SF Mayor Sends Team to Address Crisis at School District — But Don’t Call It a ‘Takeover’

After an emergency weekend meeting, the San Francisco school board announced its embattled superintendent will stay on the job — with the support of a team sent in by the mayor.

Shortly after the Sunday closed-door conversation, prompted by concerns about impending school closures, a severe budget crisis and operational struggles, Mayor London Breed said she would deploy what she calls a School Stabilization Team to “provide critical expertise to help stabilize the City’s public schools.”

It has been a rocky start to the year for the San Francisco Unified School District. Just one week earlier, Superintendent Matt Wayne delayed the highly anticipated release of a list of campuses that will close or merge after this year, frustrating teachers and families who have pressured school officials to provide some certainty on the plans.

The mayor’s team will be led by Maria Su, the executive director of the Department of Children Youth and Their Families, and Phil Ginsburg, the general manager of the Recreation and Parks Department, who Breed said has experience “managing programs and support” for families and children, as well as with facility and logistical oversight and delivering balanced budgets.

“We will be working as a partner with the school district,” Breed said during a press conference on Monday. “This is not a city takeover, this is a partnership — one in which the school district has embraced because they need help in order to get through this very challenging time.”

The district is facing the threat of a state takeover if it cannot close a massive budget shortfall — projected to reach $148.5 million this school year — and hiring delays left funded positions empty on the first day of class.

Last week, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that former Board President Lainie Motamedi, who stepped down abruptly last month, and current President Matt Alexander had revealed concerns about the superintendent’s ability to lead through the current challenges and overall district dysfunction.

Meredith Dodson, the executive director of the San Francisco Parent Coalition, said that while she was previously “aware of some challenges within the central office” and questions about the superintendent’s ability to lead, the weekend’s developments seemed unnecessarily chaotic.

“It wasn’t clear that there was an emergency issue that needed to get the superintendent out today, but that was clearly what they were trying to do by calling that emergency meeting in this way,” she said. “That’s still really confusing and frustrating to us because the last thing we need for this district right now is more chaos. What we really need is to instill confidence.”

In a joint statement from Wayne and Alexander late Sunday, Alexander said that the board is “committed to working” with Wayne and has outlined four priorities for him: balancing the budget, rehabilitating fiscal and operational systems, extending the school bond program, and “rightsizing SFUSD’s school portfolio with fewer but better schools.”

“I agree that these priorities are critical to our success, and I am ready to demonstrate effective leadership and make progress in these areas,” Wayne said in the joint statement.

Supervisor Connie Chan, meanwhile, announced Friday that she plans to introduce a resolution at Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting to call on the district to halt school closures — which Wayne said are being considered to make up for under-enrollment, not to cut costs — until the budget is stabilized.

The list of schools recommended for closure, which Wayne pushed back to next month, is expected to go before the Board of Education in December, with the affected campuses shutting down at the end of the academic year.

Chan joined the ranks of parents and community members calling on the school district to focus first on its budget crisis and facilities bond, which are both hurtling toward deadlines in the next few months.

Breed’s team will focus on helping the board pass a balanced budget, address school site issues and support the school closure process, according to the mayor. When asked whether the closure list could be expected in October, she said she was unsure when it would be ready.

“Our School Stabilization Team, once they go in and they start working with the district, they’ll be able to find more clarity and let the school district know when they believe that particular announcement could potentially be made,” Breed said.

The mayor has also allotted $8.4 million in unallocated grant money to be used by the team for “emergency needs and emergent strategies to support the school community.” The money comes from the Student Success Fund, which was created in 2022 by Proposition G.

Breed said that while the superintendent and Board of Education remain in control of city schools, her team “will be making a number of recommendations that we expect them to implement.”

Along with Su and Ginsburg, the team will also include a special advisor, Carl Cohn, who previously served as the superintendent of the Long Beach and San Diego school districts and as a commissioner on the state Board of Education, along with members from other city departments who will provide fiscal and communications expertise, and help navigate staffing analysis, payroll and family support.

“We are walking into a very critical situation at the school district, and we want to bring our experts in the city to provide support to our school district,” Su said during the press conference on Monday, adding that the team had sent letters to Wayne and the board outlining how they plan to move forward.

In a letter shared with SFUSD families on Sunday, Breed said that while the schools are facing an “incredibly challenging moment,” they “will not fail.”

“Our children will continue to be served and supported by our public schools, and they will get the education they need to thrive. This City has always done what is necessary to give our children, families and educators the schools they deserve, and we will continue to do so,” the letter reads.