Whole Foods closing Civic Center store in S.F. over 'safety' concerns

The closure comes just a year after the store opened at the Trinity S.F. apartment building at Market and Eighth streets in March 2022.

• Read more:Why Whole Foods’ Mid-Market closure means S.F.’s potential ‘doom loop just got slightly more doomy’

“To ensure the safety of our Team Members, we have made the difficult decision to close the Trinity store for the time being,” a Whole Foods Market spokesperson said in a written statement. “All team members will be transferred to one of our nearby locations.”

Supervisor Matt Dorsey, who lives in the neighborhood and frequented the store, said he’d seen signs that the Whole Foods was struggling. As a near-daily customer, he said, the store had gotten rid of handheld shopping baskets, allowing only carts. An employee told Dorsey that all 250 baskets the store had when it first opened were stolen — something Dorsey said he saw evidence of during neighborhood cleanups on nearby Natoma and Minna streets. Staff also reportedly complained about “people acting out” inside the store, he said.

“It’s obvious to me that, as an employer, Whole Foods has a lot of concerns about the safety of their employees, and ultimately that’s why they made the decision to close,” Dorsey said. “I wish they hadn’t, but I’ve also been in there and seen some things that are off-putting.”

Dorsey seized on the store closure to announce Monday that he wants voters to decide on a ballot measure next year that would re-establish minimum staffing levels for the San Francisco Police Department and set a goal of reaching it in the next five years. Dorsey, a former SFPD spokesman, said he had asked City Attorney David Chiu in late March for help in drafting the language of the potential measure, which could appear on the ballot in March 2024.

“We’re not going to make progress on solving our public safety challenges if we don’t have a fully staffed Police Department,” Dorsey said. “San Franciscans are demanding progress — at least the San Franciscans I represent. People need to know that we are taking these challenges seriously, and that we are pursuing solutions that are as big as our problems.”

Dorsey told the city attorney that he wants his potential ballot measure to set a minimum police staffing level of 2,182 officers — a number previously recommended in an analysis the city uses to decide how many officers it will seek to hire. The number sought by Dorsey is higher than the minimum staffing requirement of 1,971 officers that voters agreed to do away with in 2020. As of last month, the number of full-duty San Francisco police officers who were not on leave was about 1,500.

Dorsey’s push for a new ballot measure comes just after the Board of Supervisors approved Mayor London Breed’s request for another $25 million in police overtime this year. Supervisors are also poised to consider approving a contract with the city police union that would give raises to new and current officers and cost taxpayers about $166.5 million over a three year period.

In order for his staffing proposal to appear before voters, Dorsey would need to get a majority of the 11-member board to send his legislation to the ballot. If that effort fails, supporters could launch a signature-gathering campaign.

The Whole Foods spokesperson said there is no timetable for the store’s possible reopening.

Reach Joel Umanzor: joel.umanzor@sfchronicle.com