Strategic Plan

SFPD Strategic Plan

In late 2017, the San Francisco Police Department began developing an inclusive, forward-looking strategic plan that will ensure that the Department is ready and equipped to meet the challenges of modern urban policing and earn the trust and respect of our communities.

We began by taking a lay of the land, conducting interviews and reviewing documents from a broad peer set to understand best practices of leading public sector departments across the country. These insights informed both our strategic planning process and the outputs.

We also looked in the mirror, meeting face-to-face with more than 70 members (sworn and nonsworn) of the Department through focus groups and interviews to understand aspirations and challenges. In addition, we reviewed in-process initiatives, working groups, and strategic plans across the Department to understand current strengths and efforts. In parallel, a number of sessions focused on community policing were conducted that provided additional input on what the community expects from the Department now and in the future.

The strategic planning process was governed by both internal and external stakeholders in the form of a Steering Committee (comprising the Chief of SFPD, Assistant and Deputy Chiefs and Directors), an Internal Sounding Board (comprising Commanders and representatives of Police Employee Groups) and External Senior Advisors (comprising representatives from the community and the San Francisco Mayor’s Office). The output of our strategic process is a strategy statement and five strategic initiatives to drive the near-term priorities of the Department. These initiatives will encompass ongoing efforts, and help prioritize future initiatives.

SFPD Strategy Statement:

San Francisco Police Department stands for safety with respect for all. We will engage in just, transparent, unbiased and responsive policing; do so in the spirit of dignity and in collaboration with the community; maintain and build trust and respect as the guardian of constitutional and human rights.

SFPD’s 5 Strategic Initiative Clusters:

  1. Collaborate: Build strong partnerships with the community and City agencies for addressing community-wide challenges that impact “safety with respect”;
  2. Improve Responsiveness: Improve ability to respond in a timely, informed, unbiased and procedurally just way, and work towards a collaborative resolution;
  3. Measure and Communicate: Align on a shared vision and transparent way of measuring “safety with respect” in order to work better with each other and our community;
  4. Strengthen the Department: Instill “safety with respect” into how we organize, evaluate performance, recruit, train, promote, reward, deploy and lead the SFPD;
  5. Define the Future: Develop a future-focused, longer-term strategic plan (Strategy 2.0) for a more modern, evolving, and inclusive SFPD with input from internal and external stakeholders.

To learn more about San Francisco's Strategic Plan 1.0, please click here.

SFPD's Community Policing Strategic Plan

The department developed a Community Policing Strategic Plan that will guide department policy, training and daily operations while building trusting partnerships with the communities served in San Francisco. The plan details the vision, goals, and objectives with regard to communication, education, problem-solving, relationship-building, and department organization. To learn more about the department’s roadmap for ensuing that community policing values are integrated into all SFPD practices, please click here.