Parents react to mayor's plan to stabilize SFUSD amid shortfall, possible closures
Parents in the San Francisco Unified School District are reacting to Mayor London Breed's plan to stabilize the district amid a massive budget shortfall and the possibility of school closures.
Leaders within the embattled district called a rare, emergency meeting Sunday morning to determine the fate of the district's superintendent, Matt Wayne. He's keeping his job, for now, but even so, the city is stepping in to try to stabilize the district.
"I'm feeling tired," parent Meredith Dodson told CBS News Bay Area. "I think it's been really overwhelming to be an SFUSD parent the last few years."
Dodson is a parent of two in the district, and a co-founder of the SF Parent Coalition that aims to advocate for families within the district after years of chaos and mismanagement within the district that is now under the supervision from the state.
"It's concerning that we need this help, right? It's concerning that we need this stabilization team to come in. And that we can't figure it out ourselves as a district," Dodson explained.
That stabilization team is bringing some hope to parents, including Dodson. After a departure of more than 4,000 students from the district and a $400 million deficit, Breed on Sunday announced the city is sending in a stabilization team that includes experts who she hopes will improve communication, balance the district budget, and set a roadmap for future success.
"Everyone is rolling up their sleeves, providing their valuable expertise so that we can build capacity for our school district so that we can focus on the short-term goals that we have and ultimately the long-term impact that our school district will have students for generations," Breed said in a news conference Monday.
In a letter Monday to district leaders, including Wayne, Breed said the team intends to be a "resource for you to troubleshoot, review, validate, and provide capacity to help the district tackle its most urgent and fundamental challenges."
Those include developing "trustworthy project plans to communicate and implement necessary resource alignment initiatives, develop a budget plan to help the district retain local control, and address critical operational issues that affect students today, such as staffing."
Frustration among parents and teachers multiplied last week as a highly-anticipated announcement from the district about what schools would close next year was delayed indefinitely.
It's a decision, Breed says, the district isn't ready to make.
"We didn't have everything we needed in order to provide that information to our parents and to the public and so one of the other things we will be doing is making sure that we know what is happening in each of every school with the capacities of those schools are looking at an equitable lens," Breed said.
The mayor has limited power over the district, where the Board of Education has authority. The new stabilization team is expected to unlock $8.4 million of unallocated Student Success Funds that can be used for emergency needs.
It's a short-term relief, but a far cry from the hundreds of millions of dollars the district must cut from the budget in the coming months, roughly ten percent of its total budget.
For Dodson, the team is bringing some ease for parents kept in the dark about their students' future.
"Without this package from the mayor's office, it would feel maybe a little more hopeless right now," she said. "Feeling a little bit more optimistic, given that we have now these additional financial resources that are coming in to help, as well as this team of experts that are coming in to help. So that leaves me hopeful."
Breed said she expects the district to implement the recommendations from the stabilization team and asks for patience from parents.