our student delegates as well. one thing i would say is that, and we have had conversations with commissioner alexander to this point as well, i will say that for the team's part, we did not, and have not viewed this is the worst that we have been engaged with. and in conflict with the spending resolution that was passed in may. we can see that there have been different perspectives about that, and in terms of -- i don't want to speak for anybody, but how somebody might look at where we are, this doesn't seem to align with what we might have expected there are many ways,

perhaps the director can speak to some of these, where we have implemented or attempted to to make a good faith effort to implement multiple provisions of the resolution. and as chief wallace said, we got the particular directive to develop a plan on this timeline in september. it wasn't clear to us until fairly recently that this particular mid-december deadline was in effect. we certainly were planning to confront this large structural deficit in preparing for the next fiscal year. it is not that we had the understanding from back in may or prior to september, frankly, that we had to deliver this

particular type of plan on this timetable. do you want to add anything to that. >> i just want to point out, with the resolution it speaks to coming to bringing us an update in september of this year. may be it fell along the same timeline where we had to submit something mid-december, but if we were to have gone through this path, we would have had a proposal. we would have had information provided to the school board in september of this year to at least enter those discussions with the priority of classrooms. >> my recollection is in one of the presentations that we did make, that staff did make, i believe in the october committee

of the whole, it was the first tuesday in october, so we were a few days late on the september 30th deadline that is referenced in the resolution. we did address that particular part of the resolution that called for a progress report or a timetable on implementing the provisions of the resolution. that was incorporated into a presentation that was made on october 4th. i might not -- i might have that date mixed up. it was not its own separate presentation, but our progress on implementing that clause of the resolution was incorporated into that in october. >> okay. i appreciate that. i know sometimes we don't stick to those timelines, but my main concern is how we got to a staff

proposal that was focusing on cutting these really crucial programs that have provided crucial experiences for students, versus the least amount, which is being cut to our administrative budget. how did that conclusion come to be? >> may be i will just observe that and, chief wallace, please correct me if i got any of these dates wrong, but we have been sharing our thinking for a couple of months as the plan has taken shape. i believe we shared in three different meetings through the course of three different

meetings that we shared the proposal that is basically in front of you today. this was back in early november. we have tried to be explicit and concrete about the elements of the proposal, so if i understand your question, president lopez, you are asking, how did we get here? part of my response is we have been showing our thinking in chunks for the last couple of months. >> you are correct. i also know this is not the first time you were hearing this argument from the board. even within each time that we've listen to the budget, i not understanding why we continue to prose -- propose something that prioritizes staff positions that aren't higher up than the ones who are on the ground.

i seeing commissioner collins and commissioner alexander want to comment. >> i want to say that i want to, you know, validate your statement, president lopez. when i was budget chair, that was a recurring conversation that we had. i believe that commissioner sanchez and others introduced a resolution at that time which talked about zero-based budgeting. i was excited to think that that would have happened in 2019. we were starting that conversation of, how do we decide what are the necessary things for a school? and i have consistently asked that. i think, to some degree as a board, we have to answer that question. and what is upsetting to me, honestly, is that we haven't moved past asking the question, and we are still allowing our definition of what is the

minimum requirement at a school. i don't think it is what a school needs to be fully functional and support students. i think we need nurses and social workers and art teachers and r.s.p. and eric -- and educators and we have never had that discussion. we have continued to just put it off and say, well, we will let the school figure it out, and we had discussions when i was on the budget committee as a chair. what that means is, do i want to cut off my arm or do i want to cut off my leg? that is a choice, but it is not actually functional. that is what we're doing right now. i do appreciate president lopez for naming that and commissioner sanchez for naming that. this current budget does not support students and it will not encourage educators to continue to commit to working in conditions that are unworkable.

thank you for raising that question. >> president lopez, i think it is a really important question. i have had conversations privately with staff about this question. i'm since you raised it in public, i would like to comment on it a little bit and give my thoughts on it. there have been times over the whole period where i have been really, frankly, angry and frustrated, and wanting to almost find somebody to blame. i was having similar thoughts. we passed a solution in may that was unanimous and it was really clear. i went back and read it and it talks about our core values. it talks about comparing to similar districts that have allocated more resources to school like long beach. someone people told me, you brought this proposal for the last minute, i thought wait a

minute, i think we actually passed this back in may. i have had that very similar feeling. so i have been asking that question myself and trying to get a good dialogue on staff with it. i think our staff are incredibly dedicated. i think they are working in good faith. they have done pieces of it. it's not like the whole resolution hasn't been implemented, but there are key pieces that haven't happened. and one is one that the staff initiated which was zero-based budgeting. that has been really interesting. when i came on the board, we knew we had a deficit. we knew we had a deficit in january. staff were engaged in a process around zero-based budgeting that was intended to inform the 21-22 school year. then if you will recall in the budget committee, we talked about it in great detail. we made a decision at the

recommendation of staff, which i think was the right decision to postpone the process because it was really hard. we allocated those american rescue plan funds to kind of hold budget and we said, you know what, let's pause on your budget cutting and give us until december, which is where we are now, to engage in zero-based budgeting. our teams have made their best effort at that, but the truth is, we haven't done it. i don't think this is -- even with the staff plan, zero-based budgeting is starting from zero, which means you have to analyse every single position. it would be at a school as well. that includes, why do we have classrooms with eight or 10 kids? it also means, why do we have three different places in the

central office that coach principles? and those are structural problems within our district that the current systems don't offer any way of addressing. i almost wonder, and this is really wondering whether a large organizational bureaucracy can reinvent itself? i think there may be a need for outside help in doing this because it is really hard to ask a division chief to cut their own people. it is really hard to ask, when you have an organization with 12 division chiefs, which is grown over the years, that was not a deliberate decision to go from three division chiefs to 12. that happened over a course of years. they said this is an important job, this person is good, let's promote them. now it has gotten to where it

is. and to ask those people to then coordinate amongst themselves, figure out whether there is duplications of services, cut their own departments, that is a big task that, my conclusion is, it is not because, and again, i think you all can speak to this, i don't think it's because they didn't want to do it or didn't work hard at it. i think we collectively maybe in need to get some independent help to do a detailed analysis. so my hope would be -- i mean, part of what we talked about is bringing in folks who are more independent, who can really look. we can't do this all in january, but in january we could say, let's identify another set of possible cuts, of duplication, of high paid positions that may be uncommon. we could do a piece of that work in january and come back to the board. i think the longer restructure the conversation will take

longer than that. may be we will need to engage in an outside firm or someone who can really look at what has happened. this is not a decision that was made. a lot of this happened before dr. matthews got here. commissioner sanchez and i have been nursing old organizational charts and talking about what it was like in 2006, 2009, 2010. there is a historical forensic process that we need to go through to unpack how this happens, but really ask the questions, are these positions necessary or important, you know, and often it is a position that is highly paid. sophia one person working as an executive director, that may fund two teachers, three or four paraprofessionals. those are real trade-offs in our district, and i think that some

of that will be a longer process. some of that we won't be able to do. what i'm excited about in this moment is i think that it feels like there is, for the first time a commitment to do that work, so that is what gives me hope. i don't know. i don't know if i'm answering, but that is my analysis. i don't think it is because they didn't want to do it or didn't try to do it, but i do think on an organizational level it is challenging work. especially as we head into the pandemic. we have been trying to reopen schools. i do think, i'm not trying to make excuses, but it is work we have to do. there's a lot of reasons why it hasn't happened. i don't know if i answered your question. >> i would like to respond. and if you wanted to touch on that, i don't disagree that this is a longer process. what is true is the people we need to engage our our

teachers. if you want to talk about any of the effectiveness of our programs, whether they are impacting students were not, how well or not well they are working and supporting them, they are the ones. when we talk about disengaged -- this engagement process, i would love to see educators engage directly on the ground and every single one of the school buildings. i get we didn't have enough time because the timeline that we have now, my hope would have been to send a message with what we are voting on tonight that we are choosing our educators, and knowing in the coming months there will be revisions, there might be more funding, there is more money we can work with. at least we can say we are working with you. the people who are with our children right now. no one sitting here tonight, except for commissioner sanchez, will be in the classroom tomorrow. after having a discussion about who we want to choose and who we value the most and the message we are sending, and again, i

know we are all struggling with a process and i understand that, but we have to keep bringing it to the people who are there. many people have so many ideas. i knew this as an educator when i was teaching. i always heard of how we need to do this work from people who have never gone through this and who don't understand the educational systems and who have committed all this work, paid all this money to be a teacher and we are having this conversation, we are hearing them, and it is really frustrating to get to this point, to continue to be pushed and pushed. i don't know what we will do when we reach the point where people are going to choose themselves over this work because of the messages we keep sending. >> can i just say, i agree with what you are saying. this is what i have been so frustrated with because i think even symbolically, when we have a plan that preserves 75 executive directors and 12

chiefs. i love them, this is not about any chief. we can cut 50 minutes from school, no problem. we can't cut a single chief? that, to me, sends a strong and disturbing message. i totally agree with you, president lopez. >> i haven't had access to the zoom. i apologies. >> go ahead and speak. >> he is not muted, so i'm not

sure. he may have to log off and log back on. >> hold on. there we go. thank you. >> thank you. can you hear me? >> go ahead. >> thank you. i want to raise two points about the recommendations. i have focused on the initial ones and secondly, the words were chosen very, very carefully. so i will draw your attention to number 2. and that was staffing at all levels with student enrolment. all levels means all levels.

one of the foundational reasons, the problem you are dealing with is you have declining enrolment. and when you have declining enrolment, we see staff -- it doesn't necessarily mean reducing services. if you have 400 kids and you lose 100 of them, you don't need as many teachers. that may happen to attrition. the underlying statement of that is there is still work to be done. secondly, if you look at our midterm recommendations, which i did not go through, is it was to analyse district office staffing and assign staff the task of coming up with any additional recommendation or reassignment to schools. your work is not done. while this may have struck -- snuck up on you, the problem you

have tonight is a realignment. i will also say that in my role as representing the state, you are in a very critical period and you need to be cautious about not realignment, but restructure. we will bringing on a superintendent at the end of the here. i think it is important for the long-term process. so long as you get through the short-term. i don't know that it will be as painful as what you have heard from a lot of the speakers, there has been some attrition, there will be some realigning in terms of moving people from one site to another, and i recognize that nobody wants to change school sights. that may be necessary. i cannot promise you more money. i know everyone is working hard, but the task before you tonight

is to approve a concept. two things, that you will make the necessary staff cuts and that you will realign staff at all levels and they will all meet the needs of the number of students that you have. keep in mind, you went from 57,000 to 50,000. that is a 14% loss of students. there's a lot of districts. that is significant. so the work at hand, and i know it is easy to point fingers, i think it is a little bit more difficult to just move forward and take care of it, but that is the reason the state has stepped in. not because they want to take over. the state wants the problem fixed and to be able to say that san francisco took care of it. we are here to help in any way we can. thank you.

>> thank you for your comments. unless there are any other comments from commissioners or student delegates, we can put this up for a vote. i just need guidance on how to proceed. >> that was an important conversation. and on a more helpful note, i want to remind everyone we do have a path forward and i think these things have been acknowledged. i think, like i said, this work is really hard and i think, to expect, you know, i think it is expecting a lot and we have a path forward. i would, if it is okay with my colleagues, withdrawal my proposal with the understanding that we will proceed with, and come back in early february with a deeper analysis that would

inform our path moving forward that is based around that proposal. not withdrawing -- i withdrawing it formally, but not withdrawing the concept. it will be analysed more deeply in january and to come back in late january, early february. >> the process has already started as we started scheduled meetings to do just that. >> president lopez, just to help out our clerk, could we get a motion and a second to approve the fiscal year 20 -- 2022, 2023, 2024 budgeting plan? , both the proposals were moved and seconded. the vote should be clear which one you are voting on. >> that is correct. that is what i wanted guidance on. it sounds like commissioner alexander is moving.

does he need to make a motion? >> the board does not need to approve. you just need to not move and second and vote on that. >> we moved both of them. can we just move and second? >> that's what i recommend. >> i will move the staff proposal. >> i will second that. >> i will reread it to add clarity. we are voting on item one, fiscal year 2022-2023, 2023 -- 2024. roll call vote. [ roll call ]

>> all right. we have done item two. moving on to item three. i need a motion and a second. >> second. >> presenting this item will be our chief financial officer. >> thank you so much. for this item, i will be very brief and say with the adoption

of the fiscal year 2022, 2023 and 2024 budget balance under item one, we request approval for the first interim report. with a positive certification for submission to the california state superintendent of public construction by tomorrow's deadline. and this is a reminder that this was from the december 7th special meeting for the committee of the whole. i'm happy to answer any questions. >> before we do that, i would like to open it for public comment and remind us to turn this off -- turn off our phones. >> please raise your hand for the first interim report.

please repeat it in spanish and chinese. span-mac -- [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] >> i'm seeing forehands. >> brandy? hello, brandy? brandy, did you care to speak. >> sorry. no problem. >> hello, marie?

are you there? hello, chris? >> hello. can you hear me? >> i can. thank you. >> i a special education teacher. while i disappointed that there are considerations about these cuts to sites, i hopeful the conversation will be continuing and the information in the interim report will be accurate and presented clearly to the members of the public and that people will be given actual opportunity to provide feedback that is listens to. it hurts me when i hear that people didn't know that people wanted things when i myself have commented, hey,, i need more clarity on this. and when i have heard others comment that. i would like to thank you all for the work you have done on

this so far and encourage you to continue making this work and avoid making harmful cuts to school sites, wherever humanly possible. >> thank you. hello, terra? >> yes. i want to say that, you know, we go from 57,002 enrolled and that is a decline in enrolment. that is true. i feel like we have pointed to the easy away -- the easy way out. we get about 20 kids per class and so let's decide -- divide that by 350 teachers.

so you have 20 kids per class. i don't think that is the best way to go about things. one of the main things why people don't want to choose or that are privileged enough to not choose public schools is the teacher to student ratio. if you want to make students come to your district, how about maybe only having 15 kids per class. maybe that should be the cut off, instead of saying, well, social -- so long as we are at the cut off of 20 kids per class. it is the first thing to go. >> think you. >> hello, gregory? >> thank you. i do think that, you know, the district is very top-heavy, all the chiefs and executives and that cuts do need to be made. i think it is pretty much

impossible for a bureaucracy to make cuts within itself. i think the board should continue getting outside help to make those kind of cuts. at the same time when there are 7,000 fewer students, do not think it is realistic to not cut school staff. i don't see numerically how that will ever end up with a balanced budget. i ask that the staff budget continue to make cuts from the executive positions where possible. thank you. >> thank you. collar with a 379 phone number? >> yes, hello.

do you hear me? >> yes. >> i a teacher with san francisco unified. i taught for the district for about 23 years and all teaching positions at various levels. so in that time what i have seen is that there has been cuts. he used to be home at, used to be shop now there is no shop, the used to be. resources and now there is no peer resources. it is less fun. and then the flip side, like you could talk about is the admin were teachers on special assignments. the earth, all that, it has increased. i really hope in your january and february meetings you look at the achievement gap. it has been talked about. it has been exactly a thing. what we are doing is wrong. my opinion could be more helpful, but i think you need to start looking at getting more people with credentials in these buildings and really honing in

on the work at each individual school. the schools are so different. i go to totally different schools and they are night and day. thank you. president lopez, that concludes public comment. >> thank you. any questions or comments from student delegates or commissioners? seeing then, let's do a roll call vote. [ roll call ]

>> item four, annual and five-year report relating to the collection and expenditure of developer fees. i need a motion and a second on special order five. >> so moved. >> second. >> thank you. i would like to call on the chief to present this item. >> thank you. good evening. this will be a very brief presentation. tonight i'm here to present an annual report that is required by state law that allows us to collect developer impact fees. our recommendation is the board review and adopt the attached developer impact fee annual and five-year report for the fiscal year ending june 30th, 2021. as you maybe aware, the district is the beneficiary of a san francisco citywide developer impact fee for schools.

we use this money overwhelmingly for capital expenditures. it is limited in that day and it can be used by very few salary expenses, and overwhelmingly it goes through the facility's design construction team to deliver expansions of sites and expansions of capacity, which is also limited is asian of the funding force -- we collected six-point for million dollars in 2021. we expended about $6.2 million. we do use these funds and will continue to rely on them, particularly as we contemplate expansions and changes to sights in response to future demographics. i happy to take any questions. >> great. let's check for public comment before you do. >> please raise your hand if you

care to speak to the collection of expenditure fees. can that be repeated in chinese and spanish, please? [speaking foreign language] [speaking foreign language] >> thank you there is one. chris? >> hello. i switched to a different system. can you hear me? >> yes. wonderful. >> i wanted to ask if these funds can be used to improve school sites as we expand programs and want to offer better services to students, for example,, at school sights where there are broken windows that are almost impossible to close when it is rainy and windy, which is what i was teaching through yesterday or giving finals through yesterday. can that be used to -- can these

funds be used to fix some of these things? thanks. >> thank you. that concludes public comment. >> thank you for that. any questions or comments? >> thank you. >> page 10, table four, it illustrates all these projects. one is i happy to see, cleveland. i think they are building there and tearing out the bungalows and actually building classrooms. how do we prioritize which projects get funded through these developers? >> i think a lot of these projects are projects that have been in the pipeline and we do have a fund balance that has

accumulated because, again, it is restriction of the constrained funding. we can't use these funds for deferred maintenance. we need to use them to expand facilities in response to, you know, student population growth. there are funds here that have -- i will have to go back and get the precise amount on the existing fund balance that can be programmed, but traditionally this has been, again, in response to sight requests and when we find a project that matches the eligibility of the funds, we do try to do it and move forward.

we are moving slowly through the project. the answer there is we have not come forward with a request in a while to prioritize the funds, but it is something, particularly as we think about southeast facility planning, that i would like to contemplate how to use these files -- how to use these. >> can you remind us what the balance is here right now. >> there is a fund balance of $35.5 million and some of that balance, and i'm sorry, i don't have that number, have been allocated to projects, but not spent. i have said a considerable portion of that is unallocated. you can see in the reports that there is a whole pipeline list of potential projects and so that is the universe of projects that have been contemplated, but we have not, you know, precisely budgeted and scheduled those projects yet. >> when we were having the temp discussion around facility needs, could this be used for that? >> probably not unless we were expanding the footprint of the building to accommodate an even

larger student population. >> okay. >> thanks. one question i had related to this is how does the developer fees fit into the broader capital planning that you are thinking of rolling out? i think now that we have come back to in person learning, we are really carrying this out for 2022 and i'm thinking about how we look at the whole portfolio of assets, land assets including schools and all the modernization that needs to occur along with the funding that comes with the facilities. >> that is a great question. i would be happy to discuss this in more detail at a future building and grounds committee, i think the headline answer is there are a couple of core funding sources, all of which we

will discuss in our upcoming capital plan, including general obligation bond, including the life safety tax, and including these developer impact fees. i think one of the things that we need to plan for strategically is that notwithstanding the current contraction of the student population, overall we are still looking at a dramatic growth in the city, particularly in the eastern side of the city over the next 15 to 20 years. we have to continue to think about this, especially if there are significant changes to the student assignment policy on how to align our building footprint and the populations that we can serve on the eastern side of the city with that projected growth. i look forward to having that conversation with the board as part of our capital planning process. >> great. thank you.

>> all right. if there are no other comments, we will do a roll call vote on the motion. [ roll call ] >> item five, we are still under section h. memorandum of understanding between united educators of san francisco and san francisco unified school district regarding the online learning program, the on-demand learning program and the ongoing covid-19 pandemic, this -- i need a

motion and a second. >> so moved. >> second. >> presenting this item will be our acting chief of labor relations. >> good evening, dr. matthews and commissioners. the recommended action tonight is to approve the memorandum of understanding between the united educators of san francisco and sfusd regarding the online learning programs, the on-demand learning programs, and the ongoing covid-19 pandemic. >> thank you. let's check for public comment. >> please raise your hand if you care to speak to the m.o.u. with the united educators. can that be repeated in spanish and chinese, please? [speaking foreign language]

>> any questions or comments on this item? [ roll call ]

>> item six, san francisco county office of education, san francisco county plan for expelled and at risk youth, fiscal year 21 through 24. this is item 2112. i need a motion and a second. >> so moved. >> second. >> the staff presenting this item will be our chief of student services. >> thank you, dr. matthews. i will defer to the superintendent on this one, but i can give a quick introduction on the plan. this is a triannual plan. we have to have a plan every three years on the services provided to students who are at county schools and programs. and the assistant superintendent

can talk more about the details of the plan. >> okay. thank you so much. just to go over, there are three particular schools that will carry out this plan. that is civic centre secondary school and the centre for academic -- it is located within the ymca of buchanan and bayview. and then we have youth chance high school. those are all of the programs that we use to serve students located within the juvenile probation department. i more than happy to have -- answer any questions. those are the three primary programs that we utilized to serve students. i'm sorry my video was off. i just realized the video was off. >> no worries. are there any questions or comments?

sorry, let's do public comment before we do that. >> please raise your hands if you care to speak to the plan for at risk youth. can that be repeated in spanish and chinese, please? [speaking foreign language] >> thank you. i seeing two hands. >> yes, i a parent and i just discovered this for the first time. i wanted to say that i grew up in a small city. programs like this didn't exist when i grew up, so i just want to take a moment -- this is a

moment where sfusd, from my perspective, they are doing something really good. having said that, i hoping that we can continue to prevent this so we are not expelling students who don't need to be expelled. i just wanted to take a moment where i grew up. they were lost and there was no additional opportunity for education. thank you. we are doing it. >> thank you. >> hello. thank you for this plan and i must say, i knew to this. and my first pass at reading the plan, i see it for a lot of behavioral support. i see a lot of mention for behavior. and unless i missed it, i don't

see any mention of academics. what we find it very often and what we are finding is that a lot of our students who are suspended, we are finding a lot of students are over identified or fully missed. we are finding, that we see all the time, very often, students who have externalizing behaviours, those behaviours are coming from academic frustration. what are we doing to address the underlying academic challenges that students are facing, or as much as these behaviours? thank you. >> thank you. that concludes public comment. >> now are there questions? >> would you like to speak first? >> i just wanted to say that when i go to public commenters,

i glad that we have options for students that are expelled. but i wanted to ask that we get some detail as to how students are doing in terms of academics, but also in terms of behavior and social and emotional health. i just putting this in as a request for later on, but i would love to see those, as we do, at the beginning of the year. thanks. >> on my end, the hyperlinks aren't working. when you click on or try to click on the school resolution, it doesn't go anywhere. i don't know if that is supposed to or not. [ indiscernible ] >> it might have been in the conversion to pdf. we will convert that.

>> you white -- you might want to connect the amount of students. it says we have approximately 53,000 students. this was a number of times in the document. >> thank you. >> any other questions or comments on this item? okay, let's do a roll call vote. [ roll call ] item seven, and this is a few

sections away, but we will be hearing on a report from every one of our committees. heads up to all of our chairs. item seven, under section h., resolution finding that as a result of the state of emergency declared by california governor gavin newsom on march 4th, 2020, it is necessary to continue to conduct virtual meetings to avoid imminent risk to the health and safety of attendees. just to clarify, we are voting on this once again because we have to do it every 30 days, correct? i need a motion and a second. >> so moved. >> second. >> i would like to call on the general counsel. >> president lopez, the board and the public has seen this item many times.

it probably doesn't need a lot of explanation. the one thing i would add is i did get questions why we did this -- why we're doing this again. it is necessary to look forward. in order to have virtual meetings for the next 30 days, we need to have enacted a resolution. does because of the meeting schedule, it is necessary to bring this back to you. >> thank you. [please standby for captioner switch]

>> i want to also reaffirm the rapport earlier this evening. what we've continued to say each time this comes up and what you're hearing from others that being able to participate virtually is really a game changer for families of all sizes and shapes as many of our grandparents are raising our kids. it keeps a safer and also improves our ability to be abl to participate for our parent leaders . thank you somuch . >> president: thank you. chris? >> caller: chris strauss again. just saying my support the idea of continuing a virtual aspect to meetings but am very much looking forward to being back in person at board meetings and

continuing advocacy with you all physically in the room. i just think it's a lot easier to do it in the room when you are able to see the microphone and see the timer that's onthe wall and see the people that you are talking to and have you all see the people you are. from . i think that would increase the advocacy that people feel capable of and it would increase their confidence that they are heard and that their comments are appreciated. i'd like to point out that i want a virtual version of our meetings at washington high school while the faculty meeting is happening in person for those members who have concerns about covid so iknow it's possible to run a hybrid meeting and if you need help i'm more than happy to help you figure that out . >> clerk: hello, tara. >> caller: i agree with continuing to run our virtual

meetings and as the previous speaker said we can do hybrid easy . we have excellenttechnology to do all these things . you have everyone connected. i know we have to do this every day, to say do we want to keep doing this but maybe as a district we can just an act this to say this is how we will do itfrom now on . even if we have to say every 30 days just you know, to be in line with the requirements just as a district that we know forever we're going to do virtual and we're going to do inperson . i think hybrid is the way to go and we should past something says. >> thank you. leslie? >> my name is leslie, secretary

of usf and i would like to advocate for both having ... >> president: go ahead. >> you can hear me now? you. i'd like to advocate to continue having an online version. we've always had some tv version where you can view or zoom, whichever but i also think it's important to have our leaders have a closer relationship with the constituents theyserve and that includes students , families and educators and thecommunity . and it helps bring that relationship closer together in order for us to move forward together and collaborate. >> thank you, paulina.

>> this is paulina they are. i wantedto say i support the virtual meeting . i am open to hybrid maybe going forward but for this 30 day window i think weshould stay virtual . not even necessarily because of covid but the time these meetings go up to his hard to plan around if you go in perso . and i think that virtual aspect allows people like myself to be ableto get on from thecomfort of our homes . that's how i would be able to join . >> president: thankyou and that includes public comment . >> thank you, any questions or comments from our delegates or commissioners? i see commissionersanchez and commissioner center . >> i'm just hoping the staff, but there's hybrid where the districts, how they're doing it because i would rather have

hybridthan just one or the other . and how can weemulate them if we do get it at all ? do you know of any other districts, superintendent matthews ? >> i know that you in the east bay that i talked to are still, one isvirtual . and in the south bay there actually back but it's not hybrid. so no one isdoing hybrid . i'm not saying wecan't, i'm just saying none of them are doing it . but i think part of it is we think the issues that in closed session of a microphoneopen , all of those things have been capability to be a problem.

>> i've raised this issue the last few times and i'm getting increasingly concerned especially now that we have public comments. union leadership just now we have public comments from parents and others who want to be able to be here in person and i guess i'm concerned. my understanding of state law is that we can, like, we have to be related to covid. i'm reading the result that says because of the current limitations, meeting in person will continue to cause imminent risk to the health and safety of attendees at public meetings of the board and i don't see how allowing at least some people in this room would cause imminent risk to health and safety. so in my view i think i'm not

even sure we are following the requirements of state law prohibiting people from being here so i'm curious if we have a thought on that . and aside from that i guess sorry. i hear what the public is saying. they want that access at home but the state law says we actually have to meet in person unless there's an imminent risk and providing access is something we do voluntarily. am i missing that? >> in response to your question of whether we are in compliance, the reason we know we have limited resources is because of the pandemic so if we had unlimited resources we could probably fashion a way to have in person and remote meetings and if the board directs us to do that we will direct resources to that effort but currently because we have resources going in many other directions including keeping schools safe, that has been the

impediment to bringing back in person meetings. >> president: any other questions orcomments ? >> for the parents, i know we have more participation from families, especially families with multiple children because we have the ability to participate online . at the sametime, i feel like we've lost a lot . i think you'venever served on board where there was an actual audience . that's kind of crazy . so there's times it feels more unsafe in this climate andat the same time , people are here in person and their participating in person and thatdoes change the dynamic , beingable to see people face-to-face . i guess what i'm getting

frustrated in his not knowing when this is going toend . and i think with new variants, we are consistently going to have to deal with covid. i want to start bringing people back in a way that is safe and i want to know when staff would be able to share with us what our optionsare because we keep kicking the can down the road . we had a major change to the budget so that priority on our agenda i wonder if that's something we could prioritize, having a conversation about how we can move towards a hybrid model. >> we could definitely put that on the agenda for january and bring it up to the board.>> president: asked everyone let's do a roll call vote on this item . [roll call vote] all right,

before we move on to section i'd like to excuse our student delegates. thank you for all your work and actually we're on our winter break. [inaudible] >> we have a few more items. section i, introduction of proposals and assignments of committee .

item 1. public and for comment on proposals being introduced for first reading at board policy 50 23, translation and interpretation. can we see if there are any public speakers for a policy whichwe will limit to 10 minutes . >> please raiseyour hand to the board policy on translation . thatwill be repeated in chinese . >>. [ speaking spanish] >> on behalf of the community

advisory committee for special education i'd like to respectfully request that iep documents be added to this policy. as you all know,ied is going to take up to a month to translate . if a family has gone through the meeting and is waiting to sign their documentation without a physical copy that they can review then we are delaying assigned services and support to these families. that is definitely inequitable so having some guidelines in here for best practices with a much shorter timeline or distribution of documents is something that thebac is respectfully requested . thank you. >> michelle, go ahead. >> michelle here with the pack and i just wanted to lift up what you heard from the pack report earlier this evening that we support this policy in order to serve families that

participate in their children's education and engage in district meetings and decision-making processes. that being said i want to elevate alida fisher's comments about the need to be able to do this in a timely manner so that we are adequatelyproperly supportingour student families in education . thank you . >> caller: i'm calling as a special education teacher who deals with these ied's. it is so frustrating to me as a case manager to sit there and say you know family, i'm sorry. i'mstill waiting . and not be able to give them what they need to actually provide consent to get necessary changes to iep consented toand get services to students who need them. i'm also concerned with all the

talk about budget cuts . i want to make sure we're not thinking of cutting interpretation and translation services because i can only imagine that slowing the process down evenmore and it's already slower than it should be . so does while you're talking about this , keep that in mind. >> clerk: thank you. geraldine . >> caller: my nameis geraldine anderson and i'm in support of this policy . i've been in several meetings with miss robinson who deals with the iep's and a lot of latinx parents and it's true that we do need this policy just for diversity, equity and inclusivity especially for those who do not speak the english language. you need to member what your website states that you will be

inclusiveof all languages . thank you. >> clerk: hello, tom. >> caller: i'm a special ed teacher. i've wanted iep's with interpretation and the interpreters that come, the people that have to do the writing , there's a lot on their plate so i don't want to put anything inthis . on the form use of it to have interpreted i just think for myself sometimes it comes back quicker but you save the date that the you want, i'm not saying that happens throughout the district . i'm just saying that i know everyone's working hard so i don't want to assume the worst and i also think it's a parent and iep agrees to it the site can figure out how to put those places in the that doesn't have to be the end all be all. >> clerk: that concludes publi

comment . >>president: thank you . and given that this is our first reading i will be referring this to the fall policy andlegislation committee unless i hear otherwise . >> clarifying question. >> i was wondering if there could be i guess a fiscal analysis of what we're already spending on and if there's any changes or increases in spending that we're protecting moving forward based offthe need . >> that analysis exists, i'm glad you asked. i don't know if staff once to it at the rules committee this

month, we presented a detailed and comprehensive analysis with cost and projections and so maybe that could be shared. i mean, it's on board docs and we could email it to all commissioners. this item had been introduced by this idea was talk about the last committee meeting and it will becontinued at the next meeting as well . >> the only thing i would add to that is if we do make changes as we heard some speakers suggest tonight it would have budget implications. then we could refer some rules back to budget so it could be read there. >> i definitely will look at the docs from the last meeting to get that information and i want to make sure we have information about how much this we're getting for those dollars so not just the numbers but how much of that is having us reach our total goal or it is enough for its short and inwhich way .

>> as director how mentioned there were ideas from adding services which would definitely cost more. that's in addition to the point you're raising. all those things hopefully we can take it, i think it should go to budgetas well as rules . >> i want to ask questions about the process because ihad some concerns .we talked about we can put all these things in the list if parents don't know those are their rights things that are currently in our policy parents don't even know exist so i had questions about how we were assessing the to determine how to budget for things and how we are communicating and how we are kind of holding ourselves accountable for providing what we're putting inour policies . so what's the process? it sounds like commissioner boggess had things he might

want to add what the process for having that conversation? i know this is the place to do it but i want to know where that is because this is such an important issue in ourdistrict when it comes to families being in fall and feeling supported . >> there are acouple of choices commissioners . if we think that this is going to require substantial or more and let me put it that way substantial involvement and comments from commissioners that we could refer instead of tools and budget or we could of course comes rules and/or budget and makethose suggestions, comments and ask questions . >> i would propose this is such an important issue in our district and because if i make a recommendation and it has budget implications it's like it could keep going back and

forth that it might make more sense to put it in a cow but i'll leave that up to other colleagues to see what their ideas are. >> any other comments? >> we just need your guidance as to where to refer this. >> we want to make that decision right now. >> i might support the idea because i do think it is cost-cutting and i think actually what staff put together for rules last time would be worth resenting to the full board andactually maybe adding some analysis from some of these other questions in the options . i think that might make sense to do that in my opinion. >> that's referred to committe . all right. section j, board members report item 1 report from recent committee meetings will begin as mentioned we will be hearing from all the committees.

we will begin with the ad hoc committee on student assignment which happened monday, november 15 . commissioner. >> just to provide an update from that committee, we share updates from staff kind of on the progress as well as the comments from the public. and really i think trying to figure out how we can meet more often as we go into the new year. so that we can really is the work identifying our zone parameters and priorities and in which ways we will have to alter funding and staffing for school sites and ensureeach of those zones are equitable . i would say those are the big highlights we are planning to have two meetings, a meeting in january and a meeting in february of next year so as we get those scheduled we will make sure to post those comments sofalse andparticipate

. that's all i've got . >> president: this is followed by the budget and business committee, commissioner lamb you've met twice since then. so feel free to report on both november 17 and december 1. >> no surprise, it was focusing in on a budget balancing plan and having deeper discussions around the year projections. we also had presentations about our long-term liabilities and surrounding ourbenefits that we provide to our workforce . and really looking at what that analysis looks like long-term and we had some discussions around with proposition g and the positive ruling from the court ruling in favor of proposition g.

we had discussion around the potential proposals where we would like to spend that estimated hundred $50 million recognizing what came out of that dialogue that hundred $50 million, the majority of the committee did express that we wanted to go towards one-time funds and acknowledging the structural deficit that we would be able to rely on a source like top g. >> president: thank you. item 3, report from the ad hoc committee on personnel matters labor relations and affordability . commissioner santos. this happened november 18. >> i haven't chaired a meeting in a while . this committee only meets three times a year.

the biggest take away is from thestaff report, a 30 page report . it's really well done reflecting the diminished capacity of californians to achieve robust staff and particularly at that level so throughout the state there's a growing number of retirements and resignations further reducing supply of teachers and others work inour schools . the pipeline problems are exacerbated by teacher testing policies and inadequate financial for completing programsand future workload and burnout are major concerns . s usd opened this year with 49 classrooms not filled and we had 137 openings most of which are special education. 32 teacher openings. the good news is there are no administrators and the fulfillment rate for substitute

for teachers, parents and early educationrange from 35 to 44 percent . in other words substitutes are not showing up and classes often lead to students having to be split up and put in other classrooms or existing staff being put into those classrooms. there's other information in the report around the diversity in our recruitment efforts and so we have staff in ourschools to look at those . you. >> president: item 4, report from the building groundsand services committee monday, november 22 . >> we met with the grounds commission and there was one item on the agenda that was an updatefrom the mission bay school project . there are several milestones that the school project is walking into and the big ones

are the completion of the eir. there is a land transfer we've been working on and in the beginning of the site remediation, this is an item that's going to come back next week on the 20th or for further discussion. mission bay also has several next steps that are going to be things that are colleagues should come into and i think she needed maybe making around checking in with folks in terms of critical next stepsfor commission bay project . >> president: item 6, we already heard from business services. report from the rules policy andlegislation committee monday, december 6 .

>> as i mentioned we spent a lot of time discussing the education andtranslation policy . we have public comment from a number of parents and a great staff report that laid out what we do now and a couple possible changes which were once again we haven't done any budget analysis but there in the end of the powerpoint and those were recommended by parents in response to feedback although we just had an issue that commissioner collins referred to witches there are things that werealready doing in our policy that may be inconsistent in terms of implementation . so we also thousand long discussion of the meeting and we talked about our state legislative priorities. which you saw the link to the letter that superintendentlever for doing the presentation today . the rules committee we actually adopted a set of priorities which the two main ones are which were also both inlet letter were working on

increasing lcs at funding and the special education funding issue and advocating out the state level for that. i think staff has a good again, deputy lee and vega is taking over all the relations and i think they have a great strategy for addressing some of those issues and they maybe asking commissioners tosupport with that in the coming weeks and months . interms of doing that state-level advocacy . >> last item 7, report from the curriculum and program committeethat happened yesterday . >> we have three items on our agenda, one information action item . the informational item was an update on the success for all latin asked students resolutio

. and that presentation is available at board docs and folks want to look at that and we had two action items. one was on the creation of the ct tax and that was moved forward with a positive recommendation from the budget committee. and the other item for action was a literacy resolution which we continued and will continue at the next curriculum meeting. >> president: section j continued. item 2, board delegates and membership organization . i have see sba and i believe commissioners moliga and lam recently attended .>> we attended csba's annual

conference and overall it was pretty exciting because folks hadn't been together for 2 years in person and it was nice to be with colleagues around the state and i think people just really appreciated sharing what we've all been through in the last few years through covid, the pandemic. and some of our colleagues are experiencing quite different things that we areexperiencing here .but overall, there were workshops and we attended physical oversight and overall just i think it is a very positive space for trading and building, continuing to refresh and continue with learning as

board members and hearingabout some of the latest advocacy tracks similar to what deputy superintendent lee and team ar already working on . and looking ahead on sustainable funding . but you know, going back to that we're seeing workforce crisis similar to what we are experiencinghere as well as all loss of student enrollment . it was a consistent challenge that school boards are tackling in all areas of the state. >> how do i follow that? we had a great time. it was nice being in san diego with other school board members, superintendents and their staff and commissioner lam. i encourage our school board to go next year. it's a good way to kind of meet everyone in the state and see different methods and also the connections. so many good opportunities

again, mentor ships and just learning from folks who have beenin the game for 20+ years . but just wonderful people willing to share their experience with us and we were definitely out there talking up our school district and a lot of people are supporting us. lot of love, mother of support throughout the state . we are experiencing similar issues across the state. 85 percent of the schools are going through thesame thing so we're not alone . it was a good time so i hope next year we can all take some time and go up there and enjoy. >> commissioner moliga and i were doing our jobs, so definitely putting it out there to the network knowing that we have on our process and hopefully some interested folks will be reaching out to ho i a.

>> president:item 3, all other reports by board members . seeing nine, item4, calendar of committee meetings . announcing what is posted in the agenda. the budget and business services will be meeting wednesday january 5 2021 at 4 pm. buildings, grounds and services is meeting monday,december 20 . at 5 pm. sorry, but it's andbusiness services will be meeting in 2022 . curriculum and programs monday, january 10 20 3:40 pm. rules policy and legislation monday, january 3,2021 4 pm .

>> we decided toactually cancel the january meeting . especially now that we've decided to send the item to a cow because we don't have much legislative update . we will just gowith the february date . >> the next meeting there will be anupdate on the february . >> the first monday in february. >> ad hoc committee on student assignment to be determined as well as personnel matters , and affordability. >> personnel meeting matters meeting onfebruary 17 . >> last item memorial adjournment. i like to call on doctor matthews for adjournment in memory of sir sherman elementary school educator andrew lehman .

>> thank you president boaz. during this meeting in memory of andrew lerman. andrew was a longtime member of the sherman elementary school community . heserved for seven years as a parent educator , a new monitor and after school staff member. he also attended sherman as a student, as did his father and his great uncle. andrew was tragically killed in a car crash as he waited to cross the street to get to work on november 10. he was much loved by the students at sherman and highly respected by the staff. he was known for his caring and kindhearts , calm and cool demeanor and for making all students feel seen and heard. as an educator hewas dedicated to honing his craft . he invested a lot of time in building meaningful

relationships with students , gettingto know them as learners and as people . he was truly a warm commander, workingto maximize their growth and awareness . we appreciate the impact andrew has had on the many lives of students, families and staff at sherman and we share our sympathy with his family at the sherman community. we are grateful to all of our parent educators who like andrew strive to bring out the best in studentseach and every day . we thank you for your service and dedication. >> thank you very much. section l, closed session. before we go into closed session i call on any speakers to the closed session items listed in the agenda. there will be a total of five minutes .

>>please raise your hand if you'd like to speak . any of the items on the closed session agenda cannot be repeated in tiny's and spanish. [speaking spanish] >>. [speaking cantonese] >> president: irecess the regular

>> i resume the regular meetin . section l, reconvene to open session, item 1 . roll on student explosion matters. i moved approval of the stipulated expulsion agreement of one high schoolstudent , matter number 2021 2022 06 from the district for the remainder of the fallsemester 2021 and the followingspring semester of2022 . can i get a second ? rollcall . [roll call vote] seven aye. >> i moved approval of the expulsion agreement of one high

school student matter number 2021 2022 number 07 from the district forthe remainder ofthe fall semester2021 and following spring semester of 2022 . can i get a second . rollcall . [roll call vote] >> item 2, report from closed session into items of litigation the board voted seven aye's,provided direction to the general counsel . and second end, adjournment. there is no further business s this meeting is adjourned .

check one two. it's that time. first, let me introduce phil ginsburg, the general manager of park and rec is going to introduce the mayor. let's welcome phil ginsburg. >> happy holidays everybody. >> welcome back after a really difficult couple of years.

welcome back to golden gate park. it's crazy out here. first thing i want to do is let's hear it for our incredible mc. unique. all right. so my job is to welcome you all to the annual lighting of our beloved uncle john tree and the kickoff of the lights. brought to you by the recreation and parks department. the san francisco parks alliance, illuminating the conservatory of flowers and the national memorial grow. all right. i only have about 20 more

minutes. it will be good. so let's talk about how important this celebration is. this special v.i.p. i'm going to bring up in a second has been lighting holiday trees and and menoras all over the city for a week. there's only one city holiday tree and it's right behind you. let me tell you a little bit about this tree because to understand this tree, to understand our city and to understand golden gate park. this tree, uncle john's tree named after john mclaren who was the longest serving parks director in city history, 56 years. madam mayor, do you know the second? uncle john's tree is a cyprus

and it was planted in 1986. of the that's 125 years ago. this ceremony tonight this ceremony tonight has been going on since 1930 which is the first time this tree was lit. so we are here on its 91st year which is pretty mazing. and madam mayor has been coming to this tree lighting since 1970 started by mayor liota. for 51 years. that's longer than the mayor's been alive. so with that history in mind, golden gate park is always magical during the holiday season and this year, madam

mayor, it's bigger and better than ever. so let me tell you, let me walk you all we're going to light the tree. afterward, we're going to walk down to that music concourse for part two to see the magic. one of the most popular installations of all timeses, this is an illuminated meadow of interchanging lights. it's fantastic. right across from intwined and a little closer to us is the circle of light and it did it just two nights ago and you see the conservatory of flowers. and then you keep walking past how many people went on the sled tonight. let's give it up for the recreation and parks department.

and then we keep going and all the trees around jfk, they're all lit up and then we work our way into the music concourse and there's doing to be free music on that big old 150' ferris wheel is lit up. that's how we celebrate the holidays in san francisco. all right. so a few thank yous and i'm going to bring up the woman who's in charge of lighting this tree, but i want to thank all of our wonderful artists and performers, charles is here. of the joshua hubert has lit up all the trees. oliver did the circle of lights. dana king who did the incredible exhibit monumental reckoning and the music concord, ben davis who's here.

i want to thank you to all our partners and then behind me, we had some amazing people the incredible department heads. our entire recreation and park commission. our staff who worked so hard to put this on and then a special thank you to our parks program. in our san francisco police department and offer safe spaces. that's what parks are. safe spaces. healthy recreations for park visitors of all ages, for building jobs and leadership skills boosting college readiness and giving kids a good time. over the last four years, rec

and park has hired 100 kids from our park program in just four years. we have 100 kids working for us, but tonight, they're only job is to help us with the count down. our park champion and chief. she's everywhere. she's keeping people working. she's keeping people happy because she loves the fun and she loves her parks and she's been all over the last couple of weeks lighting trees. but tonight, madam mayor is the night. so give it up for our mayor. the honorable london breed. >> first of all, i don't think i've ever seen this many people at this tree lighting and it just makes me so happy because

as you know last year, we couldn't come together in the same way, but we're here to celebrate the holidays and it just takes me back to when i was a kid and i used to beg my grandma, please, mom, i want this doll for christmas and please, mom, can we go downtown to woolworth where we can get toys and have fun and my grandmother would say only if you did good. only if you did your homework, only if you listen. and i tried my best. i did the best i could. but during the holiday season, i can't help but think of the memories when i was a kid and what the time that i spent in san francisco and looking at the kids here now and thinking about the memories that they're creating. they're going to remember the days that they came here with mom and dad and grandma and uncles and just a different program to light this tree. so just remember this moment, remember where you are and

remember who you were with because today, we're creating memories. and i want to take this opportunity to really thank the rec and parks department for all the work in this pandemic. let me tell you. this pandemic has been hard on so many of us and because our parks were still open and available to us, it was really the only sanity i'm sure many of us had especially the parents and i want to thank them for their work and all the commissioners that are here. thank you to the families and all the people in san francisco. last but not least, before we light this tree i know we're tired of hearing talk, i just want to say we're at 70% of san franciscans vaccinated. so i am really excited about continuing to re-open our city.

continuing to enjoy the holidays. so at this time, it is time to light the largest tree in san francisco to celebrate the holidays. happy holidays, mayor christmas, happy hanukkah and all the holidays in between. phil, can we get this thing starting? count it down. you can help me count it down. okay. are we ready? we're going to start at 10 and count backwards. are we ready? all right. ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one!

turn the switch! happy holidays everyone. >> when i first started painting it was difficult to get my foot in the door and contractors and mostly men would have a bad attitude towards me or not want to answer my questions or not include me and after you prove yourself, which i have done, i don't face that obstacle as much anymore. ♪♪♪

my name is nita riccardi, i'm a painter for the city of san francisco and i have my own business as a painting contractor since 1994 called winning colors. my mother was kind of resistant. none of my brothers were painter. i went to college to be a chiropractor and i couldn't imagine being in an office all day. i dropped out of college to become a painter. >> we have been friends for about 15-20 years. we both decided that maybe i could work for her and so she hired me as a painter. she was always very kind. i wasn't actually a painter when she hired me and that was pretty cool but gave me an opportunity to learn the trade with her company. i went on to different job opportunities but we stayed

friends. the division that i work for with san francisco was looking for a painter and so i suggested to my supervisor maybe we can give nita a shot. >> the painting i do for the city is primarily maintenance painting and i take care of anything from pipes on the roof to maintaining the walls and beautifying the bathrooms and graffiti removal. the work i do for myself is different because i'm not actually a painter. i'm a painting contractor which is a little different. during the construction boom in the late 80s i started doing new construction and then when i moved to san francisco, i went to san francisco state and became fascinated with the architecture and got my contractor's licence and started painting victorians and kind of gravitated towards them. my first project that i did was

a 92 room here in the mission. it was the first sro. i'm proud of that and it was challenging because it was occupied and i got interior and exterior and i thought it would take about six weeks to do it and it took me a whole year. >> nita makes the city more beautiful and one of the things that makes her such a great contractor, she has a magical touch around looking at a project and bringing it to its fullest fruition. sometimes her ideas to me might seem a little whacky. i might be like that is a little crazy. but if you just let her do her thing, she is going to do something incredible, something amazing and that will have a lot of pop in it. and she's really talented at that. >> ultimately it depends on what the customer wants. sometimes they just want to be

understated or blend in and other times they let me decide and then all the doors are open and they want me to create. they hire me to do something beautiful and i do. and that's when work is really fun. i get to be creative and express what i want. paint a really happy house or something elegant or dignified. >> it's really cool to watch what she does. not only that, coming up as a woman, you know what i mean, and we're going back to the 80s with it. where the world wasn't so liberal. it was tough, especially being lgbtq, right, she had a lot of friction amongst trades and a lot of people weren't nice to her, a lot of people didn't give her her due respect. and one of the things amazing about nita, she would never quit.

>> after you prove yourself, which i have done, i don't face that obstacle as much anymore. i'd like to be a mentor to other women also. i have always wanted to do that. they may not want to go to school but there's other options. there's trades. i encourage women to apply for my company, i'd be willing to train and happy to do that. there's a shortage of other women painters. for any women who want to get into a trade or painting career, just start with an apprenticeship or if you want to do your own business, you have to get involved and find a mentor and surround yourself with other people that are going to encourage you to move forward and inspire you and support you and you can't give up. >> we've had a lot of history, nita and i. we've been friends and we have been enemies and we've had

conflicts and we always gravitate towards each other with a sense of loyalty that maybe family would have. we just care about each other. >> many of the street corners in all the districts in san francisco, there will be a painting job i have completed and it will be a beautiful paint job. it will be smooth and gold leaf and just wow. and you can't put it down. when i first started, it was hard to get employees to listen to me and go along -- but now, i have a lot of respect.

as latinos we are unified in some ways and incredibly diverse in others and this exhibit really is an exploration of

nuance in how we present those ideas. ♪♪ our debts are not for sale. >> a piece about sanctuary and how his whole family served in the army and it's a long family tradition and these people that look at us as foreigners, we have been here and we are part of america, you know, and we had to reinforce that. i have been cure rating here for about 18 year. we started with a table top, candle, flowers, and a picture and people reacted to that like

it was the monna lisa. >> the most important tradition as it relates to the show is idea of making offering. in traditional mexican alters, you see food, candy, drinks, cigarettes, the things that the person that the offerings where being made to can take with them into the next word, the next life. >> keeps us connects to the people who have passed and because family is so important to us, that community dynamic makes it stick and makes it visible and it humanizes it and makes it present again. ♪♪ >> when i first started doing it back in '71, i wanted to do something with ritual, ceremony and history and you know i talked to my partner ross about

the research and we opened and it hit a cord and people loved it. >> i think the line between engaging everyone with our culture and appropriating it. i think it goes back to asking people to bring their visions of what it means to honor the dead, and so for us it's not asking us to make mexican altars if they are not mexican, it's really to share and expand our vision of what it means to honor the dead. >> people are very respectful. i can show you this year alone of people who call tol ask is it okay if we come, we are hawaii or asian or we are this. what should we wear? what do you recommend that we

do? >> they say oh, you know, we want a four day of the dead and it's all hybrid in this country. what has happened are paper cuts, it's so hybrid. it has spread to mexico from the bay area. we have influence on a lot of people, and i'm proud of it. >> a lot of times they don't represent we represent a lot of cultures with a lot of different perspectives and beliefs. >> i can see the city changes and it's scary. >> when we first started a lot of people freaked out thinking we were a cult and things like that, but we went out of our way to also make it educational through outreach and that is why we started doing the prosession

in 1979. >> as someone who grew up attending the yearly processions and who has seen them change incrementally every year into kind of what they are now, i feel in many ways that the cat is out of the bag and there is no putting the genie back into the bottle in how the wider public accesses the day of the dead. >> i have been through three different generations of children who were brought to the procession when they were very young that are now bringing their children or grandchildren. >> in the '80s, the processions were just kind of electric. families with their homemade visuals walking down the street in san francisco. service so much more intimate and personal and so much more

rooted in kind of a family practice of a very strong cultural practice. it kind of is what it is now and it has gone off in many different directions but i will always love the early days in the '80s where it was so intimate and sofa millial. >> our goal is to rescue a part of the culture that was a part that we could invite others to join in there there by where we invite the person to come help us rescue it also. that's what makes it unique. >> you have to know how to approach this changing situation, it's exhausting and i have seen how it has affected everybody. >> what's happening in mission

and the relationship with the police, well it's relevant and it's relevant that people think about it that day of the dead is not just sugar skulls and paper flowers and candles, but it's become a nondenominational tradition that people celebrate. >> our culture is about color and family and if that is not present in your life, there is just no meaning to it you know? >> we have artists as black and brown people that are in direct danger of the direct policies of the trump administration and i think how each of the artists has responded so that call is interesting. the common

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