Manny's LIVE: A Conversation on Redirecting Funds from the SFPD

Manny's LIVE is bringing together the Supervisor Shamann Walton, the only black member of the SF Board of Supervisors, and Sheryl Evans Davis, the Executive Director of the Human Rights Commission to discuss how they are thinking about the process to redirect funds from the SFPD into the communities they are charged with protesting and serving.

The movement to "defund" the police has risen to the tip of national conversation. To some it's a call to substantially reduce or completely remove funding of the police force, to others it's a call to move certain funds and responsibilities away from the police and into community based organizations in the black community.

Mayor Breed and Supervisor Walton announced plans to do just that on June 4th but many questions remain:

1) How do you actually engage in the process of redirecting funds from the police?

2) Where should the funds go?

3) How should the roles and responsibilities of the police change in kind?

4) What does the interplay look like between the police, the city, the community serving organizations, and the people themselves?

5) How involved can and will the public be in this process?

The City has not figured out yet how this process will happen. We don't know that yet. This is a conversation about priorities and goals.

About Supervisor Walton:

Supervisor Shamann Walton was born in San Francisco and lived in public housing at an early age in Bayview and Potrero Hill. He has worked in District 10 neighborhoods for decades and has witnessed firsthand the challenges our community faces from long-time residents being pushed out of the city to losing childhood friends to violence and incarceration. As an accomplished and experienced community leader, Shamann has dedicated his life to improving these realities in our community and is committed to identifying solutions to our pressing issues. He has a proven track record of creating positive change in the community he serves.

As the former president and member of the San Francisco Board of Education, Shamann spearheaded the effort to close the achievement gap for Black, Latino, and special needs students and helped secure the funding for the school district's first African American Achievement and Leadership Initiative. He worked to protect undocumented students, decreased teacher turnover, increase graduation rates across the district for Black, Latino and Pacific Islander students, secured the financing and identified a site for our first affordable housing units for educators, and fought to make sure that Mission Bay will have its first school built in the next few years.

As the former Executive Director at Young Community Developers (YCD), Shamann worked vigorously to build close relationships with labor to provide job and career opportunities for residents and bring 100% affordable housing units to District 10. Under his leadership, YCD increased their annual budget by more than $10 million dollars and used those funds to better the lives of District 10 residents by placing them in jobs and careers, developing affordable housing, eliminating employment barriers and increasing education outcomes with credit recovery and tutorial services for students.

Shamann is passionate about quality public education, options for living-wage jobs, safer neighborhoods, affordable housing, support services for the homeless, and universal healthcare. As a member of the Board of Supervisors, he will strongly advocate for communities from low-income and working-class neighborhoods. He will also work to improve our schools, bring more jobs to the district, increase access to affordable housing, bridge relationships amongst all diverse communities, stop gun violence, and ensure we have safe open spaces.

Shamann is a proud father to his two adult children, Monique and Malcolm, who are both graduates of Bay Area public schools. He lives in the Bayview with his wife, Mesha, and his two stepsons--one who is a graduate of SFUSD and one who is currently in high school.

Shamann has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science from Morris Brown College and a Master’s Degree in Public Administration from San Francisco State University.

About Executive Director Sheryl Davis :

Sheryl Evans Davis is the Executive Director of the San Francisco Human Rights Commission (HRC). Director Davis previously served as Commissioner between 2011 and 2016, including a tenure as Vice Chair of the Commission.

Prior to joining the HRC, Director Davis was Executive Director of Collective Impact, a community-based organization in the Western Addition neighborhood of San Francisco. As Executive Director, she oversaw Mo’MAGIC, Magic Zone, and the Ella Hill Hutch Community Center. Mo’MAGIC, a collaborative of non-profit organizations, addresses challenges facing low-income children, youth and families in the areas of economic development, community health, and violence prevention. Magic Zone provides education and wraparound services to K-12 students and transitional aged youth. The Ella Hill Hutch Community Center provides community-building services and workforce development opportunities to neighborhood residents. During her tenure at Collective Impact, Director Davis forged private and public sector partnerships to provide critical health and social services to historically underserved communities across San Francisco.

Director Davis has also served on the SFPD Fair & Impartial Policing and Community Policing Advisory Committees, Fillmore Community Benefits District, and Redevelopment Agency's Western Addition Citizen Advisory Committee. She holds a BA degree from San Francisco State University and Master's in Public Administration from the University of San Francisco.