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CONGRATULATIONS
to
Our New Hires and to Our
Retirees:
New
Hires:
Sheriff Vicki L.
Hennessy
Undersheriff Carl
Koehler
Eileen Hirst, Chief of
Staff
Ted
Toet, Administrative
Assistant
Retirees:
Lt. R. Macaulay
36 years
Sgt. B. Kester
21 years
Sgt. W.
Weatherly
27 years
Sgt. A. Ficher
29 years
Sr. Dep. M. Benton
13 years
Dep. M.
Brown
25 years
Dep. S.
Gorostiza,
Jr.
22 years
Institutional Police Officer
G. Low
Jr.
20 years
Security Guard
F. Madamba
Jr.
18 years
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©
2016
San
Francisco
Sheriff's
Department
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A
Message from
Sheriff
Vicki
Hennessy
Today marks the end of my third week
in office. I am deeply honored to have been
elected Sheriff, and as the first woman Sheriff
of San Francisco, to have been sworn in by Senator
Dianne Feinstein, the first woman Mayor of
this great
city. But, most of all, I am honored to have
been chosen to lead the exceptional men and
women of the San
Francisco Sheriff's Department.
I want our Sheriff's Department staff
to know how much I admire the work that each of
you performs, day in and day out, to make San
Francisco a better place. Together, I hope we
can continue to build on the strong foundation
you have provided to keep us moving forward as a
professional, efficient, well-trained
department, comprised of staff who are
responsive, humane, competent, dedicated public
servants. I am pleased that former Chief Deputy
Carl Koehler is returning as Undersheriff and
former Chief of Staff Eileen Hirst is resuming
that position.
As most of you know, I have had a
long professional career in the Sheriff's
Department and I am lucky enough to know many of
you. In the coming weeks you can expect to see
me around the facilities
and units. Please be prepared as I may drop
in at any time, on any watch.
This edition of the newsletter begins
with a story on the recent Five
Keys Charter High School graduations. Almost
before I knew it, I was the emcee at the largest
community graduation ever, and then, a few days
later, I emceed the largest in-custody
graduation. At both, families and friends of the
graduates came together to celebrate a milestone
that many of us take for granted. One speaker
said it very well, "...the graduation is not an
event, it is part of a process...". Hopefully,
for most, it will be the first step on a
pro-social path that leads to a better
life.
Also take a look at the article about
peer support. Captain Paulson and Sgt. Gunn did
a great job creating and later, with the help of
Sgt. O'Shea, enhancing our program to make
it meaningful and sustainable. Participation is
completely private and I urge employees who may
be facing a personal crisis to consider reaching
out.
Don't miss the items about the great
work of the Sheriff's Bureau of Building
Services in preparing for El
Nino, and the look back at the past year at
the Women's
Resource Center.
Finally, I wish you and your loved
ones a very happy 2016, and look forward to
success in our work together.
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Education
is Key
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| Eighty-four students
from the Five Keys' 21 Bay Area
community campuses -- our largest
graduating class yet -- received their
diplomas before a proud audience of family,
friends, and
mentors. |
This
winter, the SFSD's
Five
Keys Charter High School graduated
their largest Bay Area community and in-custody
classes ever, while also celebrating a milestone
-- a new, larger public venue for our growing
community graduate commencement ceremony.
Five
Keys' community grads, comprising 84 students
from the school's 21 community satellite
campuses in the Bay Area, walked before a proud
audience of family, friends, and mentors at
St.
Mary's Cathedral in San Francisco on
January 20, 2016. This is the first time that
the school's community graduation, which has
outgrown its previous venue at the
Hall
of Justice, has
been held at an independent
community site.
The
commencement ceremony for Five Keys' largest
ever in-custody graduating class of 39
graduates took place on January 28,
2016, at the San Francisco Hall of Justice.
Providing inmates with access to
education helps create safer communities,
reduces tax dollars spent on
incarceration, and affords incarcerated men and
women the skills they'll need to rejoin their
communities and families upon release.
Unique
in its charter to provide high school education
to adults, Five Keys currently serves 3,000
individuals in- and out of custody in San
Francisco. Students who begin their
studies while in-custody can finish working
towards their diploma once out of custody at
Five Keys' community satellite
campuses.
Five
Keys Charter High School
Graduation.
SF
Gate.
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Peer
Support
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| Sergeants M. O'Shea
and M. Gunn both serve on the board of the
California Peer Support Association which
teaches first responders to support one another
by talking through their personal issues
together. | With
three SFSD
department members sitting on the board of
directors of the California
Peer Support Association (CPSA), the
SFSD is well represented among our
California first responder peers.
Sgt.
M. Gunn has been on the board since 2009,
serving as the talented "hi-tech" guy. He
currently holds the office of Treasurer. Captain
K. Paulson was elected to the board in 2014 and
quickly vaulted to the position of president.
Sgt. M. O'Shea was elected to the board in 2015
as the Northern California representative. Sgt.
O'Shea's function is to network with member and
non-member agencies in the region.
The
CPSA's primary function is to provide training
in peer support methodology and in areas like
critical incident response and line-of-duty
death notification. Peers support one another by
talking through personal issues. CPSA members
are trained to employ active listening skills,
to avoid "solving" or taking on the other
person's problems, and when appropriate, to
refer the individual to professional
resources.
Captain
Paulson and Sgt. Gunn were founders of the
SFSD's peer support group.
"Peer
supporters, throughout the state, are heroes,"
Captain Paulson reminds us. "They don't always
know which life they saved, but they are the
ones who talk to the firefighter with a drinking
problem, or the EMT with a disabled child, or
the midnight deputy whose wife attempts to take
her own life. The peer supporters are the ones
who listen when even the family of the public
safety officer does not know how to listen. That
listening, that empathy, is the real community
work. In the hectic Code 3 pace of emergency
service workers, the peer supporter helps others
learn how to pause, take a breath, and reflect
on all that we do."
The
SFSD has 45 trained CPSA members among our
ranks. We hope to offer a basic peer support
training class for new members as well as an
updated skills training class for our seasoned
members.
CPSA
is dedicated to the advancement, promotion, and
enhancement of peer support and peer support
programs for law enforcement, fire, and allied
emergency service
personnel. |
Women's
Best Friend
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| The SF SPCA's Animal
Assistance Therapy program works mostly with
dogs, but the program has also qualified therapy
cats and bunnies -- even a therapy
pig! | Engaging
with an animal has been shown to help reduce
depression, anxiety, and stress, lower one's
heart rate and blood pressure, heighten
motivation, improve self-esteem, and increase
the desire to communicate. That's why the San
Francisco Society for the Prevention of Cruelty
to Animals (SPCA)'s Animal
Assisted Therapy (AAT) program
has been invited to pilot a pet therapy class at
our women's facility at County
Jail #2. The pilot began on January 11,
2016, and features two very cuddly instructors:
Suzie, a Chihuahua, Poodle, Spaniel mix, and
Ollie, a Labradoodle (and, of course, their
SPCA-provided volunteer handlers).
"The Animal Assisted Therapy
department at the SF SPCA is thrilled to partner
with the San Francisco Sheriff's Department in
bringing therapy dogs to the women's unit," said
AAT Assistant Manager, Christina Chavez. "We
feel that this is an added benefit to their
current recovery programs. Our first visit was
met with great enthusiasm by the women and the
staff, and we look forward to future visits and
expanding the program to more
inmates."
AAT
works mostly with dogs, but the program boasts
the talents of five therapy cats, three therapy
bunnies, and one therapy bird. The program has
even qualified a therapy pig! The AAT pilot
class at CJ#2 is an extension of SF SPCA animal
therapy work already ongoing at CJ#5.
The
AAT program has operated at the SF SPCA for over
30 years, conducting approximately 300-400
visits each month to hospitals, community
centers, senior homes, schools, psychiatric
facilities, and more. They have 300 active
volunteers and visit about 200 sites within San
Francisco. We are pleased to welcome them
into our facilities to provide unconditional
love to our inmates, many of whom have
experienced emotional trauma in their
lives. |
Celebrate
Giving
|
|
| SWAP provides eligible
sentenced individuals with an opportunity to
perform community service in lieu of
incarceration. |
Many
observe Black
Friday and Cyber
Monday, days when people celebrate the art
of "getting." Since 2012, communities have also
been celebrating Giving
Tuesday, a day to join together and
concentrate on "giving."
Last
December, SFSD's
Community Programs Unit arranged for Sheriff's
Work Alternative Program
(SWAP) workers to participate in
Giving Tuesday by working at San Francisco's
Stern Grove
on park beautification, erosion
control, pruning, weeding, and clearing creek
beds.
SWAP
provides eligible sentenced individuals with an
opportunity to perform community service in
lieu of incarceration. In addition
to the usual SWAP tasks of sweeping streets,
washing cars, encampment clean-up, and the like,
our Community Programs Unit seeks out new
opportunities to improve our neighborhoods while
also putting a human face on SWAP
efforts.
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| City first
responders in December 2015, at the site of
street flooding due to a clogged storm drain.
SFSD building services staff are working hard to
keep our facilities waterproof this wet
winter. |
The
Sheriff's Bureau of Building Services
(SBBS) has performed storm planning
and repairs ahead of this winter's El
Nino storm tracks.
Roofing
companies were so busy through the summer that
they weren't able to provide bids before the
rains arrived! As a result, the downtown
facilities will have to wait until spring for
roof repair work. Many leaks at our downtown
facilities are caused by corrosion of
rooftop equipment; we are therefore initiating
capital projects which will begin replacing the
corroded equipment in two years.
The
new San Bruno County
Jail #5 front gate project has added
many new erosion features to the facility
entrance. Our crews have patched problematic
sheet metal joints at CJ#5 that caused numerous
leaks at the jail last winter.
This
will be the first year with significant rainfall
after the demolition of the old San
Bruno County
Jail #3, built in 1934, which had a large dewatering
system. The surrounding facilities are being
monitored by SBBS staff for water-related
issues.
In
spite of the roofing industry backlog, SBBS has
been able to arrange for repairs to the original
1989 roof atop the prefabricated dormitory-style
County Jail #6 in San
Bruno.
|
Women's
Resource Center - a Year in
Review
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| Mini Spa Day at the
SFSD's Women's Resource Center in July of 2015.
Participating women were provided free foot
massage baths with
aromatherapy! | 2015
was a wonderful year at our Women's
Resource Center (WRC). Here's a
sampling of events put on by WRC -- at no cost
to those in our community identifying as
women:
Financial
Workshop: Taught by an
independent agent from Transamerica, and geared
toward low-income women, participants were
instructed on the "Rule
of 72 " (describing how to
find the number of years required to double your
money at a given interest rate) as well as how
to stop loss and begin to save at whatever your
income level.
Books
of Wonder: Where community members brought
in and read from books
that changed their lives, including inspiring
stories of triumph, loss, isolation, and even
questioning one's own existence.
Housing
Workshop: Where women were given
advice on how to navigate the City's housing and
shelter system. Instruction and discussion
shed light on who gets single room occupancy
housing (SRO's), who gets into shelters, and who
does not.
Mini
Spa Day: Where women in shelters and
transitional houses were given information on
the importance of taking care of their feet, and
were provided free foot massage baths with
aromatherapy. |
and
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