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From:Becca Kieler <br />To:publiccomment <br />Subject:Public Comment against Item 6 B <br />Date:Friday, May 9, 2025 7:54:35 PM <br />You don't often get email from beccakieler12@gmail.com. Learn why this is important <br />Mayor Martínez Saballos, Vice Mayor Eakin, and Council members: <br />I am writing as a RWC resident to ask you to remove Item 6B from the agenda and <br />instead schedule a study session at a later date to look at whether it is appropriate for <br />the Police Department to use TASERs at all. <br /> <br /> Last year, RWC and San Mateo had the largest # of youth arrested in SMC and <br />94.3% of those youth were youth of Color. That % is fairly similar in adults. <br />Approximately 64,400 of Redwood City's residents are people of Color, primarily <br />brown and black. That number represents the 64,400 of Redwood City’s residents <br />who will be at greater risk of being tased and potentially murdered by these deadly <br />weapons. Do not let Axon sell this city dangerous weapon at the taxpayers’ expense. <br />These are not tools, as they may have you believe. These are deadly weapons, and <br />of all the intermediate weapons that Redwood City has at their disposal, tasers would <br />be the deadliest of them all. Let’s not forget October 3, 2018 when a simple jaywalk <br />tragically turned into a death sentence for one of San Mateo County’s sons, whose <br />name was Chinedu Okobi. <br /> <br />That death cost us 4.5 million taxpayer dollars, as well as costing his family <br />irreparable harm that will impact that lineage forever. As a RWC resident I am <br />dedicated to ensuring that the residents of RWC are treated with equality and dignity, <br />and this action falls below the standard of decency that our residents deserve and <br />demand. <br /> <br />Redwood City police deployed Tasers 91 times between 2015–2020, representing <br />over a quarter of all use-of-force incidents. -In 2018, Redwood City police officers <br />deployed Tasers 2–3 times against Ramsey Saad during a domestic violence call on <br />Lanyard Drive. The 55-year-old, who had schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, became <br />unresponsive in post-deployment and died at a hospital. <br /> <br />Last summer Redwood City projected a budget gap of $3.9 Million over the next <br />decade, and this proposal would spend an additional $1.6 Million. It is unwise to <br />dump this much money into buying 110 upgraded lethal weapons in the form of <br />TASERs. <br /> <br />I respectfully ask that you remove this item from the agenda and schedule a study <br />session to look more closely at the dangers of TASERs. <br /> <br />Thank you for your attention.