just call the police and ask them is this a hate crime level?

And I'd like to ask the police if you don't mind uh whoever is in charge of this or knows a lot about it with the police training involved.

Would you please come up and answer a couple of questions?

And I wanted to ask the Patrick Henry lady, was that a school police officer that did that?

I'm sorry.

I think I don't feel so you didn't know if it was a police officer from the city or a school police officer.

Okay, which was it though?

It was a district, okay.

Okay.

Well, thank you, officer.

I I just wanted to ask first of all, if you wouldn't mind telling us your name and yeah, of course, uh Lieutenant Matthew Botkin.

Right, I it's so nice to see you.

Um I just wanted to ask a few quick quick questions.

I think it's very important that we re-educate all of America in regard to hate crimes and sp and uh anti Semitism, but anti everything.

As bad as it is for us, it's still worse for black people, even in our city.

I want you to know the numbers are terrible.

But I but it's bad for anybody black, brown, white, green, yellow, doesn't matter.

So what I wanted to ask you was what is the training in the police academies in regard to anti-Semitism?

So while it's been 23 years since I was there, and I'm not very familiar with it.

I can tell you that the overarching theme for any law enforcement offer officer, including those that are in the academy, uh, is to be someone who listens first and then asks questions.

Um and so when it comes to what the training is, the first part is to listen to hear what's actually going on.

Um empathy plays a big role uh in getting anyone to believe you, let alone taking a great statement from them uh and understanding it.

Um, and when it comes to uh crimes involving hate and hate crime allegations, um, one of our policies, in fact, the piece that that guides what our officers do uh revolves around recognizing that a hate crime is not just an individual uh instance, it is one that affects the uh community globally.

Uh and so as far as how listening goes and how we receive things, that's the first piece for uh for our officers.

Um they have any training on the history of this.

I mean, it is 6,000 years old, it continuously comes back again and again and again, and this is why I think in our Jewish DNA, we feel it when it's starting to come again.

Yes, uh I know from from my time I don't know what the current academy classes go through, but our class was very fortunate to to visit the Holocaust Museum in Los Angeles, uh, and so that's a full day uh for us.

Umuseum of tolerance, right?

Yes, the museum of columns, thank you.

Um, and so that's a full day for us uh going to the going to that museum.

Um so that's one of the pieces.

I don't know if that's a current academy standard, uh, but I believe it's it was at least when I was there, a post standard.

Well, I think we need to are you in charge of the hate crimes unit or any?

I am not, no.

Is anyone here?

I think it's very important that they should be here.

And here comes somebody.

Good morning, ma'am.

Adam Shark, I'm a commander of the San Diego Police Department.

So Matt and his group are here to talk about something relating to it to neighborhood policing, and the other groups here to talk about real-time operations center.

So we're not necessarily prepared to answer specific questions.

But six months ago, I was the captain in charge of our training division, so I can speak to this.

Thank you.

Sure.

So there are post requirements mandated by the state of California that all police officers in the state have to go through at the academy level.

It's a four to six-month academy, and it includes coverage of hate crimes as the district attorney pointed out.

Um, how to take those crimes, how to investigate those crimes, and there's also a great deal of cultural competency work that goes into that.

How to interact with different groups, because everybody comes from a different place, and everybody's going to respond to a police officer differently.

Not just the uniform, but the person that's wearing that uniform.

Then specifically for the San Diego police department, we have what's called agency specific training.

So when a recruit graduates the police academy, they go through one to three weeks over the course of a couple of months of specific training to the police department.

And one of those days is an entire day of interacting with different communities within San Diego.

Jewish community, Muslim community, African American community, Latino community, and hearing what those lived experiences are to further contribute to the cultural competencies of those newer officers.

And that is a continuing effort throughout our time as sworn officers.

But also there's cultural competencies that are built into those as well.

And some of that's mandated by the state.

And then, as you know, we have a very robust multicultural storefront group that includes officers who are from a whole variety of different communities.

The Jewish community is very strongly represented by Sergeant John Zimmerman and Detective Dave Abrams.

Um, and I think anybody who's at interactions with them know that they're absolutely fantastic.

Great relationship with the ADL, with Bill and his team.

Great relationship with the ADL, with Bill and his team, and this is an ongoing effort with your police.

Is there every role playing in the in the training?

I think role playing is very useful.

So, yeah, there is.

So there's role playing that is tested in scenarios.

There's also um in the effective interactions portion and the cultural competencies portion, we will bring in role players to interact with new recruits and see how they do.

Because after 20 years, you kind of get a feel how to interact with the community.

But when you're brand new, you're fresh out of college, uh, maybe you're fresh out of the military or working a job at Target or AutoZone.

We have to build those skills from the ground up.

Yes, yes, I agree.

And I wanted to ask you uh do you know anything about the rock throwing incident where the Jewish person was hurt downtown, yelled at, and mistreated, and then as the perpetrators ran away, threw a rock at him, but he was arrested.

I'm not familiar with that, but I'd be happy to look into it.

Okay, I I hope that doesn't involve San Diego Police Department, but I just want to make sure that every single one of our police know not to be prejudiced and follow that in their lives every minute.

Yeah.

Yeah, and I must say, you know, I'm I'm old.

When I was a kid, it was just after the Holocaust was discovered by the rest of the world.

And so everyone grew up it every day in the newspaper they were, oh, this concentration camp has just been discovered, or this or that or that.

And so when I was young, everyone was very aware of what happened in Germany and throughout Europe because of the Nazis.

And so uh when I was in fifth grade, a girl from my class told all the other students not to talk to me because I was a dirty Jew.

The students were horrified.

I could hear them saying, What?

Because they knew better, because in those days it was so close to World War II.

Everyone knew the history, everyone understood the problems.

Now we've lost that.

People aren't being properly educated about world history, about Jewish history, about black history, and about the horrible things that have happened to people just because of who they are, and that we're all one and we're all human beings.

And that, by the way, is the premise of the main Jewish prayer.

We are one, and God is one.

And that is what the Jewish people brought to the earth 6,000 years ago, almost.

So I want to thank you for further continuing the training, making it deeper, if at all possible, since things are getting worse and worse every year, we see the numbers go up.

And I think we need to make this a national uh thing of importance, that all Americans be re-educated about tolerance and about loving.

So it's not just tolerating each other, it's loving each other.

And we have to understand where each of where our different communities came from.

And here in San Diego, we are so diverse.

I think we have 130 different languages, and so we must love each other and come together.

And I want to thank the the church that that did that.

And I'm sorry that you have to you're gonna have to hire more dogs, more guards when you have these legacy events, because there are hateful people, some of whose ancestors or they themselves came from countries where they don't understand that it's okay to do peaceful protest.

That means no hate speech.

That means peaceful, and whatever happened to you or your people should not be based on hate and vice versa.

So I I want to I want to thank you for everything you're doing, and please let's build it up much more.

And I I Summer Stefan's a friend of mine.

I'm gonna talk to her about what I heard because I'm so upset that anybody would think she's anti-Semitic.

And she herself comes from a community that was wiped out in about right around the turn of the of the 1800s to the 1900s, and she she understands this very personally, and so I find it hard to believe that she would be have any hatred in her heart for that with the.

No, no, that was somebody okay.

I wouldn't think he might have each other.

Well, yeah, I just want to stand up for her because I know that's not true.

And uh that was the actually the group that she came from, was what Hitler told his cabinet people, sort of cabinet people, his minions.

Hitler told his minions that they did it to those people so we can get away with it, just like they did back in 1900.

Well, that was his that's what he was based on.

And these groups now are based on Hitler, and so much is going on that is based on the Third Reich.

And many are trying to make the Fourth Reich.

We must put a stop to this, and I'm sure we will because we are not gonna put up with it in America.

But thank you so much.

Thank you, man.

Thank you now, Councilman Whitburn.

Thank you, Chair.

Uh, want to say thank you uh for the presentation.

Thank you for being here this afternoon.

Uh thank you to all the members of the Jewish community who are here and shared your experiences with us this afternoon.

I represent both Balboa Park and Mission Valley and the targeted abuse that has been experienced by uh the Jewish community at the House of Israel and at the Legacy Center is uh and anywhere else is obviously unacceptable.

Um I also want to thank you, Mr.

Markwart for prosecuting hate crimes.

Uh many of the victims of hate crimes suffer profound long-term impacts, as you well know.

Uh, and prosecution uh can act as a real deterrent.

We've seen that uh with some of the hate crimes uh against the LGBTQ community uh up in Hillcrest.

Uh we had uh somebody that was hit with a pellet gun, we've had incidents of vandalism, uh, the San Diego Police Department investigated those incidents and made arrests, and I think that those arrests and the subsequent uh prosecutions, uh, which were reported in the media, which I think is important, uh, sent a signal that we are not going to tolerate uh this kind of behavior.

So thanks to all of you for sharing the importance of uh enforcing the law against hate crimes, and uh thank you to the district attorney's office for pursuing justice.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you very much, and thank you all for being here.

Thank you again, and thank you to our district attorney.

And um this is an important conversation, that's why we wanted to have it here at City Hall, and we appreciate you being here.

Um now turn to our next item in the agenda, which is uh agenda item number four.

Sarah, please introduce item four.

Thank you, Chair.

Item number four, ghost gun prosecutions and reduction of gun violence.

And if you're watching on City TV or the live stream and you'd like to dial in, please call 1669-2545252.

Hanwin prompted at a web and writing 1613980144 pound.

Sure.

Okay, now please reintroduce yourself.

Um good afternoon.

Can you hear me?

Yes, go ahead.

My name is Christina Aralado.

I am a deputy district attorney, and I am the assistant chief of the gang prosecution division for the district attorney's office.

Um today I will talk to you about the challenges involved in the prosecution of ghost guns.

I'm going to discuss um and provide information on trends that we're seeing, discuss challenges involved in those prosecutions, and then also tell you a little bit about what the district attorney's efforts are to reduce uh gun violence.

Um, one of the most significant or the most significant challenge surrounding ghost guns is their accessibility.

They can be obtained without any background check.

Any individual can get their hands on a ghost gun.

A juvenile, somebody with a concerning mental health history, a criminal history, they can be purchased online, they can be made with 3D printers, and we have seen in some of our cases that parts are purchased out of state and assembled here.

The accessibility accessibility of ghost guns allows an individual intent on committing violence to act upon that urge more easily and more violently, thus putting our community at risk.

The trends that we have seen in our office, at least as it pertains to adult cases, um, as previously indicated and reported that around early 2025, we had about 123 ghost gun cases.

In 2024, we prosecuted about 218 cases.

So in 2025, we were somewhat on track with the previous year, maybe slightly less.

Half of our gang cases have go are usually involving ghost guns.

In 2024, we had 50 gang cases involving ghost guns, and in 2025, we had about 28 uh gang cases involving ghost guns.

Uh juvenile cases, I can give you some information in terms of trends.

Um, juvenile cases are confidential, but in terms of juvenile cases involving guns, and when I mean guns, I mean possessions, but also assault of offensives where guns are used.

We actually appear to be trending in a positive direction.

Um there were significantly fewer petitions being filed in 2024 versus 2023.

We saw an approximate 40% reduction in juvenile gun cases or juvenile uh gun petitions filed.

That's a great thing for our youth and for our community.

There could be many factors involved with that reduction.

That could be law enforcement being proactive.

That could be community partners being proactive, and to be quite frank, juvenile ceiling laws sometimes make it difficult for us to look backwards at statistics.

There's not really one thing that we can point to to this significant positive reduction, but we are pleased about it nonetheless, and this is a positive thing for all of us.

However, what I do think is important to note is that although we're trending in a positive direction with fewer cases or fewer juvenile petitions, we are still not at the levels and the low that we had prior to 2019 and 2020, which I know you all know is very significant because that's really when we began to see ghost guns more prominently in our community.

So we're not at those pre-sort of introduction of ghost gun levels, but we appear to be going in the right direction, at least with our juveniles.

There are a number of different challenges presented with prosecuting ghost guns.

It can be difficult to find the source, the manufacturer, the seller, whoever's assembling them and providing those that are using them.

The ease of which a ghost gun can be obtained obviously is a danger to the community because it is a path to gun violence in our community, particularly in the gang context.

A criminal street gang's mission is to inflict violence on their arrival gang members.

Now, when you introduce ghost guns and the ability to access those ghost guns, that heightens the danger to the community because out of necessity, that street gang's rivals will need to arm themselves to protect and inflict violence on their rivals.

And it naturally results in an arms race between conflicting and rival gangs.

And the community really is at risk at whole by having violent criminal street gang members armed with firearms.

The other challenge with Ghost Suns is we really lack significant enhancement and stricter punishments for them.

Locally here within the world of misdemeanors, the conduct is already proscribed due to the action of this council, which is a great thing.

But there's still a need for more significant consequences to hold offenders accountable when it comes to the possession and use of ghost guns.

The call to action is really at the state legislature level for felony enhancements and filly prescription of that conduct.

The DA's office does a number of things in terms of preventing gun violence and holding offenders accountable, and I think holding offenders accountable is traditionally what we think of our office doing.

I'd like to talk to you about two significant prosecutions that our office had.

In 2024, we had a significant conviction in the case of people versus Hans Nanduka.

At the time of this defendant's crimes, he was on felony probation for carjacking with a knife.

And while he was on this probation, he attempted to rob an AMPM convenience store.

He was wearing a mask and he was armed with a ghost gun.

And he shot the clerk during the robbery several times in the stomach.

The clerk was hospitalized, hospitalized for several weeks, but miraculously survived.

The defendant was not immediately apprehended and went on to commit or attempt to commit another robbery with that same ghost gun from employees at a local Mexican restaurant.

He was apprehended immediately after that, and he was prosecuted, and he was sentenced to 30 years prison as a result of his crimes.

Also significantly in 2025, we obtained a conviction in people behind Gonzalez.

This particular defendant used a ghost gun when he open fired on seven separate victims during a 90-minute shooting spree throughout Spring Valley in Canto and Bay Terraces.

This resulted in the murder of one individual and the injuring of three other people.

And he was sentenced to 86 years to life.

These cases highlight the district attorney's office great prosecution work and protecting the community and holding offenders accountable.

But in addition to that, we do a lot more.

We make great efforts in trying to remove firearms and guns from the community off the street.

We participate in countywide gun safety events.

I will informally call them gun buybacks.

We have been doing this since 2021.

There are five or six events a year, and in these buyback events, individuals can anonymously bring their firearm to the event, and they can obtain a 100 gift card in exchange for their firearm.

And if they are turning an assault rifle, they would receive a $200 gift card.

The San Diego Sheriff's Department and the San Diego Police Department are really the host agencies due to their ability to house and store the firearms that are turned in.

But when they're held in local areas, for example, in South County, then those agencies such as Chula Vista Police Department and National Police Department were also partner.

Our office serves to work in this gun safety event by providing manpower at the actual event and providing staffing.

And we also contribute a significant number of gift cards to pass out of this.

And since 2021, when our office began involved, over 4,000 firearms have been turned in.

And so that's a great thing to have these firearms off the street and out of our community so that they're not stolen or obtained or used.

Another way in which we work to get guns off the street is that we engage with our law enforcement partners for long-term operations.

Most recently, in early last year, you may have heard about our operation called Los Impuestos, that was a six-month undercover operation with the San Diego Police Department, our office, the DEA, and the ATF.

And in that operation, it was revealed that Mexican Mafia members were using a vast network of local gang members throughout our county to extort local businesses, traffic drugs, traffic firearms, and intimidate witnesses, and commit acts of violence.

This operation, this long-term six-month undercover operation resulted in the arrest of 39 individuals associated with the Mexican Mafia and local gang members.

We recovered a number of weapons from this operation, 21 handguns, 23 rifles, four shotguns, and even two grenades.

In addition to weapons, we recovered a number of narcotics, such as 75 pounds of meth.

We recovered cocaine, over 59 pounds of fentanyl, and over 4,000 fentanyl pills.

So that's another way in which our office works and partners with law enforcement to get guns off our street.

The district attorney's office also believes that early intervention is important for gun violence prevention.

When we partner and work on a number of different programs in our community, one of them is called Families in Motion.

This is a collaborative program to help educate teens and their parents on issues confronting the teenagers in their life.

It is a four-week program, and the teen and their parent meet once a week at the school for two hours.

And there are a number of topics that are discussed that are most prevalent in that teen's life, which could be drug awareness, teen DV, mental health, and gang awareness.

During these meetings, there are additional resources offered to the family, such as housing, counseling, and attempts to address food insecurities.

We also are very proud of our juvenile diversion initiative.

This is run by our office, and it is diversion for juveniles that have never had a juvenile petition filed for our office.

We use this to assess the juvenile with a parent, and uh divert a diversion plan is established specific to that youth's needs, and that can involve individual counseling, family counseling, academic support, lived experienced mentors, pro-social activities, and what we believe is one of the most important parts of the dirt diversion program is our restorative justice aspect, where the youth can, if the victim of their crime is willing, meet with the victim to have an understanding of the impact of their conduct and develop empathy for their victim.

But if their victim is not wanting to participate, we have stand-in victims to still give the youth the same restorative effect that it would have if the victim was willing to.

It is a collaboration between the DA's office, the San Diego Police Department, and Restoring Citizens Program.

It's designed to curtail juvenile delinquency, diminish recidive recidivism rates, and provide viable alternatives to involvement in street gangs, substance abuse, and entanglement with the criminal justice system.

It is a 12-week course.

There are 24 sessions.

And the classes for Project Impact are about decision making, healthy communication, financial literacy, and conflict resolution.

It includes guest speakers, lived experienced mentors.

They help them with employment prep.

And there are other extracurricular activities involved in it.

It can be sports and academic assistance and peer team building.

Individuals are referred to project impact, it's usually at the middle school level from the middle school, the school that identifies at-risk youth.

And we offer wraparound services for the youth's family.

At our care center, it's a community satellite office of the district attorney's office that provides community-based support for prevention and intervention services.

And so youth that is in Project Impact, we provide support for the adults and the families to help with job loss, food insecurities, anything else that needs to help that entire family, you know, work through whatever is happening.

For those that are unfamiliar with the care center, it's located at 12 North Euclid Avenue in National City.

And lastly, our office thinks that it's very important to support our community-based organizations.

Supporting our community is vital to gang intervention and the reduction of violence.

And we do that through our community grant program.

We have grant funds of up to 50,000 available.

And in the fiscal year of 2023 to 2024, we awarded 35 grants to organizations with community-based solutions that focused on community safety, uh, youth and family support, protecting vulnerable youth and victim support.

Because again, supporting our local communities and our community organizations is a great way for intervention and reduction of violence in our communities.

In conclusion, the district attorney's office mission is to pursue equal and fair justice for all and to build safe neighborhoods in partnership with the communities that we serve, holding violent offenders accountable, and early intervention is a critical component to that mission.

Thank you again for the opportunity to speak with you today.

I'm very proud of the work that our office does, and I'm happy to answer any questions on my office's behalf.

Thank you very much.

Uh fantastic presentation.

Thank you for your work.

Uh, we'll now open it up to public comment and then we'll take any council member comments or questions.

Thank you, Chair.

The public comment period for item four is now open.

Each speaker will have one minute to provide their comment.

We haven't received any speaker slips here in chambers.

So beginning the five-minute timer for all those in the virtual queue to indicate if they wish to comment, we will start with Andrea Ebbing.

Please unmute and begin.

Hi, Andrea Ebbing here.

I would love to have this on the record.

I would love to know why there was an arms case with Leo Hamill, who paid Summer Stefan 84,000 plus in her 460 forums, which are on SDvote.com.

He paid her 84,000 dollars but avoided jail time.

But Marco Garmo, our number two sheriff, went down for the same charges.

Why, if ghost guns are important, did she accept so much money through the San Diego Gun Owners Pack from Lenny McGill in his ghost gun case?

How about Dallas Marson, this Highway synagogue shooting?

How about the um I don't know, maybe 250,000 of tactical, quote unquote tactical events she says she pays for for the district attorney's office uh through her San Diego Gun Owners Pact, which she's filtering about eight or nine million dollars through.

Uh tons of defendants are paying her off.

She pays Michael Schwartz over 300,000 a year, as well as Wendy Hoffman, but she now she's paying her husband because they're caught.

Uh Summer Stefan and Jim Desmond have identical campaign transactions, Conathan Fletcher.

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

Blair Beekman, please unmute and begin.

Hi, thank you.

Uh Blair Beekman.

Thanks a lot for this item.

Um the Bay Area.

Uh the City of San Francisco with its old DA and uh Bay UASI, the UASI of the Bay Area work together uh to really come up with good ghost gun uh solutions that would uh prosecute uh corporate entities, mostly coming in from foreign places with ghost gun issues.

That was back in 2021 or so.

Um it was at the same time that the work you started doing with ghost issues in San Diego.

It'd be good for you guys to connect with each other, go over some old notes what you're doing so well or what you've done so well.

What you're doing so well or what you've done so well.

Um I'm very interested in how that we can really end the corporate uh import of ghost guns in California from that place.

You're talking about how do we deal with day-to-day kids and their issues.

Um thanks for your work on this item.

Good luck in continuing.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And Chair, this concludes comment for item four.

Uh thank you very much.

And um I'll turn over to my colleagues for any questions, and uh starting with counselor Campbell.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you for the presentation.

Uh it's it's critical work that your office and you are doing uh to prosecute these ghost gun cases.

Uh these untraceable firearms pose a serious threat to public safety and holding those who manufacture, sell or possess them is is essential to keeping our community safe.

I want to acknowledge the great work uh that our city has done under the leadership of our chair, Martin von Wilbert, who has just since I've been on council introduced many measures that have made it possible uh that we can bring ghost gun possession down and hopefully disappear.

Uh she has brought that forward.

Uh I helped out on the on the uh that one, and uh another one that she brought was to ensure that city contracted gun dealers must comply with state and federal gun laws.

And another one uh that I hope I helped at least a little bit with was trigger locks and gun safety storage, which was so important.

Um these these things have helped decrease the number of children uh hurt accidentally by gun accidents, which is one of the biggest killers of American children, unfortunately.

Uh so I I thank you for that, Chair, and and I know that you will continue to do that good work.

Um, just because we speak about proving people from gun violence doesn't mean we're anti-second amendment.

I myself used to teach shooting.

It was rifle shooting, I'm from Colorado.

Plenty of people I've known throughout my life have had to go out and get their meat for the winter by hunting.

So for some people, it's still very important to know how to shoot correctly.

When I taught safety was always first, and anyone who didn't follow safety were kicked out.

Uh fortunately had to kick out one ever from the class.

But nevertheless, I just want to point out that there was a federal assault weapons ban in place from Senator Diane Feinstein of California from 1994 to 2004.

And when I looked back through the computer to find out what all happened and how many shootings there were in those days, there were almost no school shootings.

There were almost no mass shootings.

And I think that's because of the assault weapons ban.

I think it's very important that we reconsider doing that.

We have lost way too many lives, lives, because that was that was allowed by the Republican Congress at the time to sunset in 2004.

Keeping people f from unnecessarily committing murder in a bizarre and horrible method is not anti-second amendment.

And people need to understand that.

And while I'm talking about the Second Amendment, very briefly, I'm gonna say that reading letters between Ben Franklin and his son that were written way back before the American Revolution, even.

This is what the Second Amendment grew from, because the British would not let our colonists have firearms or have safety precautions in case they should use them against the British.

And that's why the Second Amendment was placed in the Constitution.

That and to protect people's right to defend themselves.

And so don't take for granted that any politician who wants gun safety happens to be against guns.

No, it's not true.

I'm a doctor.

I'm against broad use of guns because of health, it's not safe.

And it kills children often just by accident.

So I want to thank our chair and all the work she does and you for all the work you've been doing.

And I I just I can't thank you enough and think of all the thousands and hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people saved in the United States by those who keep tabs on these people and get rid of ghost guns.

They should be banned from manufacture, banned from engine store nation.

So thank you so much.

And thank you, Chair.

Thank you, uh, Dr.

Jen.

And uh I also want to thank you for your work in the update and the partnership between the district attorney and the San Diego PD on getting ghost guns off the street.

Uh we did enact the first law in California banning the sale of untraceable ghost skins and the sale of the firearm precursor parts to try and help prevent guns from getting into the wrong hands.

And so uh I very much appreciate your holistic approach to gun violence convention, including restorative justice, intervening before people get guns, uh, but also getting guns out of the community and out of the wrong hands.

So I do have a question about um be trying as you said, prosecuting ghost gun possession is very difficult because nobody has well, most people don't have a receipt from the illegal gun dealer who sold it to them.

So how are you able to figure out where the parts of these weapons came from?

You know, are they sold by San Diego stores outside of the state stores?

How are you doing with the source of the guns?

I would say we see them a number of different ways, like I mentioned.

We saw where um there are undercover operations.

We saw that parts were brought in from out of state and being assembled here.

We do see them be assembled by 3D printers.

Um we do see uh parts being bought online and then assembled here.

Um we do our San Diego Police Department, as you're aware, does have a specific task force that targets a lot of the manufacturing, the distribution, and the selling.

And we really just partner with them in working on those cases and those prosecutions and and locating um all of those sources.

But it can be very challenging.

Got it.

Thank you.

Well, we're also happy.

I used to be a civil side um prosecutor, prosecuted businesses that broke the law.

So if you ever need uh the unfair competition allowed to go after a business that's selling illegal ghost guns, I'm happy to talk to our wonderful city attorney Heather Ferber, who cares deeply about this issue as well.

But just thank you so much for being here.

Thank you for your work.

Uh, we appreciate your partnership very much.

Thank you for having me.

Of course.

Okay.

All right, that brings us to our next item.

Um item three, where we're going out of order.

So, item three, uh Sarah, please introduce item three, which is our real-time operations center.

Thank you, Chair.

Real time's operations center.

And if you are watching on City TV or the live stream online, you can dial 1669-2545252.

And when prompted, input webinar ID 161-398-0144 pound.

Chair.

All right, thank you.

Please introduce yourself and let us know how much time you'll need for your presentation.

Uh Lieutenant Chris McAndrew, um, please proceed.

Okay.

Uh good afternoon, Lieutenant Chris McAndrew.

Um, here's talk about our real-time operations center.

I helped design and uh currently supervise that real-time operation center.

The concept of bringing information into a centralized area to make quick informed decisions dates back decades.

In 1965, NASA opened mission control Nerf Center for real-time American human space flight, that iconic room filled with multiple workstations, facing large monitors on the wall, established a coordinated data-driven approach to addressing real-time incidents.

This room would later serve as a model for future real-time centers throughout the country.

Forty years later, in July of 2005, NYPD opened the nation's first real-time crime center at a cost of around 11 million dollars.

Since then, there are estimated to be over 300 active real-time operation centers nationally.

Some real-time crime centers are agency specific, while others are built on regional partnerships, the combined resources such as staffing, funding, and technology.

Of the 10 largest cities in the nation, as shown on this chart, starting with the largest on top, San Diego was one of two that did not have a real-time operation center.

Los Angeles was the other.

Last year, LAPD opened their first RTCC, and in July of 2025, the San Diego Police Department Real Time Operations Center went live, joining the nine other largest cities in the nation on the stage of modern policing.

Real-time centers have been used by agencies for decades, and with advances in technology have become more obtainable.

These centers enhance informed decision making, support officers in the field, and streamline investigations.

And locally, we are not alone.

Our neighboring cities, such as Oceanside, Chula Vista, and the County Sheriff Office are all operating or building a real-time crime center.

The real-time operations center is located downtown at police headquarters and took about six months to build.

In total investment to build the center was just under $90,000.

Of that, over half of the center's funding came from private donors through the San Diego Police Officers Foundation.

Our center is equipped with eight workstations, a conference space, and a large video wall and has access to new stations, allowing officers to stay informed about what's happening not just locally but nationally.

The video wall, which jumps out at most people when they enter the center, allows everyone working on an event to see the same information and enables supervisory staff to see what is happening in real time.

This wall eliminates confusion within the center during critical events by ensuring everyone sees the same information.

This wall also provides a citywide operational overview of the department's staffing, calls for service, and where resources are being utilized.

The RTOC is a technology focused unit.

As such, we are committed to ensuring that all technology utilized in the center is in compliance with the city's trust ordinance.

Understanding what technology is available to the department, we are able to optimize its use.

For example, prepared 911 allows officers in RTOC to listen to calls for service as they come in.

This gives them the ability to start working on emergency calls before they are even dispatched to our officers in the field.

Utilizing existing police databases, such as our own report management system or Argis, officers in the center are able to quickly conduct records checks and provide pertinent information to officers while they are responding to calls for service.

Some of this information could include whether a suspect has a warrant, if weapons are registered to the suspect or the house, whether police have responded to the location in the past.

This information allows officers to make informed decisions while responding, such as if they need more resources and what type of resources are appropriate.

Real-time access to video feeds from the department's helicopter and drones gives officers in the center a real-time view of what is happening on critical incidents.

This allows officers in the center to respond quickly to unfolding events or identify potential issues.

ALPR and Smart Streetlights provide real-time information that officers in the center can utilize to identify suspect vehicles based on victim or witness descriptions.

That information can be provided to the officers in the field, eliminating unnecessary police contacts.

Having trained officers in the center who understand how to use various technology systems enables us to provide the information field officers need to make more informed decisions and to support precision policing.

The mission of the San Diego Police Department's Real Time Operations Center is to provide support and expertise for the department's patrol and investigative units.

The goal is to enhance the safety of community members and police personnel through the strategic use of authorized technology and data.

The unit strives to increase the safety of officers as well as improve their situational awareness and efficiency by providing that information and analysis for incidents throughout San Diego.

And we have already seen success with the center.

Last year, a female was getting into her vehicle in Pacific Beach when she was approached by an armed suspect who stole her vehicle at gunpoint.

Utilizing this technology, a detective in the RTOC heard the 911 call come in and was able to immediately start working on the incident by accessing police databases to verify the information and enter the stolen vehicle's license plate into the department's ALPR hot list.

While officers were responding to Pacific Beach, the ALPR system alerted officers throughout the city that the recently stolen vehicle was in downtown.

Not just a different part of the city, but a different police division altogether.

Central division officers responded to the alert and took the suspect into custody and recovered the firearm.

The total time from when RTOC was made aware of the incident to the suspect's arrest was 30 minutes.

Historically, the vehicle wouldn't have been entered into the stolen vehicle system in that amount of time.

Officers would have been searching Pacific Beach for the suspect, can now respond to other calls for service in their division.

Since July of 2025, the real-time operations center has assisted with over 500 events throughout the city.

Support from RTOC varies from providing historical information on barricaded suspects, identifying potential suspects in assault with deadly weapon cases, or assisting and locating missing persons.

Two recent cases involve a felony hit and run and an assault with a deadly weapon.

On December 19th, 2025, a pedestrian was struck while walking in a marked crosswalk by a white SUV.

The vehicle fled the scene immediately following the collision.

Responding officers arrived to find the victim unconscious and suffering from serious injuries.

The real-time operations center promptly reviewed nearby smart streetlight footage.

Using this footage in combination with the ALPR database search, the RTOC detective was able to positively identify the suspect vehicle.

That information was quickly disseminated to officers in the field, and within hours, the suspect vehicle was located and the driver was taken into custody for felony hit and run.

On November 13th of 2025, the real-time operations center was monitoring police traffic when officers were dispatched to a reported violent assault with a rock.

The suspect fled the scene in a vehicle, and a witness was able to provide the call taker with a vehicle description and a partial license plate number.

Using the limited vehicle information available, RTOC conducted a search of the ALPR system and identified the suspect vehicle in the immediate area.

This information was relayed to responding officers via police radio.

Officers located the suspect vehicle and took the suspect into custody again within 30 minutes of this violent attack.

The suspect was positively identified by witnesses and arrested for assault with a deadly weapon, in addition to an outstanding warrant for battery.

The real-time operations center allows us to see the full picture in real time, make better informed decisions, and respond with precision.

It enhances officer and community safety and streamlines our investigations.

This center has helped us address staffing shortages by utilizing technology.

We can free up officers by conducting detailed records checks while they are on scene, identify suspects, coordinate resources, and have the ability to collect and impound evidence.

Over the last several months, the center has become a hub of activity for patrol officers and investigators.

We have used it to link series-related cases, identify wanted suspects and flyers, and connect investigators throughout the city.

This is the foundation of modern policing.

Moving forward, we will evaluate new technology and see how it can best serve our department in the city to keep us on the cutting edge of policing.

Thank you very much, Lieutenant, um, for the great presentation.

Now I'll take any public comment on this item.

Thank you, Chair.

We've not received any speaker slips here in chambers, so I'll move to the virtual queue.

Each speaker will have one minute.

We will begin testimony with Andrea Ebbing.

Please unmute and provide your comment to item three.

And before I begin, there's not anybody commenting.

So is that can we have two minutes?

Because I don't understand why it's one.

Each speaker will have one minute.

Please begin.

Okay, could you restart it then?

Because it's kind of restart it.

We each speaker will have one minute, so we've paused your time, but we're gonna start it when you begin speaking at 52 seconds.

Please begin.

Perfect.

All right, San Diego Police Department, what a powerful tool.

Great.

I wonder if you could have used that tool to reference things like I don't know, a CWS cross report of child abduction, uh, multiple DUIs.

So this is for one one of the perpetrators in my case.

I'm wondering if this uh system and like these technologies would find uh that a permanently suspended license when he abducted my daughters.

The CLEDAS system would have shown I had full custody and protection of my daughters, felony strangulation charges, cohabitant abuse with injury, poisoning, admitting to drugging my five-year-old daughter, but he kept his firearms and the kids.

And the rehab owner, the two guys awarded five million dollars, three open CWS cases, child abduction reported, fraud embezzlement, um, felony TV, attempted drug smuggling over the US Mexico border, um, and Jenny Stillman's death investigation all disappeared from all systems.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Blair Beekman.

Please unmute and begin.

Hi, I totally back uh Andrea's words.

Uh I think there should at least be a minute 30.

If you can add an additional 30 seconds to my comment and remaining comments, public uh that'd be really nice of you.

Uh we deserve it if this for this set of items.

Uh, like I've been uh offering previously, Oakland is leaving their flock program uh for a new AOPR vendor.

They are working toward a better principled process in the future, and one where uh you know their local area can have more control.

Um, I hope in all this this is domain awareness center issues that we want to practice well-principled things.

Argus is going through a beginning uh overview by its uh committees and you know and its board of directors.

Um, we need to practice well-principled uh ideals when we're dealing with data collection and these sort of things.

The check is really important, but how we use that tech, how we have policies with that tech.

I hope this data center wants to work with the community towards best practices.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And Chair, this concludes testimony for item three.

All right, thank you very much.

Um, and thank you to everyone who commented.

Uh I recently received a tour as many of the council members did.

I know everyone was offered to come in to see the real-time operations center, and I appreciate very much uh the work you've done to make sure we comply with all state local uh count regulations, including the trust ordinance, including SC54.

Um, it's very important that we do comply with all state and local laws.

So thank you for your diligence in that.

Um, and it's also been pretty incredible to see how quickly we can uh everhend violent criminals.

Um, this is not used 24-7, correct?

This is only used as an when we can staff an admitted basis.

That is correct.

Right now we have uh one team that's um in the center, so it's operational about 40 hours a week.

Okay, got it.

Um I very much appreciate the fact that you're able to work with different departments to resolve a critical incident.

You know, when I was in there, I saw a rotating picture, which was an example, thank goodness, of a large structure fire, huge building on fire.

And so, for example, how are you able to work with our uh fire department and other departments if that were to happen?

Yeah, if we have uh large-scale incidents, we're able to quickly coordinate with them.

Um if we need to activate our um any next level uh or like our DOC or anything like that, we're already we're tapped into them.

We can get them that information, they can get it a lot more quickly.

Um so we are connected to our watch commander's office, which is an open line of communication uh with our fire departments or neighboring agencies.

So we we build those relationships and we we partner a lot with that.

Okay, got it.

And just to reiterate um again, to make sure we always have to reiterate this nothing in the R Talk is violating the Values Act or cooperating with integration enforcement whatsoever.

No, it absolutely not.

Okay, correct.

I mean, just in these times, we have to reiterate that this is not ever going to be used in violation of California law.

So I appreciate you very much.

Um seeing no questions or comments from my colleagues, uh, we very much appreciate the presentation and your work to keep people safe.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you very much.

Uh this will bring us to item five.

Sarah, please introduce item five.

Thank you, Chair.

Informational item number five is the intervention services team presentation.

And if you're watching on the live stream or online and you'd like to call in to speak, please dial 1669-2545252 inputting webinar ID 1613980144 pound.

Chair.

All right, thank you very much for being here.

Uh please introduce yourselves and let us know how much time you'll need and uh proceed.

Hello?

Yeah, press the Hello, my name is Steve Shabloski.

I'm the captain of neighborhood policing division for San Diego Police.

Uh 10 minutes.

Actually, here we go.

Okay, thanks.

Uh good afternoon, Council members.

Today I'm here to give an overview of the San Diego Police Department Neighborhood Policing Division's intervention services team.

The team was formed in the fall of 2024 to build on the success the success and drive of single officer Dave McGowan.

Officer McGowan has been and continues to be a dedicated officer who is driven by his compassion for people who are struggling with serious substance abuse addiction and or serious mental health issues.

Officer McGowan understood that he was often the single critical conduit that connected San Diego police with some of our most vulnerable members of society who needed services that could realistically mean the difference in life or death for them.

However, as diligently and effectively as Officer McGowan worked to connect these individuals who in a who are in a variety state of crisis, he was the lone officer on the department doing the critical work, and as such, his efforts were limited by his singularity.

Coupled with these individual struggles was the reality that many of them were having a disproportionate and negative impact on the community by their inordinate consumption of public safety and emergency health services and resources.

Since Chief Wall became the chief of San Diego police, there has been a renewed emphasis on tackling some of the core challenges of chronic homelessness that negatively affect our city.

It is well known that serious substance abuse disorder and untreated mental illness are core driving factors with our chronically homeless population.

So crafting a compassionate yet firm approach to assist these individuals is a cornerstone to N NPD's approach on how we engage with these individuals.

In response to meeting these challenges head on, Chief Wall authorized neighborhood policing to expand on Officer McGowan's work by forming the intervention services team.

The goal was engaging earlier, more often and more effectively with members of our community that are struggling with severe substance abuse addiction and or mental health issues.

Next slide, please.

The intervention services team was expanded from one officer to now consisting of one sergeant and four officers.

A scale in that is proven to be a force multiplier, which is built on the work done by so for so long by a single officer.

The intervention services team has taken the lead for San Diego Pedia on partnering with a variety of public and private entities like City of San Diego's homeless strategies and solutions department, the county's health and students health and human services agency, the San Diego Fire Department's RAP, the resource access program, Lyft with life-saving intervention for treatment, the city attorney's office, Jewish Family Services, Turn to Recovery, McAllister Institute, Father Joe's Villages, various local hospital networks, and many others.

As a result, the intervention services team has increased our capacity and effectiveness to do good for those struggling with severe drug and or alcohol addiction and those suffering from serious mental health issues, as well as decreased the negative impact felt by the community.

These efforts have resulted in achievements on a human level that are nothing short of remarkable, and on a resource level that could not have been better timed given the staffing and budgetary challenges we as a city presently face.

One of the clearest examples of our impact involves a homeless individual who had been cycling in and out of the criminal justice since 2018.

Over a six-year period, this individual has been arrested a staggering 163 times, primarily for low-level narcotic and quality of life violations that the result of hundreds of radio calls, get it done complaints, and officer observations.

Before the intervention services team was formed, situations such as these fell on patrol commands to handle.

This situation was seen as hopeless, frustrating, and ineffective by officers, members of the community, and the individual.

The result was a failed example of a chronic offender who cycled in and out of jail while taking officers out of service for hundreds of hours with really no progress.

However, the intervention services team, now led by Sergeant Kayla Evans, who has extensive experience as one of our homeless outreach sergeants, focused on building on Officer McGowan's innovative model of consistent engagement, trust building, and coordination with treatment providers and behavior health experts.

As a result, they are finally able to break that cycle.

This person has now remained out of custody for months, is actively participating in treatment, and has become one of our strongest examples of how focused, team-based work can change what's once seemed impossible.

I would like to share a couple other success stories with you.

The next success story surrounds an individual that took a lot of patience, hard work, and expertise.

However, sadly, this was not an isolated incidents.

For example, in 2024 alone, we had four individuals who were responsible for 927 calls to 911 prior to intervention.

At a conservative estimate of $650 per call, this number of calls will translate to $602,550 in cost to the city and countless hours on an already strained police and fire services.

After coordinated efforts by the intervention services team, Lyft, and the San Diego Fires RAP team, the calls for 911 by that same group was reduced to 92, a difference of 835 calls to 911 or a fiscal savings of 542,750 and countless hours of reduced strain on our city's EMS resources.

Another example involved a person who has a high utilizer of the 91 system, and in fact was the top repeat caller to the 911 in the city.

Every time the police or fire responded, the person ended being transported to a local hospital.

Over several months, our team collaborated with RAP, Lyft, and the City Attorney's Office to address the situation holistically.

After analyzing the data, we found that police and fire responses, this one individual cost the city an estimated quarter of a million dollars, not including hospital costs, reduced access for hospital emergency rooms, and delays in emergency transportation for the general public.

Through consistent follow-up, exploring every possible avenue of treatment and coordinating with all partners, including a critical role by RAP and the city attorney's office, we were able to obtain a conservatorship.

This not only provided the care of this person desperately needed, but also alleviated a massive financial and operational burden on the city's emergency services.

And on that note, I want to recognize these two individuals who work with RAP, who are our partners in this who showed up today.

So we could not do this alone, and just the collaboration between the city attorney's office, the fire department, and the RAP is certainly recognized, and we're grateful.

For a final story, let me tell you about a person we helped who struggled with the most prevalent issue for many persons experiencing homelessness.

Chronic alcohol and our drug abuse.

Officers from the intervention services team were alerted to an individual suffering from chronic alcoholism who become a familiar face with both police and fire.

They struggled deeply with addiction and frequent emergency contacts for intoxication.

Applying a comprehensive team approach, intervention services made it a priority to build trust and rapport with this individual.

Our efforts worked, and despite multiple relapses, this individual recognizing the persistence and honest intention of the officers, recognized, excuse me, reached out to us for help each time.

We responded with compassion, ranging for straight transport to hospitals or the recovery bridge center and connected them with residential treatment programs multiple times over several months.

Proud to share that this person has now successfully completed their last program.

They moved back to their home state to be closer to the family and has maintained sobriety, stable employment, and housing.

This story and others like them are kind of the long-term change that demonstrates the true impact of the work done by the dedicated officers of the intervention services team, not just for one person but for entire families and communities.

As San Diego PD and NPD look forward and deeper into 2026, we see the intervention services team as an integral part of our enforcement and outreach strategy.

We have since been able to move Officer McGowan to an acting sergeant position on our homeless outreach team.

This has allowed our HOT and Intervention Services team to communicate and work together more effectively as there is a direct link between the teams and considerable experience in the supervisory position of both teams as intervention services sergeant Kayla Evans, as I mentioned, was one of our former uh homeless outreach sergeants.

And this collaboration with NPD has also grown department wide.

As for the past year, every new officer on San Diego police comes through neighborhood policing for a period of three months.

Once there, they gain valuable experience and knowledge on how to interact with our homeless members, our members of the homeless community in a in an effective manner.

This includes not only to help enforce laws related to quality of life violations, narcotics, and other offenses related to homelessness, but also learning how to interweave enforcement with our homeless outreach and intervention services team in a firm and compassionate way.

This experience allows every officer on San Diego PD to gain valuable understanding on what resources and tools are available when addressing homelessness throughout the city that not only increases their effectiveness but also minimizes misunderstandings.

Thank you for your time and questions.

Fantastic.

Thank you so much for this great update, uh especially the amount of money that we can be saving by actually helping people with what they need.

But I will open it up to a public comment first.

Thank you, Chair.

We've not received any speaker slips that you're in chambers.

So I'll begin the five-minute timer for all those to indicate if they wish to provide comment on item five.

Each speaker will have one minute.

We will begin testimony with Northern Division.

Northern Division, please unmute and provide your comment.

I apologize that I came in as Northern Division.

I'm Catherine Douglas, and I'm a member of the uh general public.

Uh, as someone who's been on three ride-alongs with um under um Captain Shlbowski's department.

Um, I saw compassion, I saw effectiveness, I saw organization, and this team is a perfect example of investing a little bit of money in something and saving a lot of money along with helping people.

Thank you very much to everybody and NPD for this amazing work.

Thank you for your comment.

Our next speaker is Andrea Ebbing.

Please unmute and begin.

Hi, this is Andrea Ebbing.

The effective the effective rate of uh effectiveness rate of rehab is like five percent.

Everybody that goes in there is body brokered.

Um, everybody's getting kickbacks for the placement of these people in this rehab program.

I would like this on the record.

I want the specifics on the program.

I want to know the names of the sergeants and the police officers involved in the program, and who are many others.

We need to know specifics on the agencies you're working with.

We know you're taking kickbacks.

We know lots of people are taking kickbacks right now.

It's an exploitation of the Affordable Care Act through these rehab facilities who are money laundering, insurance um fraud brokering, body brokering.

Uh, for example, Kayla Evans got uh $37,000 in other pay and $20,000 in overtime in 2024.

The other officer got $28,000 in other pay in 2024 and $56,000 in overtime.

It's on Transparent California.

You can organize by other pay.

It's not pension benefits, regular pay, it's or overtime.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Blair Beekman, please unmute and provide your comment.

Hi, thank you, Blair Beekman.

Uh, thanks a lot for this item.

Thanks for all the public comment on this item.

Also, um, boy, in living in uh the Bay Area the past uh four or five months now.

I got a really important lesson and a reminder of the good work that the city and people of Oakland do towards what you're talking about with this item today.

I mean, I was so geared on talking about flock and technology.

I just it was so nice reminder that I mean in Oakland they really tried to build community policing with people.

I mean, more to an extent uh than what this item offers.

They really want their uh mental health services to be handled by people outside of law enforcement as much as possible.

This item itself, it sounds really good, and it's off to an important uh start in that uh with you know new mental health and uh addiction uh rules coming down from the state level.

Uh the you have an incredibly important role in this job.

Good luck that we're we offer humanity and and work on it better and better.

Uh thank you.

Thank you for your concluding remark.

And Chair, this concludes testimony for item five.

Thank you very much.

Um, and I'll turn over my colleagues for comments or questions being with Council Recample.

Thank you very much.

Thanks for the presentation.

Thanks for all the work you guys do.

You know, I've I've been here little more than seven years now, and it's amazing how much progress we've made uh in this particular area.

It's so difficult to figure out a way to make this work, and and it looks like you really have.

And I so appreciate it.

Uh, this mental health crisis in our streets is one of the most pressing challenges that we all face.

And so I'm so happy to hear about the sergeant for officers, two per clinicians to human uh health and human services agency specialists working together uh to provide this care and support our most vulnerable residents.

And this is uh why I'm gonna call on our county partners to help us.

We in the city did a conservatorship program law many years ago, a year before the state even did it.

And we got no help at all from the county.

They're the ones in charge of health and human services, they are the ones in charge of the guardianship conservatorship program, and we need their help with the court process, et cetera.

And we want we want to thank them for starting to step up, and we want to encourage them to continue to work with us so that we can save uh people in the street who are sick and need help, and save our agencies all throughout the city and county.

All the money as you have represented, it saves tremendous men money to provide this help to individuals, and it saves the individual most importantly.

So thank you so very much.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Thank you, Councilman Whitburn.

Thank you, Chair.

Uh thank you for the informative presentation here.

I really uh appreciate it, appreciate all the work um that SDPD does to uh address some of the uh challenges uh that we see on the streets, uh certainly the and NPD and um the intervention services team, RAP, just really appreciate all the work.

Uh and I will say it's hard work.

Um I mean you know that better than I do, but you're dealing in many cases with a population that uh has profound challenges, uh, may not be looking forward to interaction.

Um so uh thank you for taking that on.

And I'm really pleased that folks as they uh uh come out of the academy are getting exposure to uh that that experience.

And thank you for sharing the uh success stories.

You're obviously helping to turn lives around while at the same time reducing the number of calls from people who have historically called PD all the time.

Uh and of course had freeze-up officers for other calls.

I'm interested in some of the mechanics of this.

Um how are people selected in terms of those that you uh engage with uh with the uh the team?

Are are you actively looking at who the high users of the system are, or are you targeting people based on not targeting, but interacting with people based on you know the profound challenges they face who by default are high users, or how are you choosing who gets this service?

Wonderful question, council member.

I actually have Sergeant Cale Evans here and Officer Dave McGowan, who can actually give I think the best boots on the ground perspective.

Sergeant Evans, would you like to respond, please?

Or Dave.

Hi, good afternoon.

I apologize.

I'm fighting a cold, so I might have David help me out here.

Um it comes from different sources.

We work very closely with the rap team who might bring someone to our attention with community members, um, a lot of other officers who know and understand what our team does.

They'll approach us and say, Hey, I have someone who you know you might be interested in, you know, see if we can work with them.

Um it really it just depends.

It comes from everywhere.

Sure.

Uh we have advocates in the community that we've worked with who've heard what we do, and they'll have a friend of a friend who will send us an email saying, I need help, I have a son who is schizophrenic, or is you know A, B, and C.

It just kind of depends.

And we'll evaluate it and see if see if it's someone that we can um assist.

And we try to explore every avenue.

I have a team of very compassionate officers who are very experienced, and they've worked a lot in our community in different divisions throughout the city, and so it's oftentimes they're aware of these people because they've arrested them in the past or they've contacted them in the past.

So um a lot of it comes from their experience as well.

Lots of referrals from different places then.

So are you dispatched to address a specific instance or how how do you No, it's it's through contacts with like I said, with the community and everything.

We don't get dispatched to anything.

We're a proactive team that um it's brought to our attention, and we'll kind of explore our options and see if it's something that we can assist with.

Okay.

But it's through word of mouth, basically.

We and we get calls from a variety of sources as well.

Um we'll have clients that will call us themselves.

Uh one of the examples, the severe alcoholic.

Um, every time he relapsed or drank or was kicked out of a program, would call us directly and ask for our help.

And we would respond that way.

But it's it's done very objectively.

Um, and like Sergeant Emman says uh we get a lot of referrals from the patrol officers who just keep responding to the same individuals in the same activity over and over and over again.

Excellent.

Lots of bang for the buck on this program.

Uh last question, then do you are you out there every day, or how often um is the team in service?

Yeah, we are Monday through Thursday, but we often do work extra, depending if we have a case that we want to address, we will come in and over the weekend and help out.

We're on call 24-7.

So we do um hospital pickups if we need to, or we'll coordinate with our partners here.

Um if they need help with something, we will roll out.

If I may, if I may add, council member.

Um I truly believe in my 30 years of law enforcement, the most patient officers on this department work, or two of them right here in front of us.

They really deal with some of our folks.

Like you look at the gentleman that arrested a hundred and sixty-three times.

That's not good for anybody involved.

And the amount of patients that goes into, but these are the experts, and I think one of the best things we have is that force multiplier of having all the new officers come through neighborhood policing, neighborhood policing, homeless outreach, and the intervention services is almost like homeless outreach on steroids.

They really deal with our most difficult folks that honestly I believe if they did not get involved, these are the individuals that we're gonna find, you know, dead on the streets, or their families are so frustrated and long on they don't know what to do.

So the impact not only on that individual, their family, the community around.

Um, like the gentleman they got, the the gentleman that was suffering from chronic alcoholism, they just we're not just about putting people on a bus and send them away.

It's we want to put them with the tools where they can impact their community in a positive way.

So that word of mouth, whether it's coming through the fire department, through emergency room visits, it's how can we free up ambulances, free up officers where they're able to go to other true emergencies and take a more holistic long-term approach that benefits these people outside of the criminal justice system.

That's excellent.

I really appreciate the intensive intervention with some of these really challenging cases.

Uh you mentioned, you know, conservatorship can sometimes be an option.

Uh, you know, I have uh district that has a lot of freeways going around, and it just it's so upsetting every time when you know folks they don't know where they are and they wander out out of the freeway and you know get hit, and and that's that.

And uh, you know, by the work that you're doing, you can help prevent some of that and and get people to do a better place before something bad happens.

So thank you very much.

Really appreciate what you do and appreciate the presentation this afternoon.

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you.

Um thank you very much.

And this is incredibly hard work you're doing.

Uh, we read the story in the UT in the fall, uh, highlighting the excellent work that you're doing to get people back on their feet um and and away from this 911 rotating system.

So I just really appreciate all the work you've done.

I do have a couple of questions.

Um, and I'm I'm very familiar with MPD, and I'm glad that everybody is going through MPD when they become an officer.

And one of them was how we identify people.

Um our dispatchers, you know, who are getting the 911 calls or our fire police dispatch, do they also identify who the frequent callers are?

Yes, they do.

Okay.

I figured they're probably hearing the same stories all the time.

Um I do think it can be a little tricky because you do get different dispatchers that sometimes end up right there, but what happens is that person gets identified, and whether it's through rap, through the officers beat knowledge, through the the same emergency room, because they have a tendency to frequent the day marriage, it ends up sifting back, but it's not always necessarily at the front of it in the nine-won't call, but definitely by the back end.

Okay, perfect.

Um I have a question about how you've been interacting with Care Court.

You know, since Care Court was first launched in the county of San Diego, um, one of the issues we wanted to try and tackle was you know, one of your examples was the highest utilizer of 911 system in the city.

And the result was they got an LPS probate conservatorship, which of course the county must intervene in.

We do not have jurisdictions of the city.

So, how has it been with Care Court?

Have you been able to find success there, or does that need tweaking or reform on this CREP?

No, uh our experience with CARECORT was a little disappointing.

And um there's inherent flaws with it when um it was uh sort of narrowed down from its original uh concept all the way to schizophrenia, and then they took away the involuntary off-ramp and made it voluntary only.

Severe schizophrenia and voluntary just don't go together.

And so um, in anticipation of Care Court coming on board, we already had a handful of patients that we just knew were perfect candidates.

They they had insight into their mental health, knew they needed help, they wanted help, and we believe they would be good candidates, but unfortunately the the program failed.

It didn't, they none of them were accepted.

Uh they were deemed either unable or unwilling to participate in a care plan.

Um so we had to find alternatives.

And thankfully at the time we had our lift program, life-saving intervention for treatment, where we we were able to leverage the probate court, get that individual onto a conservatorship.

And I actually just got an email two days ago from her mother saying she's doing well still, she's at a new place.

Here's a picture of her and her sister.

Um, and so we we utilize conservatorships as a life-saving measure and a last resort.

Um we always say that you know, our teams are only you know, the hot team and intervention services, we're only limited by the resources that exist in the community.

And with our partnerships with with RAP and uh Health and Human Services and everybody else.

When we exhaust every possible option, and someone is not getting stable, um, they're declining, then um conservatorship was a tool that we would use to get them stable.

Uh it's never meant to be permanent.

Um, just a way to sort of force the government to meet their needs and save their lives.

Got it.

Thank you.

I too have read those stories in the news that care court was not implemented the way that a lot of families thought it would be.

Um, so noted for our friends in Sacramento.

Um, and also I I know our folks from the rap team are here, so I do have a question for for you all as well.

Uh you know, one of the things we were talking a lot about was uh you know street medicine, things that we can do to give people care on the street that don't require hospitalization that could you know potentially for hip uh prevent a hospitalization, another ER visit or a jail visit.

And so are you able to perform any degree of street medicine at this time, or do you need more resources?

We actually provide a lot of street medicine care.

Um we just hired our third physician assistant onto onto wrap.

And so um the San Diego Fire Department's wrap team primarily does street medicine, um, and we're a free service, like we don't charge for it, it's all free, um, which is like it's it's amazing.

And so most of the treatment that we provide is surrounding substance use and severe mental illness, right?

Anything that has a psychotic feature to it, so bipolar schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder.

Um, but we are really like the the front-facing primary team in the city that does long-acting injectables routinely for these medications because the oral tolerance of a patient with severe schizophrenia, like Dave was talking about, is so poor.

The best medication for them is the one that they're taking.

And so we will try an oral tolerance with this medication, and then once we have enough rapport built with this patient, we will transition them to an injectable form of that medication, which is good for 30, 60, 90 days, and we see like 180 degree turnarounds with these patients.

Um, one of our patients I was presenting on today at um our continuing education for the fire department, he was living in North Park behind an autozone, had severe COPD, um, severe mania, and was very, very aggressive, smoking lots of stimulants.

And so, with the help of these long-acting injectables, he was able to connect the dots between his stimulant use disorder and the amount of times that he's transporting via EMS to the hospital for his COPD.

Now he just signed a lease for his own apartment, like last week.

It's crazy.

He was like top five caller in the city, right?

Um, because of these medications, because of the street med that we do, and it's not limited to those injections like I was talking about.

We do inhalers and um spentanyl test strips and suboxone on the street, and like everything that's just like, hey, are you ready for treatment?

If they say yes, like I want to have it in my back pocket, I want to decrease the amount of barriers to say like, oh, let's prescribe it, and then it's at this pharmacy, it's gonna cost 10 bucks.

Like they're we're just I want to limit the amount of ways that they can say no.

So if you say yes, like let's do it right now.

Um so I would say that we are doing street medicine.

I would love it if we had a bigger team because we could do even more street medicine.

That would be amazing.

Um, but yeah, like we we're doing it.

That's fantastic to hear, especially as somebody who you know wasn't able to care for themselves living behind a car tire shop and are now signing their own lease.

I mean, that's this is the kind of success stories we want to hear.

And I just want to thank you all very very much for your work.

I know you are still underfunded, understaffed, and we are working on that as a city.

Um, but you know, this is very helpful, especially in terms of the budget savings it provides to everybody uh and the help it actually provides evil because calling 911 a thousand times a year, literally almost a thousand times a year, uh, doesn't help anybody.

And so I just really appreciate the work you're doing.

Um we at City Hall really appreciate the work you're doing and know that we'll continue to push to get you the resources you need.

And thank you very much for and for being out of the field today.

All of you here in uniform had to be out of the field to be here today to share this with the public.

So we just appreciate you taking the time to educate everybody and know that you have our support.

So thank you.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

That uh brings us to the end of our agenda, and now we will take knowledge and public comment.

Um second.

Thank you.

Um the council members respect and appreciate the public's input and are fully committed to protecting every participant's free speech rights at council and committee meetings.

Sarah, please proceed with public comment.

Thank you, Chair von Wilpert.

Per Rule 2.7, non-agenda public comment is an opportunity for members of the public to comment on items that are not on the agenda but are within the subject matter jurisdiction of this committee, and each speaker will have two minutes.

I'll begin the five-minute timer since we've received no speaker slips here in chambers.

So we'll start with virtual testimony.

Andrea Ebbing, please unmute and provide your non-agenda public comment at this time.

Hi, it's Andrea Ebbing, and I just want to ask that this is on the record.

I think today we've we have uh heard quite a few really unfortunate truths.

But there is a duty to kind of like follow through on the information that's provided.

It's valid, it's real, it's only from credible sources like our registrar and uh, you know, uh SDvote.com, uh transparent California.

There is absolutely malfeasance taking place.

Um, and it just kind of can't be hidden anymore.

Like uh entire swathes of people are just kind of being wiped out in general.

Like, you know, we're hearing from the Jewish community, we're hearing from Encanto, we're hearing from victims of violent crimes and like the homeless, and it is just like unbelievable, but we all know what's going on.

Like it's pretty clear.

So I'm just asking that the information that's that's been provided is is looked into.

We have a new director for the uh commission of police practices.

We need a thorough audit of uh our dis.

Oh my gosh.

That is a an absolutely uh critical system that is being manipulated in all the wrong ways.

And um the the numbers that were shown to us at Sandag for like the uh the flocks was either flock or argus, like almost identical polls for 2024 and 2025.

That is statistically impossible.

So it's just kind of like putting it up there like we're idiots.

Do you know what I mean?

Like it's like, are you serious?

And even somebody pointed to it, just I it just undermines our intellect, is all I'm saying.

It's really embarrassing.

And we can't trust the data that we're given as the employers of everybody at the table and everybody with a badge on.

We employ you guys.

Do you know what I mean?

We you're you're paid by our tax dollars so much more than everybody thinks.

They said 200.

It's more like 608, 63.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Our next speaker, Francine Maxwell, please unmute and begin.

Francine Maxwell, Southeastern San Diego resident.

I want to make sure that the council understands that as we prepare for Black History Month.

The San Diego police department just passed over a black man for the third time for a promotion.

As African Americans, we always have to be 10 steps ahead of everybody.

This African American man has two master's degrees, graduated from the FBI Academy, is loyal in and out to the uh uniform that he wears because this is a job that he sought as a community.

We celebrate and we appreciate of all those who are first responders.

But I want to make sure that you understand in the um just reverence of African Americans as we prepare.

Roulette Armstead.

I want you to Google that name if you're not familiar and you weren't blessed to meet her on this side and the things that she exposed our community to, the education that she walked us through.

Again, history continues to repeat itself with the San Diego police department internally, the turmoil, the officers that are watching people with one third of the experience get promotions because they are friends, because they are family.

We have to do better.

The city council has to demand better, and it would be nice to hold a hearing on a Friday at six o'clock when the working community can come and tell you what they're experiencing throughout San Diego, in between them working their two and three jobs that keep a roof over their head.

Again, as you're standing next to people, as you're signing things for Black History Month, I want you to consider the state of Black San Diego and how we have not improved with the city for all of us.

Thank you for your testimony.

Our next speaker, Blair Beekman.

Please unmute and begin.

All right, thank you, uh, Blair Beekman.

Really interesting meeting today.

Thank you.

Uh interesting way to have a spent a Friday.

It was it was really um helpful for myself.

Thank you.

All the agenda items.

Thank you for the words of Andrea Ebbing in that uh I'm in agreement.

Dumbing down uh the public meeting process, thinking the public is uh not intelligent.

It was really hurtful.

Well, people are really, I mean, they have serious ways to work on tech accountability.

Uh I'm a little bit lacking a bit.

I I hope my my second team attempts that really I I try to work on how we how do we talk to each other well?

How can we be honest and feel the process is safe and trusting?

We should not fear sharing our technology and that we can't share things.

Um, and I really want to work on that.

I've been trying to work on that here in San Diego.

Um, I hope we can continue to work on it.

The public is intelligent.

That's how you really build public safety, sharing an informed process for everyone.

Then you build true public safety, and people aren't going all over the place with lots and ideas.

So good luck in those sort of efforts.

Um considering going all over the place.

I hope our Trump administration does not once you start talking about war in Venezuela and Iran right now.

Obviously, from his first attempts at Venezuelan war, uh, we are obviously we're dealing with police and ICE agents who grew out of control.

They did not know how to handle themselves.

We're trying to address that now.

Good luck how we can be uh together.

Um, and I think that starts with uh not asking for war at the national and the international level.

And I think we can, and we have to develop ways to talk in those good terms.

Um I've mentioned flock issues.

I hope San Diego could be working on the flock, uh leaving flock the same as Oakland has done.

Um it's it's it's a well-principled idea.

We can work on good local terms.

It just takes practice from us.

Good luck.

We can talk about it.

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony.

The five-minute timer has concluded.

We have three hands remaining in the queue, and we'll take no other callers beyond these remaining three hands up.

Kathleen Lippett, please unmute and provide your testimony.

Thank you again for the opportunity to speak.

Protecting the innocent is an honorable endeavor, and public policies should target the behaviors causing the most harm to the innocent.

Actual science analyzes the death data to prioritize risk, and public policies should reflect those actuarials to make the most difference.

Gun deaths, especially involving children, are tragic, but they pale in comparison to drug-involved death and overdose.

In 2024, there were 80 over 80,000 drug overdose deaths, down from 110 in 2003 during COVID, 26% decrease.

But that's nearly three times more death than from gun violence, and six times greater than the number of firearm deaths.

It's 207 times greater than the number who died from mass shootings.

These stats are from CDC, NIDA, and the U.S.

Department of Justice.

Please rethink your support for increasing high potency marijuana products that being the drug abuse and addiction journey that begin the drug abuse and addiction journeys that end in tragedy.

And please reconsider continuing to waste taxpayer dollars on failed policies that do not reduce the target problem, but simply grow the bureaucracy that grows around it.

Thank you for letting me speak.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Peggy Walker.

Please unmute and provide your comment.

Thank you.

Umdose, uh, as a public health educator, I came to share warnings regarding trending use by teens as young as 13 of intoxicating nitrous oxide, also called NO, in retail products with fanciful names like galaxy gas.

In comments yesterday at a county's substance use and overdose prevention, DA narcotics chief James Fontaine and a UC medical expert attributed rising teen use to easy accessibility and cheap cost.

Teen use has resulted in an uptick in serious pediatric burn injuries, according to Eli Strait, nurse service manager at UC Health Burn Unit.

Strait said nitrous oxide burns sometimes require long-term hospitalization.

They occur when canister help between the thighs or in hands release gas onto the skin.

Fontaine said recreational nitrous oxide products can have a hundred and seventy times the concentration of nitrous oxide of that in grocery store whipped cream containers.

Each hit creates immediate craving for another, resulting in chronic dependence.

Fontaine called out social media for marketing in OS grape for parties, while JAMA reports a 578% increase in inner related deaths.

It also produces side effects like paralysis, nerve and brain damage, and incontinence.

DA Summer Steffen and Sheriff Kelly Martinez have issued previous safety warnings about nitrous oxides dangers, including three local fatalities.

So I urge you to support Fontaine's recommended recommended solution, a local ordinance prohibiting sale or distribution of recreation.

Thank you.

This does conclude your time.

Thank you for your testimony.

And the final speaker in the queue today is Madison Rapp.

Please unmute and provide your comment.

Hi, thank you.

Good afternoon, Public Safety Committee.

I also wanted to talk about some marketing and how business marketing can have a direct impact on the public safety in our community, especially when it comes to marijuana advertising.

Today, marijuana marketing is everywhere.

Billboards, storefronts, websites, and especially social media.

These ads often send the message that marijuana is harmless, healthy, or even good for you.

But research shows these messages are misleading and they disproportionately reach teens and young adults.

A recent review published in current addiction reports found that nearly half of teens in states where recreational marijuana is permitted report seeing marijuana marketing often.

These ads are not neutral.

Discounts and deals used by about 90% of retailers online make marijuana more appealing to young people.

Inside stores, between 35% and 74% of retailers in California were found to have advertising that appealed to youth using cartoons, flavors, younger looking models, and messaging tied to popularity or coolness.

Even more concerning is the health and wellness spin.

Over half of the ads used medical symbols, and many made unsupported claims about anxiety, sleep, pain, or depression, often without any warning about risks or side effects.

This lowers perceived harm and creates the false impression that marijuana is a safe solution rather than a mind-altering substance with real risks for developing brains.

From a public safety perspective, this matters.

When youth exposure increases, use increases, and that affects mental health, school outcomes, impaired driving, and long term well-being.

So please treat youth exposure to marijuana advertising as a public safety issue and strengthen the enforcement to protect our children.

Thank you.

Thank you for your testimony, and Chair, this concludes an odd agenda public comment.

All right, thank you very much for everyone for your participation today.

I will now adjourn the special meeting of the public safety committee to our next regularly scheduled meeting on Wednesday, February 11, 2026 at 2 p.m.

We are adjourned.