Sergeant Culbert Chu : Newly-elected President of San Francisco Asian Peace Officers Association

(SAN FRANCISCO) Chinatown community Police Sergeant Culbert Chu has an additional position since January this year in 2023, as the newly-elected President of San Francisco Asian Peace Officers Association (APOA), to represent 260 Asian police officers and retired officers at the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) on recruitment and promotions.

Chu was elected by the APOA members as its new President starting January 2023 for a two-year term. Other newly-elected members of its Board of Directors are Vice President Tina To, Treasurer Will Ma, Secretary Mike Pheng and Sgt-at-Arms Jung Park.

Chu has appeared on a new TV advertisement lately to recruit more young people to join SFPD which is short of over 500 sworn officers like other police agencies in the nation.

"I was born in the City. I was raised in the City. And now I am protecting our City. Please join us," Chu said on the TV advertisement which was privately funded by Ripple Co-founder Chris Larsen for recruiting more qualified candidates to serve at SFPD.

Chu has been well known and popular with the Chinatown community for the past 6 years since he became the first police sergeant in 2017 to oversee the public safety issues in Chinatown.

Chu joined SFPD in 2002. Prior to being the Sergeant to supervise all foot beat officers in Chinatown, he had served at the Taraval, Bayview, and Ingleside Police Stations, citywide Plain Clothes Officers Unit, and the Mayor's Office Security Detail.

When Assistant Police Chief David Lazar was the Central Station Captain back in 2015, Chu was transferred to the Central Station as an investigator on crime occurring in the Central Station jurisdiction.

After Commander Paul Yep took over as the Central Station Captain in 2017, Yep expanded the Chinatown foot beat patrol program including creating a new Sergeant position to assign Chu to supervise the officers patrolling the neighborhood. The number of the Chinatown beat officers was up to the record high at 9.

Chu is a second generation Chinese immigrant and as a native born in San Francisco. His father as a teenager first migrated to Mexico from Taishan, a city in Guangdong Province of China. Chu's father later moved to San Francisco and settled down in the Sunset District.

"I served 4 years in the U.S. Marine Corps before joining the SFPD. Four very hard years but very rewarding and helped me adjust to being a police officer," Chu said in an interview in Chinatown.

In fact, Chu had a dream of being a police officer since he was a little boy at the kindergarten. "I saw two white police officers talking to us when I was in kindergarten. I thought it was very cool to be a police officer," said Chu.

Like many Chinese American parents not to support their children to enter into law enforcement, Chu's parents were no exception. Chu's mother looked at the police work as too dangerous for his son.

"As a young man in my 20s, I would do it for my whole life," Chu recalled. "Now my mom is very happy. She knows that we are doing great work."

When Chu was discharged from the U.S. Marine Corps, Chu made up his mind to apply to police agencies. It was very competitive to be a police officer back in 2000. Chu submitted his applications to four police departments, SFPD, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego Police Departments.

The San Jose Police Department first accepted Chu into the academy. "A week later, I received an acceptance letter from SFPD. Of course I would join SFPD to protect my own community," Chu shared his joy for joining the SFPD 21 years ago.

The demographic data shows that the number of Asian officers joining SFPD has been increasing for the last 20 years. However, since the pandemic in 2020, the percentage of sworn Asian officers in SFPD has fallen from second place to third place behind white and Hispanic officers.

Presently as of the data available on April 3, 2023, Asian officers make up 17.5% of the total force in the SFPD, while white officers represent 46.14% and Hispanic officers are at 19.44%.

In respect to the promotions, Asian officers are behind other ethnic groups on the level of top management. There are no Asian Deputy Chiefs at SFPD currently.

"I see Asian officers, overall, having the same opportunities to be promoted as every other officer in the department. However, I think there needs to be more Asian representation in the department as a whole. Asians only make up 17.5% of the SFPD (23.75% including Filipino officers), yet Asians make up 34.33% of San Francisco's population," Chu said.

Chu agreed to the fact that there has been a gap at the mid-level management positions at SFPD, very few Asian lieutenants and captains. Chu also believed that not all the Asian officers would take the promotion tests when they were qualified.

"As for my plan to get more APOA members promoted, I will continue to communicate with Chief Bill Scott and advocate for the promotion of our eligible members, and to continue to train and prepare APOA members for the promotional process as best as possible," Chu said.

Recruiting more Asian applicants into SFPD is one of Chu's top priorities at APOA. "When I grew up, there were not many Asian Police Officer role models. Now all of us (Chinatown beat officers) want to be the examples of Asian officers protecting our community," Chu added.

Chu plans to launch many new programs to connect the APOA members to the community. The APOA has been working with a number of community organizations on events and issues under Chu’s leadership.

"Recently, we have worked with the CMAC group to help clean up the graffiti that affected the mural at Washington and Grant Streets. We sponsored 15 seniors from the North Beach housing for bingo at the Salesian boys and girls club, where we picked them up from their home, drove them to the Salesian Auditorium, and assisted them over 10 bingo games with numbers and letters," Chu continued, "Two of the seniors actually won a jackpot!"

Members of the Chinese community are always thankful for the support from the police officers, especially during the anti-Asian hate sentiment in the last 3 years.

Chu encourages the community to invite them to be a part of their events and solutions. "We understand the fear especially of anti Asian hate crimes, but we also want to be there to give the community a sense of safety, and we being a part of their community and events can help bridge that gap," Chu said, "I would love to have the opportunity to connect the membership to the community in any way possible."