participate. so you have capacity for growth, because you know i look through this. and there are neighborhoods that are over represented and some that are clearly under-represented. you have a bunch of school in the valley and in richmond and none in the intermission. so i think we need to do some specific outreach. if we want to have equity past who is interested. and we need to target some school and talk to some principals. and maybe other people in the community. and i would be happy to help with that. but also paying attention to that kind of balance is important. >> i will add to that, absolutely, i think you are spot-on. one of the reasons about holding this hearing today is to let the school commissioners know about what is going on. and for you to identify as well, since you are closer to it. hey, these are schools that we

think should be a part of it. i can talk to the principals personally. that help is invaluable. i will tell you i was surprised when we did our first fund-raiser. we have raised over $100,000 each year for this. i thought when people would talk about budget cuts and the reasons why we couldn't open the schoolyards, this is true. the use of proceeds i thought would be 100% paying for people to open and close the gates. the majority of the money is going to the ptas, and that's a good thing for them to apply on the weekends to program their school site. layering an additional school site is incrementally expensive. "a," the funds are there to begin with. but "b" it's not a cost issue, but a principal buy-in issue. and i know that principals are talking to other principals. and parents talking. and michael and christine going

to the schools is invaluable. making the principals and the parents feel the buy-in. >> i would like to say one other thing that is really, it's so much now a part of the fabric that we don't even mention it. but many years ago when we first started doing not a program but open some schoolyard or do something. one thing that took years and years to resolve was the issue of liability. and that was really the big-budget issue. and the cuts we are talking about are not the ones in the school district but the restructuring of public funding. even in the old days before i was around, but you may remember this supervisor farrell, because you grew up here. it used to be that rec and park had a director in each school after school. that's the kind of changes we

are talking about. and it took years sitting down with lawyers and the use of the public facility. we changed that we can't be liable, we can't be liable discussion to make these kinds of partnership programs possible. and that's the kind of cooperation and sort of common sense of course we have to -- we can't say, oh, we are not going to make any of our public facilities available to the public. because we are afraid that something might happen to one or other institution, that we compete to see who is safer. it was ridiculous. and it's that kind of ground work that makes these partnerships possible. >> supervisor avalos. >> thank you, i wanted to say that this is a really fantastic program. and a great idea. and i want to congratulate supervisor farrell and rec & park department and school

district and the mayor's office and dpw as well. i have lived in different neighborhoods around san francisco, and the neighborhoods that had elementary schools open have made a big difference in what is available for people to do and have recreation on the weekends. it's really great. chavez is a place i have played in the intermission. it's not on the list, i wonder if the gates are open. it's used to be. a lot of events happen on the weekend there. monroe elementary school i see is on the list, i see you are going tomorrow. i was told it was friday and i can't go i have a meeting in my kids' school. but i want to congratulate you. >> thank you, and i want to thank supervisor farrell for

taking this on, working with the school district and of course the city departments. these are the type of items we want to bring forward to strengthen the partnerships as a cohort and this is exciting to see that we have been able to do that. and i noticed that betsy carmichael is on this list, i am not sure that our community is aware that the school is open on the weekends. and it doesn't have as strong pta association if they don't. and betsy is one of them. it would be great to get fliers and flyer our own neighborhood so folks know that schoolyard is open on the weekends. i am sure that we are not the only school to make that request. but that would be one thing if supervisor offices can help outreach for the neighborhood. unfortunately i only have three school in district 6, and two of them don't have a schoolyard.

tenderloin elementary and life learning charter school. but i do know that marshall elementary just got their schoolyard redone. they are in the northern part of the mission, that used to be district 6. i can reach out to their principal and see if they are interested in joining as this grows. commissioner mendoza. >> thank you. so i wanted to respond to you quickly, supervisor kim, with betsy carmichael and because she's right across the street from a park. we had installed these railings that close off the street, sherman. that allows the kids to play safely between the school and park. and that's been terrific.

in this closing, i want to thank all of our city partners. they have consistently come to the table with me on some very challenging issues. and have not batted an eye when it comes to supporting this idea. and dpw and rec & park in particular, they have worked everything out in their budget. we have had dave george and matt hansen, who used to be our risk management person at the district. and who is our risk management person here, and that has helped a lot. and between the two of them, they helped work out the mou, that was an important piece for the work we need to do. and they are helping us out on who can be on the yards and what cannot be. so we are putting in the safety measures. and i want to give a shout out to michael and christine. these are volunteers, residents

in the community. that loved this idea and stepped up to say, what can we can do to help. chris and i didn't have the capacity to make this a stronger program. and i feel such confidence in michael and christine to make this a strong, viable program. i think that the principals will be appreciative that there are funds for them to do something on the weekend. and to bring people on their school site. and i want to give a heart-felt thank you to supervisor farrell. without your help and support and willingness to raise the funds and to see a vision for community and schools to be closer aligned. and just the vision to open those up. i feel badly, roosevelt is not on our list. and this is the school across the street from supervisor farrell that inspired him to want to do this in a first

place. but michael rimer is all over it, and what he can do to make it happen sooner and not later. i want you to be sure that we are making it happen -- possible across the city. and what supervisor farrell is doing, it's enabling us to open more sites. we will be strategic about the schools we want to open. this started off as opening sites that were furthest away from open space. and now we really want the school sites to buy into this. the first round of funding and everything was about reaching out to school sites and having them want to do this. with this presentation and all the out-reach that supervisor farrell is doing and the chatter that will happen. more and more principals will want to do this.

and we may want to think how to raise more money and how to incorporate this into the city's budget, it's a benefit to the city. >> i had one more question. that i just got. if a resident went to a schoolyard and found it closed, they call 3-1-1. okay, i wanted members of the public to know that. supervisor farrell. >> thank you, and thank you to everyone who came today and those who spoke and didn't. i want to say this is to benefit the community. and this is also a community effort. and it doesn't happen without so many people from sfusd and commissioner mendoza and the mayor's office and michael and christine and larry and dpw and denny and rec & park, and 3-1-1. it doesn't happen without the

effort of a lot of people. and i want to say thank you to you all. and i look forward to this being a bigger project throughout the city. we see statistics of families leaving our city. the more we can do, certainly as a father of three, the more we can do for the families, the better off we are. thank you, guys. >> can we add park alliance? >> i was going to recognize, i want to thank again dpw, rec & park, and principals. thank you for coming out. and we have san francisco park alliance and maria who is a fiscal sponsor for this project. and it's rare to sit in a chamber of all parents. and it's rare to have that talking about families in san

francisco. if no further comments. we will close this item. would we like to make a motion to continue to the call of the chair to close this item? >> thank you, we will open up for public comment at this time. thank you for that reminder. any members of the public that would like to speak? there is a timer on the other mic, it's a little bit more helpful for members of the public. >> yeah, i am a parent with kids. we would rather be on the playground and riding bikes and probably head out after a snack. but yeah, just part of the love-fest of gratitude for the initiative and the access off the sidewalk, really. and into these magical little

places that are otherwise shut away as a parent. very supportive. and also phil ginsberg asked me to show up, my day job is america scores, we run sports and academic enrichment programs at public schools. at 20 different public schools. and we sit in that space between the school district and the city. and we do six-day a week programs at the school sites monday through friday and at the fields on saturday. the reason that he suggested that i show up today, sort to introduce an initiative that may dovetail at some sites. and that initiative is an attempt to change certain, what i would call microareas of

playgrounds of concrete into turf fields. you know in the schools that we are working, low-income schools, kids are there during the school day. after school. and they are on pavement five days a week. and i find that unconscionable. when there is an easy solution. we are part of an initiative of public scores looking for private funding to take pavement to turf. and part of that i think is to open that to the community on the weekends. that's a big part. i wanted to introduce that and say thanks again. >> thank you very much, any other members of the public that want to speak on this item? seeing none. public comment is closed. colleagues. >> i make a motion to continue to the call of the chair.

>> second. >> we can do that without opposition. >> thank you, madam clerk, please call item 1. >> thank you, file 121078, and it's a hearing to locate a public middle school in potrero hill, sponsored by supervisor cohen. >> thank you, and the sponsor of this item is here today, supervisor cohen. thank you for your patience as we made some adjustments in our agenda. i know that we will also be getting a presentation from sfusd afterwards. but wanted to give supervisor cohen an opportunity to introduce this item. thank you for being here. >> thank you. good afternoon, everyone. thank you for your continued interest in public service. colleagues, thank you for hearing this item today. the reason why i sponsored this hearing is to continue the conversation that is going on between parents and the school

district about a future of middle school option in potrero hill. as you know that a nearly decade long process in the eastern neighborhood yielded us an opportunity to continue to see increase in growth of the southeastern neighborhoods. it's with this growth that comes a need not only infrastructure, transportation and affordable housing but also schools. oftentimes we don't do a good enough job to be sure that our infrastructures are timed with growth. we are lucky in potrero hill to have a group that work together everyday to make sure that our public school students have access to a quality education. anywhere and everywhere i go in

potrero hill, i hear increasing concerns about middle school options for children. whether from parents of daniel webster that want to send this children to multilanguage school or parents wondering the future of their student, middle school or high school or combination. the goal is simple, to provide parents from daniel webster and also acknowledging that isa was extended an invitation to come. but i understand that the district has decided to speak on behalf of isa. and to use this as an opportunity to present their concerns and suggestions on how the city and district can address challenges that population increase will bring. i am looking forward to hearing from mr. lee from the school district that will walk us through the process that the

school district has undertaken thus far and a timeline that they anticipate for future decisions related to this matter. i think it's essential to build as much collaboration between parents, schools and districts, we want the same thing. we want our kids to have a safe and enriching school experience. madam chair, as a point of clarification. i would like to start with the school district. i understand there is some board rule that prohibits parents from speaking. >> no, there is no board rule that prohibits parents from speaking. and i will not be strict about the time. but we will have the school district present as you would like. >> okay, san francisco unified school district is prepared to make a brief presentation today. and i would like to provide time

for the daniel webster parents who have taken the time. and there a board rule of 5436 that would allow unanimous vote for parent to make a power-point presentation. >> we will allow them to speak at public comment. they can use their time as they like. normally it's two or three minutes but i will be flexible because of misunderstandings. >> could i ask that we allow each parent five minutes to present? >> i was told 10 minutes total. >> all right. >> i will be flexible on the time. i won't be strict on the time. i know there a presentation. >> okay, we will stick with the presentation of 10-minute allotted time. first i will call mr. lee, thank you for coming and facilitating

this conversation. good to see you. >> thank you very much. and supervisors and commissioners and thank you for setting the frame for this discussion. supervisor cohen. and we are going to make a brief summary of some the background of this important topic. and some of the considerations and the options that the board of education and the school district are wrestling with on this subject. and then i think the daniel webster community representatives that are here will do a very impressive job, as they always do elaborating on their point of view. i am the deputy superintendent of policy operations for sfusd. and joining me with the school district staff is dr. stevens.

he's one of our elementary superintendents of the district. we will tag team a little. committee members, there is a very short hand-out that we provided and this will be helpful in summarizing this discussion. it's an interesting and complicated and layered discussion. this is the 10-minute version, there are many moving parts and this capres some key elements. but probably leaves out many finer points. if you have questions for either dr. stevens or me, we can expand on what is presented on the document. for starters, by way of background. the board of education did implement. this decision was made in 2011.

but it was to establish feeder patterns between elementary school and middle schools that are used for the first time in making statements for the school year 2012-13. it's a fairly new policy that the board has implemented. that the board has decided and then the district is implementing. and that is an important piece of context for this whole discussion around the international state academy and daniel webster and brian webster school that is related to the other schools in this feeder pattern. in 2011 the set of feeder patterns were established and for daniel webster and the academy is unique. and that's for a few different

reasons. the primary reason is that isa it's the only school in the district that has this grade span, 6-12. all of our other middle schools are grades 6-8. we have a number of k-8 options in the district but this is the only 6-8 option. that's important as you hear from me and from members of the daniel webster crew that is here. some concerns that are raised and observed if this unique feeder pattern. and i will start with feedback we have received from the members of the daniel webster parent community. they will elaborate on this. they have expressed concerns about the perceived quality of the academic program at isa and

they have addressed concerns about sharing a site with older students. the questions of physical capacity at webster and isa is sufficient to accommodate the future demand for school feeds. both at the elementary and middle-school level. and this reflects the housing pattern that supervisor cohen eluded to. and there are other concerns as well. with respect to bryant elementary, that is not on potrero hill, per se, it's on the eastern side of the mission. that is also an elementary school that joined with webster into the current feeder pattern

of isa. there is some concerns raised, not as vocal, but some concerns whether isa is an appropriate and natural feeder pattern for bryant as well. and there is a sense that everett middle school is a more natural feeder pattern historically speaking. and for several other reasons that members of the bryant community feel that everett is a more appropriate feeder pattern. in the meantime we have seen that very few families and students exiting the fifth grade. and we have one-and-a-half years of data on this, because the feeder patterns are fairly new. between webster and bryant, when the fifth graders are moving on to sixth grade.

few have requested isa as a middle school. now we are still in a period of several years, where the assignment of middle school, the first step is for families to make a choice. we are not in a stage of automatic assignment to any middle school. and also in the meantime as i think everyone is aware. the board of education members i know are aware of this. sorry for the repetition as you have heard this many times. for the benefit of the supervisors in particular, members of the daniel webster community have done a lot of work and lot of impressive work to develop a proposal regarding a two-campus k-8 school that would be located at the current daniel webster campus, that would serve p-k through 2. and then at the current campus,

that is called maxwell campus, that is the location of isa. and in their proposal that campus would serve grades 3-8. so it would be a two campus k-8 school. in light of all of this, the district convened a staff working group in the fall of 2011. it's been a little while. almost a year-and-a-half that this work has been going on to review these issues regarding these set of schools. and various other issues regarding the use of the facilities and program, location and the like. and in may of 2012, the district staff made a recommendation to the board that we thought to address some of these concerns and observations about the lack of demand between webster and bryant for isa and some concerns

about middle school. that robustness of the middle school program at isa. and that recommendation was to make an adjustment to the feeder pattern, so that these two schools instead of feeding into isa. they would feed to everett middle school. and that recommendation was shared with all of the affected school communities that would have been affected. if the recommendation had been implemented. and then when the board came back from recess last august, after it's july recess. it took up this recommendation and held a committee of the whole, or maybe it was -- well, student assignment oriented meeting. and all, at least six or if not all members of the board of education participated in this. and it was very illuminating

discussion. and many discussions outside of this meeting as well. but in this particular meeting many members of the daniel webster community attended and expressed their concerns about this proposal. and spoke in behalf of their proposal to create this two-campus k-8 school. the board of education collectively expressed many questions. and wanted the staff to look more carefully at some of the factors. and do more analysis and express reservations about moving forward at that time with the staff's recommendation to implement this change in the feeder patterns between isa and everett. that was recommended to take affect for next school year, 13-14. the board of education asked the staff to sort of hold off on that direction. and take the time that was