San Francisco workers protest 127 layoff notices amid budget deficit

City Hall’s budget crisis reached the front line on Wednesday as union members and city workers rallied against 127 layoff notices that could ripple through the services San Franciscans use every day, from public health and human services to police civilian operations and Laguna Honda Hospital.

The notices went to workers across 18 departments, with some employees given 30-day notices and others 60-day notices. The layoffs are part of Mayor Daniel Lurie’s broader plan to eliminate about 500 city positions and save roughly $100 million in personnel spending as San Francisco confronts a budget gap that has been described in recent reporting as about $643 million over two years and, in some estimates, nearly $1 billion.

Departments exposed to the cuts include the Department of Public Health, Human Services Agency, San Francisco Police Department civilian roles, the City Administrator’s Office, the Office of Economic and Workforce Development and Laguna Honda Hospital. Labor leaders said the notices are not just a bookkeeping move, but a choice that will be felt in slower response times, thinner staffing and less room for error in already strained departments.

Mayor Lurie has defended the layoffs as necessary, calling them “incredibly painful,” while city officials say the reductions are part of a broader effort to stabilize the city’s finances and bring staffing costs under control. The administration has also said a hiring freeze could affect about 2,000 vacant city positions, signaling that the budget fight extends beyond the workers who have already received notices.

Unions are pressing the city to pursue alternatives before deeper cuts take hold. One of the options they are backing is Proposition D, a June 2, 2026 ballot measure that would tax companies whose chief executives make more than 100 times the median pay of their San Francisco employees. Labor leaders have argued that new revenue, not layoffs, should carry more of the burden as the city moves toward the next budget cycle.

The mayor is expected to release a full two-year budget proposal on June 1, 2026, setting up a critical test of how far City Hall will go to close the deficit and who will bear the fallout if services start to thin out. For the workers who marched outside City Hall, the answer begins with whether 127 notices become the first step in a deeper cutback to the city’s core functions.