SFUSD staff outline fiscal stabilization plan as district confronts enrollment and attendance declines

The San Francisco Unified School District Board of Education on March 4 held a special budget study session in which Deputy Superintendent Chris Mompanitas and district fiscal staff laid out revenue assumptions, enrollment and attendance trends, and a multi‑year fiscal stabilization plan meant to restore the district’s long‑term financial stability.

Mompanitas told the board the district’s revenue mix includes federal, state and a comparatively large share of local dollars — driven by measures such as PEAF and parcel taxes — and that revenues are derived by plugging enrollment and average daily attendance (ADA) into state fiscal tools. “We literally plug in the assumptions on the left, and this is a publicly available document online,” Mompanitas said of the state’s LCFF ‘dartboard’ and calculator the district now uses.

Why it matters: SFUSD is funded on a three‑year average of ADA, and Mompanitas said the district’s attendance (funded ADA) — roughly 44,790 — is substantially below registered enrollment, which he said is about 48,768, reducing the revenue the district receives. He warned the district’s concentration funding tied to unduplicated pupil percentage is also declining and remains a fiscal pressure.

The staff presentation outlined three tiers of fiscal stabilization measures that will be reflected in the district’s second interim report: measures already underway that are in the current multi‑year projection; additional central‑office reductions and contract trimming planned for fiscal year 2026–27; and a larger set of program and staffing changes that would be implemented later if needed.

Already implemented or captured in projections, Mompanitas said, are the realignment of staffing to projected enrollment and the shifting of about $17 million in eligible expenditures from unrestricted to restricted funds. He told the board the projected district deficit on the restricted side has been reduced to about $44 million but that restricted deficits are growing and, if spent, would push costs back to the unrestricted general fund.

Niru Jayaraman, the district CFO, and Jennifer Shuster, interim executive director of the budget office, described recent process changes. Shuster said institutional budget knowledge was lost during turnover after COVID and that the district has adopted better practices, including ongoing monitoring and using the state’s projection tools. “We’ve been instituting much better budgeting practices so that we’re monitoring our budgets throughout the year,” Shuster said.

Board members pressed staff on key details: how parcel taxes such as QTEA and FWEA are governed and whether those revenues will cover health‑care increases in tentative agreements; the source and duration of restricted settlement funds; how accurate past revenue projections have been; and whether enrollment declines are a transient blip or a longer trend.

On parcel taxes, Mompanitas explained that each parcel tax is governed by ballot language and memoranda of understanding that restrict how the funds may be spent. He said unspent carry‑forward balances and some restricted set‑asides could cover proposed health‑care increases for roughly a year and a half, but that staff plan to seek parcel‑tax reauthorization in 2028 to sustain those costs.

Staff also described options to reduce double‑budgeting in special education where, in some cases, both a district employee and a contract are budgeted to provide the same service. Mompanitas and Niru described a plan to align staffing with IEPs, renegotiate vendor pricing and, when appropriate, bring contractors into district employment to eliminate duplicative line items — actions staff estimate could yield several million dollars over the coming years.

As part of the stabilization options staff offered a sequence of scenarios: a set of measures that can be implemented immediately and are reflected in the second interim; a ‘baby FSP’ with expanded contract and supply cuts that could be phased in by July 1, 2026; and a larger FSP that would include personnel reductions and program/site consolidations to reach a larger savings target if the board chooses a more aggressive path.

Mompanitas cautioned the board that while adopting the less‑aggressive measures might keep the district in a ‘‘qualified’’ certification status, adopting the full three‑page plan now could potentially restore a positive interim certification but would invite state scrutiny about whether proposed long‑range savings are credible. “Minimally I would recommend the first two pages,” he said, while noting the third page would face headwinds from the state.

Board members asked for additional, legible detail on how the staffing model incorporates equity weights and what safeguards exist so that sites serving higher‑need students do not lose targeted supports. Niru said the staffing model does include allocations beyond base teacher ratios — for assistant principals, counselors and supplemental teachers — and that the district used supplemental and concentration allocations to add roughly 89 supplemental teachers targeted by need.

What’s next: staff said the second interim and a formal FSP will return to the board next week for consideration and that a position‑control policy and administrative regulation will be presented to improve reconciliation of vacancies and requests. President Kim adjourned the meeting at 7:39 p.m.