San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee said today he is about a week away from announcing his pick for the city’s new permanent police chief, and that the selection will come from the list of candidates given to him by the city’s Police Commission.
Lee was tasked with selecting the department’s top cop in January after outgoing Mayor Gavin Newsom picked former Chief George Gascon to take over the position of district attorney for Kamala Harris, who was elected the state’s attorney general.
In the meantime, Gascon’s second-in-command, Jeff Godown, has been serving as interim chief.
In early March, the Police Commission submitted three recommendations for the permanent position to Lee. Neither Lee nor any commission members have revealed the names of the three candidates being considered.
According to the city charter, the mayor can choose one of the commission’s recommendations or reject them all and start the process anew.
Lee, who spoke with reporters today at an unrelated event in the city’s Mission Terrace neighborhood, said the commission would not need to start collecting more resumes for a list of new candidates.
“I will be picking from the list the commission gave me,” he said.
Lee estimated that the announcement of his pick is “about a week away.”
Whoever is selected could have a short run as police chief.
The chief serves at the leisure of the mayor, and Lee, who was selected as interim mayor when Newsom was elected the state’s lieutenant governor, has said he does not plan to enter the November mayoral race. The new mayor could decide on a new chief as soon as next year.
Dan McMenamin, Bay City News
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