Galileo Academy of Science & Technology, the public high school near San Francisco’s Fisherman’s Wharf, has a lot of physical problems, as you might expect at a 102-year-old facility. After the pandemic, when workers tried to fix the heating system, classrooms instead became so hot that students were unable to focus, and the heat had to be shut off again.
Like many of San Francisco’s aging schools, Galileo has had to wait for major repairs. Nearly two dozen facilities, tabbed for repairs via a 2016 bond, instead saw their fixes postponed until the next bond. And now that next bond is delayed, again.
The public school district announced last week that the bond, slated to go to SF voters on the March 2024 ballot, would be pushed back to November. Perhaps more than $1 billion, it could be the city’s largest bond ever. Officials cited the need for more time for community engagement and project planning.
Update: The bond is on the November 2024 ballot and has shrunk to $749 million.
As The Frisc reported in 2022, the billion-dollar bond was a possibility for that year’s fall ballot. It was shelved, though, amid questions about the 2016 bond spending.
The latest delay underscores the district’s precarious political position at the moment. Voter approval is usually a slam dunk in a town willing to spend public funds on its schools, libraries, transit, and other services. But SF voters shocked officials in June 2022 when a $400 million bond for transit upgrades didn’t muster enough votes.
The delay also comes as school officials try to boost sagging student performance, stem chronic absenteeism, and reverse a years-long enrollment decline, all exacerbated by the pandemic. They’re in the middle of reforming elementary school reading, middle school math, and high school programs and admissions. But deteriorating schools are also a problem.
“Improving facilities has a big impact on how well students do in school,” SFUSD superintendent Matt Wayne told The Frisc last month. “This involves ensuring that buildings are safe and sound, classrooms have comfortable temperatures, and students have access to up-to-date technology, all essential for a 21st-century learning environment.”
Students in well-maintained schools perform 5 percent to 17 percent better on standardized tests, have lower suspension rates, and are more likely to attend regularly, according to the California Department of Education. Even the temperature of classrooms can affect student performance.
Because the district’s needs are so great, it’s not clear which schools will be selected to receive the 2024 funding. Galileo is one of four high schools flagged for poor conditions. Only one is likely to get funding for a full overhaul.
The district has identified $6 billion in needed repairs across its 155 schools and facilities, but there’s only so much money it can raise at once. The previous bond was a $744 million vehicle that voters approved in 2016; the centerpiece of that funding was nearly $100 million for the district’s first new school in the Mission Bay neighborhood. It is just now breaking ground. (The site will host an elementary school, pre-kindergarten program, a career center for high schoolers, and a teacher training center.)
The longer SFUSD waits for its next capital infusion, the longer students and staff at places like Galileo must sweat out suboptimal conditions. “It has been seven years since the 2016 bond was passed, and the long timelines of large-scale school facilities projects require a bond-level investment — yesterday,” said Lex Leifheit, chair of the Citizens’ Bond Oversight Committee (CBOC), whose members are appointed by the school board to keep watch on the district’s bond spending.
Because the district’s needs are so great, it’s not clear which schools will be selected to receive the 2024 funding, if the bond passes at all. Galileo is one of four high schools flagged for poor conditions. Only one is likely to get funding for a full overhaul.
Less trust, more risk
A municipal bond is usually a simple financial proposition. A public body raises money from investors who are all but guaranteed their money back, plus a modest bump of interest. It’s not lucrative, but it’s a safe bet, as public entities rarely default on their debts. (When they do, it’s a big problem.)
With SFUSD’s financial turmoil in recent years, its credit rating was downgraded in 2021 by at least one credit agency. Ratings help investors evaluate risk; the higher the risk, the more interest investors want in return. There’s no indication that the 2024 bond delay is related to investor discomfort, but there’s another group the district must convince: San Francisco voters.
The district’s troubles are well documented. A slow return to in-person school during the pandemic fueled the school board recall of early 2022. Teacher shortages and a painful payroll problem have hurt too. The possibility now looms of closing or consolidating schools within a year or two to fit a smaller student population. (California’s Department of Education threatened a fiscal takeover during the pandemic and, with more tough decisions coming, still keeps a close eye on its budget.)
The 2016 bond sowed seeds of discontent as well. Its documents listed more than 40 schools and facilities eligible for the funds. The legal language was clear that no site or project was guaranteed funding, but in the election run-up, public officials raised expectations that weren’t fulfilled, resulting in a loss of trust. The main example: $100 million from the bond was widely expected to pay for the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts’s relocation to Civic Center, but it was eventually scuttled.
The district needs a 55 percent yes vote for the new bond’s approval. Delaying the vote until November 2024 might be a wise move, according to CBOC member Laurence Lee. “People are currently looking at the school district with so much concern due to lack of trust with financial matters,” Lee said. “A delay can give time to work on items which will ameliorate that kind of perception in the public.”
Mission Local reported recently that the district is struggling to get the backing of local labor groups, whose campaign muscle can help turn out votes. A construction trade union picketed the district Monday, alleging unpaid wages. The teachers union has not publicly backed the bond and did not respond to requests for comment.
The district and teachers union recently came to a tentative agreement on a new contract, avoiding a strike. The union ratified the contract last month; the school board is scheduled to vote next week.
Can’t have it all
Comments at a September school board meeting were prescient about voter mood. “It’s hard to go out and ask the public to support us, and not make a commitment to modernizing all schools knowing that’s a significantly larger dollar amount than what we’re [currently] asking for,” said board president Kevine Boggess. “It’s really important for us to figure out how we can walk hand in hand with our community members, union partners, and allies as we rev up to engage in this really big campaign.”
SFUSD bond program director Licinia Iberri emphasized that not everything can be fixed or upgraded in one vote: “SFUSD needs bond programs in series, and while this isn’t a $6 billion dollar bond, $1 billion plus one, plus one, over the course of several decades will hopefully get us closer to where we need to be.”
Boggess, Iberri, and other district officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment, or deferred questions to a spokesperson.
One of the thorniest decisions will be which high school gets big renovation dollars. The 2024 bond plans say four are in consideration: Balboa, Galileo, International, and Mission. They’re all candidates for “modernization,” district-speak for a huge overhaul that includes upgrades for seismic and fire safety, building systems, and accessibility. It could also require moving some or all students to another site.
Of the four, Galileo would cost the most to replace with a new facility: $187 million. An October 2022 facilities report says the school’s HVAC and electrical systems and windows are “deficient.” (Ann Hsu, the former school board member and former Galileo parent-teacher association president, described the overheating classrooms. The school’s principal and SFUSD spokesperson Laura Dudnick did not respond to questions about the school’s condition.)
At the September meeting, board members worried about repeating past mistakes when choosing the high school. “We need a clear, transparent, and inclusive process when the bond passes to say this is how we’re going to decide which of these four high schools gets it, so that people don’t feel overpromised,” said Matt Alexander.
His board colleague Alida Fisher said that by budgeting for only one modernization, a “worst-case scenario … would end up pitting school communities against each other in the quote-unquote fight for these funds.”
The district’s 10-year master plan has assessments of 147 of its 155 facilities. The high school selection could hinge on factors that include data from the facility report, school locations, the percentage of students receiving free or reduced lunch, and past bond program investments. Balboa, Galileo, and Mission are among the 23 schools with deferred maintenance that were supposed to get 2016 bond money but did not.
Schools that aren’t tabbed for full modernization could still get upgrades. Dudnick said the district “considers all options for the modernization of a building, including the possibility of demolishing all or a portion of the existing structures on-site.”
As of Nov. 1, the district had spent $465 million from the 2016 bond, nearly two-thirds of the total, to renovate 14 libraries, upgrade 16 kitchens (including this one), remove 22 portable classrooms, and add 44 new classrooms in various schools.
Three school modernizations — Buena Vista Horace Mann K-8, Denman Middle, and West Portal Elementary — are in the design phase. And at Mission Bay Elementary, the 2016 bond’s biggest-ticket item, crews have just begun preparing the site, which requires extra soil remediation.
The school is slated to open in 2025, nine years after the money for it was approved by voters.
