Parents, staff press board for transparency over staffing, special education and payroll failures

Dozens of parents, educators and community members told the San Francisco Board of Education that the district must be more transparent about its budget decisions and must protect special-education services as it navigates large projected deficits and labor negotiations.

During the public-comment period, parent Selena Chu criticized virtual public-comment procedures, saying attendees who participate remotely "should be allowed to speak just like us here, without, you know, taking that right from them." Several callers raised accessibility concerns for people using screen readers and asked the board to adapt remote-access procedures.

Special-education teachers and parents repeatedly warned that staffing cuts risk violating service mandates. Chris McLean, a parent at Rosa Parks Elementary, said the school lacks an occupational therapist and speech-language pathologist and described dozens of students currently eligible for services who are not receiving them. Multiple speakers warned that cutting related-service provider roles pushes staff to contract agencies and weakens retention.

Community speakers also criticized the district's recent payroll replacement work (referred to in public comment as "Empower"). Supriya Ray told trustees, "I believe that whole debacle has cost us about $40,000,000," a figure cited by several commenters as an explanation for part of the district's current budget pressures. District staff discussed the fiscal impacts of past implementation failures but did not confirm that specific dollar figure during the public presentation.

Several parents urged the board to restore oversight committees (budget, facilities, program and curriculum) to improve transparency and advance meaningful consultation before school consolidations or other site-level actions. Community groups also urged the board not to pit labor against community; multiple labor representatives and parents spoke in favor of ratifying the tentative SEIU and UESF agreements to preserve staff and services.

The board acknowledged the concerns and staff said the district will present more detailed school-level staffing allocations and consult with stakeholders through the January-February budget planning window before making site-specific decisions.