Supervisors urge SFUSD to use equity criteria when aligning school resources; amendments add neighborhoods

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors on July 2 unanimously adopted a resolution urging the San Francisco Unified School District to include clear equity criteria when it aligns resources, staffing and services across school sites.

The resolution asks the district to consider cultural and community significance of school sites, neighborhood density and walkability, language services and on-site direct supports for low-income immigrant and BIPOC communities that may otherwise be undercounted. President Aaron Peskin introduced the resolution and said it is intended to guide SFUSD as it faces difficult decisions amid a budget shortfall and declining enrollment.

Supervisor Shamann Walton, a co-sponsor, said the district must “do everything in its power to ensure the decisions to close, merge, and remove any school from its community is done with an equity lens.” Walton told colleagues she wanted to be added as a co-sponsor and emphasized protections for public housing residents and single-room-occupancy tenants.

Supervisor Hillary Ronan asked that the Mission be explicitly added to the list of neighborhoods; the language on the long title and the Whereas clauses was amended on the floor to add Chinatown, the Tenderloin, Bayview‑Hunters Point, Western Addition and the Mission. The clerk recorded the verbal amendments and co-sponsor additions on the floor, and the board adopted the resolution as amended without objection.

The resolution is advisory: it urges the SFUSD superintendent and board to incorporate those equity elements in the district’s resource-alignment initiative. The matter does not change district authority but serves as formal guidance from the Board of Supervisors.