SF Emergency Dept staff are staging a literal revolt over management. When does the city hold leadership accountable?
Just read the latest piece in the SF Standard about the absolute meltdown happening behind the scenes at the Department of Emergency Management (DEM).
Apparently, staff are circulating an anonymous petition for a vote of no confidence against the Executive Director, Mary Ellen Carroll. The complaints aren't just minor workplace grievances—they are talking about deep leadership failures, severe burnout, and a complete lack of operational understanding of public safety functions.
On top of the existing 911 dispatch staffing crises we've been hearing about for a while, leadership is now overseeing staff cuts to critical disaster-response and security initiatives without any real plan for program continuity.
We constantly hear about how SF is trying to clean up its act and fix its broken systems, but how can we expect the city to function when the very people running our emergency responses are ready to revolt? If our frontline dispatchers and emergency staff don’t trust their own director to keep the city safe, why should we?
Link to the article: https://sfstandard.com/2026/06/05/sf-emergency-dept-staff-revolt-director-competence/