Oakland Unified School District Board of Education - Regular Meeting

welcome to the Wednesday May 27th 2026 regular board meeting tonight in closed session oh can I have a roll call to establish quorum on the attendance roll call to establish quorum student director Simmons student director Smith director Lara

director williams director hutchinson director barry director thompson president vice president brohard vice president brohard i'm sorry vice president bachelor sorry here and president brohard here okay can we have the interpretation check mr hoss

Yes, Madam President. For tonight's meeting, we have currently two languages available for live interpretation. They are Arabic and Cantonese. And we have a translation closed caption feature available on Zoom that you can use by clicking the closed caption icon on your Zoom taskbar. With that, we will move on to announcements for live interpretation. We will start with Cantonese. I will lower all attendees' hands on Zoom. Please only raise your hand if you need the language being announced at this time, which is Cantonese. And I will ask Mr. Yuen if he can come off the mute and give the translation announcement for Cantonese.

Hello, everyone. This is the Oakland College Education Committee. If you need Cantonese translation, please click on the icon in the bottom right corner of your screen, type in a地球形狀的符號, and then select Cantonese. You will be able to listen to Cantonese translation. If you need Cantonese translation, please raise your hand. Let us know if anyone needs Cantonese translation. If you are in the scene and need Cantonese translation, please get a computer from the staff, and follow the instructions just now. Then you can listen to Cantonese with online people. Thank you. Mr. Harris, now Cantonese announcement is done.

Thank you, Mr. Yuen. Checking the attendees to see if there's any hands raised for Cantonese interpretation. Seeing no hands, we will not start with Cantonese interpretation at this time. Moving forward to Arabic, I will lower all attendees' hands on Zoom. Please only raise your hand if you need the language being announced at this time, which is Arabic. And I will ask Ms. Abdi if she can come off the mute and give the interpretation announcement for Arabic.

Arabic announcement is done.

Thank you, Ms. Abdi. Checking the attendees to see if there's any hands raised for Arabic interpretation. Seeing no hands, we will now start with any interpretation at this time. That concludes the first announcement for interpretation, and I will pass it back to you, Madam President.

Thank you. Tonight in closed session, we will discuss the following matters. D1, labor matters, conference with labor negotiators. D2, conference with legal counsel existing litigation. D3, conference with legal counsel existing litigation. D4, conference with legal counsel anticipated litigation. D5, conference with legal counsel existing litigation. And item D6, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation. Under public employment, we'll discuss D7, public employment superintendent of public schools. Under pupil matters, D8, expulsion student WW. D9, expulsion student XX. D10, expulsion student YY. And D11, expulsion student ZZ. We will then reconvene to public session at 5.30 p.m. Are there any public comments on closed session items?

Yes, President Brewhart, we have one registered speaker, Carol Delton.

Two minutes.

Hello, I don't see a clock, so I hope you can hear me.

We can hear you.

Thank you. I am commenting on items D2 and D3, and I'm speaking very personally. I'd like to begin by telling you how happy I was to see the We Are One World poster that appeared as part of the multicultural celebrations in OUSD's elementary schools because it included both the Israeli and Palestinian flags alongside many other countries. At the last board meeting, several speakers opposed to the district complying with the CDE order on antisemitism received extended time to speak on the superintendent's report, while others like myself were not called on, nor were we called on to speak during the non-agenda public comment. I'm not a member of the Oakland Jewish Alliance, but I've seen the suggested remedy from their attorney, and I think it's reasonable, and they should take it seriously by providing dedicated time to the speakers who are registered and not called, given that speakers opposed to the CD order were given more than double the allotted time to speak. Some referred to the need to teach critical thinking. In late 2023, the curriculum provided to teachers on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict trivialized or ignored the history of Jews in both Europe and the Middle East. That is not teaching critical thinking. My grandfather, who came on his own to the U.S. in his late teens, not unlike our unaccompanied migrants here, never got over what happened to his parents and siblings who were barred from entry to the U.S. a few years later. Those who survived were essentially stateless and had no place to go but Israel. Nor my in-laws from Libya, native speakers of Arabic, by the way, who also had no place to go. Nor those Jews who have lived continuously in the land for centuries, despite repeated invasions by the Babylonians, Romans, and Ottomans. From my perspective, anti-Zionism unfortunately overlaps with anti-Semitism in the very basic question of where can my family live? When I see a map of the region, as was published by OUSD in repeated years, that has erased Israel, I feel worried. No matter how much I or they, my family and Israel, disagree with the Israeli government, they have nowhere else to go. In Oakland, I hesitate to wear the necklace my grandmother gave me or respond in public to a cousin's WhatsApp message in Hebrew in case someone is looking over my shoulder. much like the Jewish students at our schools. When I hear that someone is lifted up as a hero at one of the school sites and that person has vowed part of their life's mission to kill Jews, I feel worried. When I offer time and time again to district staff to work with them so the board and committee meetings aren't scheduled on the very most observed Jewish holidays, I feel frustrated. When I notice there's a conflict like that, write to board leadership and don't hear back after a month, I feel dismissed. I value that there is one place in the world that runs on my calendar of religious observance. Some of the e-commenters at the last board meeting wrote that they were asking that both Jewish and Palestinian history and peoplehood be lifted up. And so do I. Thank you for listening.

Thank you. Are there any other public speakers?

No, President Brown, I take a call for public speakers.

We're now going to close session.

welcome to the March 27th sorry May 27th school board mr. rake start can we have a roll call to establish quorum please yes on the attendance roll call for the purpose of establishing a quorum student director Simmons student director Smith are absent director Lara present director Williams present sir director Hutchinson present Director Berry.

Present.

Director Thompson. Present. Vice President Baxter.

Here.

And President Brohard.

Here.

Warren present.

Thank you. Mr. Hollis, can we have an interpretation check, please?

Yes, Madam President. For tonight's meeting, we have three languages available for live interpretation. They are Cantonese, Arabic, and Spanish. We also have a translation closed caption feature available on Zoom that you can use by clicking the closed caption icon on your Zoom taskbar. With that, we will start with... announcements for live interpretation we will start with cantonese i will lower all attendees hands on zoom please only raise your hand if you need the language being announced which at this time is cantonese and i asked mr yuen if you could come off the mute and give the interpretation of it for cantonese

Thank you, Mr. Yuen. Checking the attendees on Zoom to see if there's any hands raised for Cantonese interpretation.

Seeing no hands, we will now start with Cantonese interpretation at this time. Moving forward to Arabic, I will lower all attendees hands on Zoom. Please only raise your hand if you need the language being announced at this time, which is Arabic. And I will ask Mr. Turek if he can come off the mute and give the interpretation announcement for Arabic. I'll ask Ms. Abdi if she can come off the mute and give the interpretation announcement for Arabic.

As-salamu alaykum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh. What's your credit? Arabic announcement is done.

Thank you, Ms. Abdi. Checking the attendees to see if there's any hands raised for Arabic interpretation. Seeing no hands who will not start with Arabic interpretation at this time. Moving forward to Spanish. I will lower all attendees hands on Zoom. Please only raise your hand if you need the language being announced at this time, which is Spanish. And I'll ask Mr. Copenhagen if he could come off the mute and give the interpretation announcement for Spanish.

Thank you. Buenas tardes. En un momento activaremos el servicio de interpretación. Para escucharlo, localicen el icono de interpretación en la parte inferior de la ventana. Seleccionenlo y se abrirá una lista de idiomas. Seleccionen Spanish para escuchar en español. Si no ve el icono, haga clic en los tres puntos suspensivos y verán por ahí la opción de interpretación. para saber si hay personas en la reunión que necesitan el servicio por favor levanten la mano virtual en este momento o escriban en el chat que necesitan el servicio si no se pide de esta manera no se prestará el servicio durante la primera parte de la agenda y para las personas presentes en el auditorio si necesitan interpretación hay computadoras disponibles muchas gracias thank you

Thank you, Mr. Copenhagen. Checking the attendees on Zoom to see if there's any hands raised for Spanish interpretation. Seeing no hands, we will now start with any interpretation at this time. That concludes our second announcement for live interpretation. And we will make further announcements later on in the meeting. And with that, I'll pass it to you, Madam President.

Thank you. At tonight's meeting, there are several allotted times where you may make public comments, provided you preregister to speak online before the meeting started, or if you fill out a comment card, which you can find on the table by the entrance. And you can submit those cards at any time. There will be time for public speaking after the adoption of the pupil at the time of the pupil discipline consent report, at the time of special orders of the day, at the time of superintendent's report, the adoption of the general consent report, the adoption of the general consent report number two, the adoption of the general consent report. all non-agenda items within the subject matter jurisdiction of the board during the public hearing, after unfinished business, and after after each of the items i'm sorry of unfinished business the amendment application local assignment option california commission on teacher credentialing application for provisional internship permit application for variable term waiver application for local assignment option there will be public speaking allotted under new business under the first item two oh two four two oh two seven local control and accountability plan 2025 report board policy 7115 capital program construction related local small local and small local resident business enterprise program and the application for provisional internship permit california commission on teacher credentialing Please be aware that in compliance of the Brown Act, board members may not respond to comments regarding issues that are not on our posted agenda for tonight. I ask that all speakers keep their comments to the scope of an item, and if a speaker speaks to a different item, the chair will need to ask that that speaker either speak to the specific item or hold their comments until the appropriate public comment period. report out of closed session for may um session for may twenty seventh twenty twenty six under labor matters on item d one number twenty five dash eighteen sixty four conference with labor negotiators the board gave direction on this matter Under legal matters, item D2, under item number 25-2682, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation, the board discussed this matter. On item D3, number 26-0703, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation, the board discussed this matter. On item D4, number 26-1246, conference with legal counsel, anticipated litigation. The board approved a settlement in this matter. Motion by Vice President Batchelor, second by Director Thompson with a vote of six to zero and one absent. President Brohard, yes. Vice President Batchelor, yes. Director Berry, yes. Director Hutchinson, absent. Director Lara, yes. Director Thompson, yes. And Director Williams, yes. On item D5, number 26-1248, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation. The board approved the settlement in this matter. Motion by Vice President Batchelor, seconded by Director Thompson. Vote approved six to zero. President Brohard, yes. Vice President Batchelor, yes. Director Berry, yes. Director Hutchinson, absent. Director Lada, yes. Director Thompson, yes. And Director Williams, yes. On item D6, number 26-1298, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation, the board approved a settlement in this matter. Motion by Vice President Batchelor, second by Director Thompson, approved on a vote six to zero with one absent. President Brohard, yes. Vice President Batchelor, yes. Director Berry, yes. Director Hutchinson, absent. Director Lada, yes. Director Thompson, yes. Director Williams, yes. Public employment matters on item D7, number 24-1967, superintendent of schools. The board did not take up this matter. Pupil matters on items D8 through D11. The board heard these matters and will vote on the matters in public and section I on the agenda. That is the end of the May 27th, 2026 closed session report out. I now have modifications of the agenda. I would like to pull items O, sorry, zero dash one, and zero dash 21. I would like to withdraw special order of the day, J1, and I would like to move our public hearings after our special meeting on the agenda. Are there any other items, modifications to the agenda?

I'd like to pull 021.

That was pulled.

That was pulled? Yeah. Because I heard 01.

01 and 021.

021 was pulled. Yeah. Thank you.

Director Hutchinson.

Excuse me. Thank you. I'd like to pull on the facilities consent report P8 and P12.

P8 and P12. Thank you. Are there any other modifications to the agenda? With that, we will move into the pupil consent. Pupil matters, is there a motion to approve? So moved. Second. And is there any public comment on this?

Yes, for public comment, we have Asada Olaballa.

Two minutes.

brief because I continue to say the same thing. I think that attention to what is happening, and you're going to see it when you do this review of the violence that's going on all over the country with our young people around discipline. And we have to do something to take our most vulnerable students when it comes to their behaviors and work with them. Not send them to Alameda. I just think that we did a wrong action when we closed that community center school where we had the ability to embrace these young people, find a way to put them on the right track, keep up with their academics, work with their parents and their teachers. You talk about a lot of groups that you focus on. I look at the agenda, your refugees, your immigrants, your newcomer students, every agenda you give attention to them. There's nothing wrong with that attention. But these young people need attention. They need care. They need support. And we're not doing it. I'm sorry.

Thank you. Mr. Rickster, can we have a roll call and vote, please?

On the motion to adopt the Pupil Discipline Consent Report. Student directors are absent and would be recused. Director Lara?

Yes.

Director Williams? Yes, sir. Director Hutchinson? Abstain. Director Berry?

Yes.

director thompson yes vice president batchelor yes and president brokaw yes the pupil discipline consent report is adopted the next item on the agenda is item j which is special orders of the day i believe we have a presentation on the renaming of the field in honor of john beam and tony fardella thank you sorry

I believe this is a voting item.

I'd like to make a motion to move this item forward.

I'll second it. You approve it, right?

Move to approval, yes.

Good evening, board, superintendent Sandler and community. I'm Pranita Ranvasi, executive director of facilities. Good evening, board members and the community. I'm the executive director of facilities planning. First off, I'm honored to be able to present to you all resolution for renaming the Skyline High School Athletic Field, resolution 25-26-0107. Before I go into the brief presentation, I would like to first of all thank the Skyline High School leadership team, the field renaming advisory committee, Skyline students, families, and staff, as well as the alumni, coaches, and community members who actively participated in this thoughtful and collaborative process. I also want to recognize the facility's engagement specialist, Ray Bermudez, who helped lead this community engagement effort as part of the renaming process. Tonight, I'm really honored to be able to present this resolution to you all. in honor of John Beam, Tony Fardella. This recommendation comes straight following a community-led request and a formal engagement process conducted in alignment with board policy 7310 regarding the naming of district facilities. Coach John Beam and Tony Fardella have made long-standing and meaningful contributions to Skyline High School through decades of their leadership, mentorship, coaching, advocacy, and support of student athletes and the athletic programming. As part of this process, staff convened an advisory committee of staff, alumni, community, and students who conducted outreach as well as we had a public survey with participation from parents, students, alumni, teachers and staff. The feedback demonstrated a strong support for recognizing both individuals and highlighted appreciation for the Skyline's athletics legacy and community identity. The resolution also acknowledges future opportunities to continue celebrating skyline athletics, including the potential for a future consideration of John Beam Stadium, Tony Fordella Field, as well as additional parks, displays, monuments, or recognitions featuring honoring skyline athletics history and achievements. This naming effort is also being coordinated alongside district's active skyline athletic field lighting project of approximately 1.5 million. Fiscal impact associated with the renaming of this field is anticipated to primarily include signage, installation, and related recognition materials. Staff proposes that these costs be supported through existing facilities resources, operational resources, and community partnerships. Tonight, staff respectfully requests the board to adopt Resolution 2526-0107, naming the Skyline High School Athletics Field the John Beam-Tony Fardella Field. Thank you, I'm happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, are there any public comments?

There's no registered speakers.

Okay, and are there board comments?

thank you as the facilities chair and the board director representing this skyline community is an honor to bring forward this resolution recognizing these two individuals whose names are deeply woven into the fabric of skyline high school coach john beam and tony fardella each represented decades of dedication mentorship leadership and unwavering commitment to oakland students and student athletes for generations of skyline families coach beam was more than just a coach he was a mentor a role model and a steady presence who pushed young people to believe in themselves both on and off the field his impact extended far beyond the wins and losses he helped shape character build community and create opportunities for countless students across oakland tony fardella's contribution to skyline athletics and school spirit has also left a legacy a lasting legacy through the years of advocacy support leadership he he has helped strengthen the athletics program and ensure that student athletes had championships standing behind them what makes this resolution especially meaningful is that it came from the community itself alumni students families staff and stakeholders participated in the process and expressed overwhelming support to ensure these contributions are permanently recognized at skyline high school facilities are more than just buildings and fields they hold history identity community memory and using the superintendent's words our schools have souls and we must honor that naming this athletic field the john beam tony fardella field ensures that the future generations of students will know the shoulders that they are standing on and the legacy of excellence mentorship and pride that will help them shape skyline athletics i am proud to bring this resolution forward from the facilities committee where it was voted on by more by my board colleagues unanimously thank you on director hutchinson

yes thank you skyline class of 91 both mr fardella and coach beam were teachers at skyline when i was a student there they were both lifers in OUSD and in the community, and I know dozens of people personally who really benefited from their experiences with both of them. It's a little bittersweet that this honor didn't happen at a time when they could have both been here to enjoy it. And I have to say, for something like this, as important as this, something that's as important as this to a lot of us in the Skyline family, It's disappointing to see that this is how it's being handled. To have a renaming of a field and not have anyone here to speak on it from the community, from the alumni, from their families, it really means that as a district and as leadership of the district, we continue to drop the ball. And to me it also shows a troubling lack of connection that too many people on the school board actually have with the community. if i would have known that this was a plan i would have personally made the phone calls to make sure the skyline alumni were here you know many of the same people who were putting on the memorials for coach beam not too long ago and it's just disappointing and at a certain point you know this is long overdue i'm really happy that this is finally happening but it feels disrespectful to the communities that this really matters to so hopefully going forward if the board is going to honor people who mean a lot to some of us in the community we can do it in a way where we actually allow the community to come in and participate Enjoy this. And hopefully there's going to be a different ceremony for the naming of the field itself because both Mr. Fardella and Coach Beam's legacy deserve more than what I'm seeing here tonight. Thank you.

I wanted to just make a comment. I did know Coach Pardella and Coach Beam well. And I also want to mention that Coach Beam's daughter, I saw her recently at the African American Honor Roll. She participated in that. She's participated in many, many events in the community. It's very stressful for them. I've had personal phone calls with them. I have not talked to Coach Fardella's family, but I know Frankie Navarro. is in touch with them. So we are very sensitive to when we ask families to come out to these events. We want it to be a time when it's a celebratory time, but there's a very emotional context for the families. So I do not want anyone to know that staff has not been in touch with families, that staff has not worked with staff, and that staff has not worked with community. That is not the case.

Are there any other comments? Can we take a roll call on the vote, please?

Yes, on the roll call to adopt the resolution as stated. Student directors are absent. Director Thompson? Yes. Director Berry?

Yes.

Director Hutchinson? Yes. Director Williams? Yes. Yes, sir. Director Lara?

Yes.

Vice President Batchelor?

Yes.

President Brewhorn? Yes. Motions adopted.

Thank you. We do have a special meeting. I'm sorry, we don't have any student report tonight, and we don't have PSAC. We do have a special meeting, but it is not scheduled to start until 7, and this is probably record time, but we are not, we're ahead of our schedule. So we are going to move to labor partner comments. Are there any... Labor partners online.

I'm checking to see if I have any collective bargaining units online. President Brewhart, no bargaining units online.

Thank you. We'll now move to the superintendent's report.

Good evening, community, members of the audience, board members. I'd like to start off just highlighting several events that occurred between our board meetings. Most recently, on May 6th, we had the annual STEM fair, which was much bigger than last year. In fact, it was hosted at the Oakland Coliseum. There are hundreds of students, families, and educators, and STEM professionals that attended to view our students' creative science and engineering projects. We had everything from robotics to what I call movable science projects, I truly enjoyed the opportunity of spending time talking with students, hearing them describe their projects. I want to commend the staff for a phenomenal display by school of students' fantastic work. You know, I've been around a long time to see how the science fair has evolved from a small school-site science fair into the Chabot Science Center. and now at the Coliseum. I want to thank several organizations for supporting us having access to the Coliseum. And by the way, families and staff were able to enter the Coliseum parking lot without fees. I mean, there was a lot of support for this happening. I want to thank the Oakland Roots in Seoul for hosting us. This was a very special occasion which was covered by the press and just a great acknowledgement of student learning and growth. I also want to acknowledge Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and our partner, the Oakland Public Ed Fund, which does, on a regular basis, literature read-ins. They had a major read-in on May 4th at 15 elementary schools. there were over a hundred volunteers from organizations like the oakland literacy coalition wells fargo bank of america blueshield and lyft that visited schools and read books by asian and pacific islanders to students They visited schools including Bella Vista, Martin Luther King Elementary, and Manzanita Community and Seed. The Ed Fund says that the read-ins are 90 minutes experiences where volunteers read aloud, and this is something that wasn't an isolated event for Asian Americans, Pacific Islander. This is something that the fund does on a regular basis with our students and with their volunteers. Next, I wanted to highlight Oakland Lacrosse hosted the OAL Championships and unveiled new scholarships with a heartbreaking beginning, but something good has come out of something extremely sad. On Saturday, May 16th, the Oakland Lacrosse Club hosted their annual OAL Championships, which were won by Oakland Tech, boys and girls teams, and the Edinburgh Bureau of Boys and Girls Teams at the middle school level. During their high school celebration, sadly, we know that there were some students who died in a car crash in 2024, and their families chose to provide what they call Purple One Scholarships to students. The first two recipients of those scholarships of $2,500 were Jeremiah Voon, a recent graduate of Dewey Academy, and you'll see them in the picture, and Cesar Carmona-Filipe, a recent graduate of Oakland Tech, and their parents were on the scene. Again, this was a wonderful expression of ongoing remembrance of students who lost their lives in a recent car accident. Then moving on, our supporters great supporters golden state community foundation celebrated educators and they were uh... during educator appreciation month uh... community foundation golden state community foundation visited highland community school uh... excuse me where samantha keller is principal and delivered a mexican food feast and uh... facilitated a surprise visit from warriors legend festus ezele The former Warrior Center talked about the importance of work of education and gave the staff lots of trivia questions. He loves to do that, and if you see him on the news, it's a regular occasion. He brought with him a signed jersey, Draymond Green jersey, and one from Valkyrie's Kayla Thornton to support educators at the site. I want to thank the Golden State Community Foundation for continuously supporting our educators. Then I want to move on to a recent Oakland Education Summit that was hosted by the Oakland Ed Fund, where along with Sophia Navarra, who's Oakland's Deputy City Administrator, and Dr. Ingrid Roberson from CDE, formerly an OUSD staff person and myself, participated in a panel along with other staff persons who talked about our teacher task force, teacher... teacher task forces and several issues, current issues that education is facing and the nexus between what we can do on the city level and on the state level. This was supported by district partners from the Ed Fund as well as Salesforce and Comcast. And we also had with us former Superintendent Kyla Johnson-Tremell and Gary Yee who were in attendance and part of the discussion. We talked about Next Generation STEM, and support for educators and the retention of educators. And lastly, I wanna just highlight our focus on student achievement where I was in attendance along with many board members at all of these celebrations of student achievement, of students who've achieved 3.0 or above certainly we want to increase these numbers and I'm Next time we have the report I want to share out of how many students in that category but at the 25th Oscar right annual celebration of 2000 there were 2003 students and who received GPAs, African American students, with GPAs of 3.0 and above. And by the way, Maria Beam was one of the people who gave out those medals at that event, and that was pretty special. uh... and then at the annual arab american student honor roll there were three hundred three students who received awards i attended that over at uh... i c s and t c n uh... and is very well attended and then uh... the pacific islander student honor roll uh... was held in april and we had a hundred and twenty five students and at the latino honor roll which was held at fremont high school that was uh... a major event where we had 3 857 students who had a 3.0 or above and most recently vice president bachelor attended the maya honor roll and i'm sure she'll share that more information about that in her report There will be many more discussions on really how our students are doing that should be at the top of our communication at all board meetings, how they're actually doing, and what kinds of things are we doing to support students who need assistance. I want to ask at this point, at the end of my report I would respectfully ask the board to adjourn the meeting this evening we lost two wonderful staff people who most recently Max Robinson the third Any of you who've been in the district any time have had an interaction with Max, who was a very special person, so I recommend and hope that we would consider adjourning in his memory, as well as Deborah King Cooper, who was another longtime staff person who many people might have known. That's the end of my report, Madam President.

Are there any public comments on this item?

Excuse me, yeah. For public speak for this item, we have Sheila Haynes, Carol Dilton, A.V. Ringer, and Asada Olaballa.

Take the in-person, Ms. Asada first, and then we'll go to online.

Noted, thank you.

Two minutes.

So much on your plate. It's just a lot. And thank you for being here, all of you. I have been looking at some of the challenges going on in classrooms across this country, and it's quite overwhelming. So a couple of things. Parental support for their children in the academic arena as well as in the, what we call the behavior issues. I think parents are not involved enough. This room should have some parents in it. The other thing is classroom management based on some of the behavior challenges. We've got kids, young people are different. They really think they can talk to adults as if they are adults. And we have to look at teacher retention because of these challenges. A lot of teachers are walking away good teachers and they need support to keep them in the classroom. And that goes for our administrators as well, principals and anybody involved in the system to put out, do an outreach to people. If you need support, let us know. If something's going on, I just had a relative commit suicide

We didn't know anything was going on.

So a lot of people are very stressed. And these teachers, I don't know how they're doing it, but that involves money. But I would just hope that we could do, number one, our students' behaviors in the classroom. And I'm just seeing it from an outside source all across the country. and physical attacks on teachers. Okay, thank you, that's all.

Thank you. The first speaker on line is Ms. Haynes.

Yes, I'm going to Ms. Haynes. If you can go ahead and unmute yourself.

Hi, can you hear me okay?

Yeah, we can hear you.

Okay, I don't know if I heard right, but I was signed up for the violence prevention presentation. I have over 1300 supporters that support a ban on hate speech and keeping our kids in the most loving space. I don't wanna take it personally, but the board knew I was gonna ask for you guys to mandate an official ban. Increases in violence happened during the summertime. So I'm just wondering if there's a reason why this violence prevention presentation was withdrawn. It doesn't show a good look that you guys are putting student safety as a priority to withdraw this item on the last day, the last couple of days of school. I mean, I know there's financial challenges, but helping to cut down on violence has a lot to do with our youths being able to talk to each other and respectfully. Lives are being lost. I mean, you know, ever since my resolution was introduced, the board has taken millions away through a block grant and additional cuts to staffing and programs in the arts. Again, I know there's financial challenges, but it doesn't cost money to mandate love and respect. We need to go back to a culture of respect. So I just, I don't understand why that violence prevention presentation was withdrawn. There was many people that were gonna speak out about student safety. I mean, while I appreciate that the board has recommitted to a zero tolerance of hate speech, that's not good enough. Lives are being lost. And I just, I don't know what to feel about you guys in terms of student safety, because this presentation was critical for the community and for people to be able to see what the board is actually doing to combat violence. And so I was really looking forward to the presentation. I actually did see on the report that verbal altercations have been witnessed at different school sites. So again, I mean, I just, I would just like to understand why it was withdrawn. It makes my hope of safety being priority for the board. I don't know what to think. I'm just really disappointed.

Ms. Haynes, the presentation was postponed until June 10th at the presenter's request. So that presentation will be held on June 10th. We take that seriously, too, and wanted to accommodate that request from the presenter.

Next speaker, please. Yes, next registered speaker is Carol Dunn. Go ahead and unmute yourself to speak.

Good evening, Board. I did submit an e-comment on the violence prevention report. One of the things that I saw in it from students was request for de-escalation. And there is a program that the district adopted a number of years ago. It's called CPI or crisis prevention and intervention. It tends to be used very much in special education settings, but it's really for everybody. It's a multi-day training. And the first day is really about recognizing a crisis before it becomes a crisis and helping with the de-escalation process. That is something that could benefit staff around the district to have a common language and therefore be able to support students with more collaboration among staff. And I hope that you will seriously consider, as you have many professional development days, devoting some of that time to this type of intervention, that you can do that consistently and across all settings. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Next speaker is Avery Ringer.

I'm on the thing. Hello? Hi, we can hear you. Thank you. Dr. Sadler, I just want to let you know why I don't want someone who's dishonest as superintendent. Because core character and leadership matters. Do you know that after I attempted to speak at the last meeting, opposing the extension of your contract for your dishonesty and deceit, I sat down and your deputy superintendent turned around and said to me, you better watch yourself. Do you know how, what it feels like as a parent to have a senior official of the district threaten you like that? When every day I leave my daughter in your care, but what can I do about it? Nothing, because I don't trust you. I have nothing against you personally, but if I can't trust you to keep my daughter safe, if I can't trust what you're saying about the district books, then my rights as a citizen are violated. When Ms. Gard saw you be deceitful to your senior staff, she saw what leadership was above her. And she must have internalized that and made it seem okay that she could do that to me. I don't know. But I hope that you will exercise better character in leadership from here forward. Thank you.

Next speaker, please.

Our speaker's name has been called.

Thank you. Are there board comments? Director Hutchinson.

Yes, thank you. Unfortunately, I'm very frustrated with what's been going on. And I found the press release that you sent out Superintendent Sadler on Tuesday to be offensive. You know, when you first became superintendent on July 1st, you inherited a balanced budget. A balanced budget that the board had approved the June before. Then in September, you notified the community that there was a crisis because the district was overspending by $4 million a month. Then in December, on scenario three, what you're now referring to as a plan, it stated that there needed to be $27 million in emergency solutions for this year. But now we can see with the original budget that was passed, originally called for 916 million in expenditures for this year. On the second interim, that number had ballooned to 260 million. That's all overspending. And now on the third interim, it's increased even more to 978 million. So that means what was once a $4 million a month overspending has at least doubled now at this point. And not only have you not curtailed the overspending or stopped it or looked to make cuts, it's accelerating. But yet you put in a press release that we've solved the problem because of hard work. And that's not what the numbers show. The numbers show that on your watch, this year we are projected to overspend by more than $60 million. And we know we don't have any place to draw those dollars from. So what is really going on with the budget numbers, and how can you call that positive when you haven't stopped the overspending that's incurred on your watch solely, on your watch solely in this fiscal year? And that's what your numbers that you're putting out in the third interim report say, that expenditures this year have now projected to go from 916 million to $978 million. So not only have we not cut spending, not only have we not stopped the overspending, it's only gotten worse and worse each month. So I thought you said we had freezes. I thought you said there were measures taken. But spending continues to escalate out of control and on top of it now you issue a press release saying this is positive, we finally solved this after decades. That's not what the numbers show and I also have a real lack of faith now. We have to be able to do better and I don't understand a PR campaign when we all know what the real numbers are. i've never seen anything like this before and i know a lot of us feel like we deserve a whole lot better than this thank you thank you are there any other board comments vice president

Thank you. As Superintendent mentioned, this Saturday at Clinton Park was really a beautiful reflection of what Oakland is at its best. More than 400 of our Mayan mum students were honored in the first annual Mayan Mum Honor Roll. This community celebration was hosted by Union Maya and Tribe, and it recognized the hard work, academic achievement, and resilience of our students. families gathered with food music and enjoy the celebration of those cultures their languages again most of our students are not only um bilingual but most of these students are now trilingual because of their academic excellence What made this event especially powerful was it was created by students themselves and supported by our OUSD teachers, Christy Grossman and Frida Caro, volunteering their own time alongside dedicated community leaders like Henry Salas Hernandez and Andrew Park. Their collaboration showed what is possible when schools, students, and communities come together to uplift young people. At the same time, in the same park nearby, seniors were practicing Tai Chi while our Arab families were gathered in the playground with their children. This was really, again, an amazing experience because we were all sharing that space, many cultures, many generations, many traditions, all that make Oakland the vibrant community that it is. These moments remind us that Oakland's diversity is one of our greatest strengths. when our students feel seen celebrated and connected in community they thrive so congratulations to all the mayan mom honor roll students again these are students that achieved a 3.7 or above gpa from our middle schools through our high schools and as queen mentioned one of the staff at tribe they may not look like me but they're my family now i also lastly want to give a shout out to again our student athletes from skyline our varsity boys baseball team made a remarkable championship run and recovering from a early six game loss to win the oakland athletic league premier division and is going to be advancing to the cif oakland selection tournament so again congratulations to our amazing student athletes and scholars director barry

just two really quick things about the report so one i did notice a thank you b i did notice the footnote about the latino student honor roll and the significant decline in the latino student population And it is significant and is falling at a faster rate than, for instance, African-American students. And so I, especially at this time of year and especially because it does impact budget, because it does impact culture of schools and our approach to teaching and learning, just would love to get an enrollment update and whether what we, how we were interpreting shifts this time last year has changed over the last 12 months. And then the other thing at the end of the educator summit, the last line spoke to educator support and retention. And I really want to pay a lot more attention there because it's just such a big issue and it could be an incredible asset, especially at a time like this. And I'm also thinking that in particular about how we're not just supporting educators who are teaching in our classrooms, but educators at every level, including our principals and how we're supporting them as well.

I just wanted to add to the celebrations. I had the opportunity to go to the Dewey graduation this year and I have to say it was packed. It was a tech in the auditorium and watching the students get up to give their speeches and watching how nervous they got, and some of them kind of stopped, but it was, the whole audience started cheering and encouraging them to continue with their speeches, and I mean, for a number of these students to see themselves as leaders and as public speakers, I think was, they were both nervous about it, but to see the encouragement of the families, It was just, it was very heartwarming graduation. So again, I just shout out to Dewey students. And again, I also share the same concerns about some of the decline in the numbers of students on the honor roll. So I hope next time we also have a report on graduation rates, because I think we've also had some concerns about that. All right, thank you. With that, we are going to make one other adjustment in the agenda. We're gonna move into public comments. So if there are anybody who wants to add a speaker card at this point for public comment, please do so. On non-agenda items, yeah.

Okay.

Public comment on agenda items.

No.

I feel like we're making you stand up and sit down and stand up and sit down, Mr. Nelson. Do you want to come on up here? Yes, for, should I call our names? Yeah.

Okay. Call the comment on non-gen items. We have Carol Dunn, Kim Davis, A.V. Ringer, and Jack Nelson.

Okay, we'll start with Jack Nelson in person and we'll do the others online. All right.

That's good either way. Sorry, I'm late. I would have been here on time, but I was at the A's game My friend still is vice president operations there, and I took some people home, and I thought I'd be all right, but I'm behind To say I'm thrilled that you voted 7-0 to name the stadium Yep the John beam and Tony Fardella Field will have a slash there by the way after I want to thank you. As Gomer Pyle would say, thank you, thank you, thank you. Back in the old days here. You got to be over 50 to appreciate that, I guess. But it's been a long, long, long, this is my 30th meeting, seven facilities and 23 board meetings. And I would say I'd do it again. It's worth it. These guys did a lot. I mentioned last time Valerie and Director Thompson and Director Berry were there. Just quickly about John Beam. I got to know him better in 2012. My father was still alive. My father ran the OAL from 69 to 82, and they wanted him to do the coin flip at the Silver Bowl. Laney and John was the athletic director at that time, just had become it. I went up because my dad couldn't roll out in his walker. He was getting old, and he died the next year. So I went up to the booth up there, and I said, Coach, I didn't really know him that well, so I said, Coach, could you help get my dad somehow out to the 50-yard line so they can do the coin flip? And he said, Joseph... You go get that golf cart right now and take that OAL icon legend Aldo Nelson out to midfield. And I said, whoa, that's pretty good. And it was done like that. And I try to do that myself with things. Try to stay on point. And remember, this isn't going to cost you a dime. I'm going to write the check tomorrow. You know, I hope September 25th you can all come and we can have the Beam family and the Fardella family. Tanya has gone through breast cancer this year, so that's his daughter. She was a toddler when I went to Skyline. But I'm hoping you can all come. I'm also hoping in the future, I'm not done. I want to make sure McClymonds gets some of the things that they need. And I'm thinking about doing a fundraiser for them and for Skyline. And it's just in my head now, but I'll work on it. I'll tell you about it when I get it in full. This, I'll finish with this. This means a lot to me. This is one of my most prized possessions, believe it or not. It is my volunteer card. This is my city. And, you know, for better or worse, I'm going to work. Volunteer for it for as long as I can and do as many good things as I can And I want to thank everybody I want to thank Mike Hutchinson for his Keeping me abreast of things and Valerie of course and and Director Berry and Director Thompson for pushing this onto the full board. Thank you very much because this means a lot. Fardella was big in my life too. He filled the void for when my dad was running the OAL and you guys know because you have lots of meetings. My dad wasn't around much but Fardella was for me and that's about it. Again, thank you very much and you won't hear the last of me.

I don't have the ability to thank anybody for the work that has happened at McClymonds. There's nobody to thank because nothing has happened. We had a facilities meeting and I got some documents. The document that is the geotechnical study for McClymonds was completed September 30th, 2022. So in that document, there's sulfur concentration, seismic issues, foundation issues, retaining wall issues, high moisture control, not suitable for a vegetable garden, and drainage issues at the school. In the breakdown, I got this. For everything that's going to have a cost factor, it's broken down in three pages. as it relates to the contaminated material abatement, zero amount of money. They say in here that it will be shown in the select demolition report below. So for site demolition, they have an amount of money, but they don't break down for your understanding how much of that money is going to go towards contamination material abatement. Something's wrong. The biggest issue going on at McClymonds, one of them, is the contamination of the soil in other places. And you have a listing that will demonstrate how much money you're going to spend, and you got zero. You also have zero for carpentry. You have zero amount for electrical issues. You have zero as it relates to the field. You guys have to stop being so ridiculous as it relates to this McClymonds issue. On the agenda tonight, I'll wait till that item comes up, but I'm not satisfied. I will continue to come back here. It's insulting, it's a slap in the face of these children and teachers that are there. This project was supposed to start the summer of 2025, as far as actual work.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

Next speaker is Carol Delton. If you can go ahead and unmute yourself to speak.

Thank you. So I would like to lift up some of what I've been hearing in the community, seeing online on different platforms, very much questioning the accuracy of the third interim that's going to be reported on later tonight. And I think that the communication from the district and board has led to some of that. Since I've been digging into the documents all along and having them match up with each other, I knew that we were headed, that OUSD was headed into a more positive direction. but that wasn't apparent from various things that were put out. And we still don't know, I still don't know whether many of those suggested practices in attachments A, B, and C ever came to pass. So I'm going to ask you again to put out to the community a comprehensive list of the budget adjustments that were done this year and the status of everything that was previously recommended, whether it was completed, whether it's in process and where that is, or whether and why there was a decision that this was not an appropriate way to go. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next speaker, please.

The speaker's name has been called.

We are now going to recess and give KDOL a minute to set up our public hearings.

Mr. Rakester can we have a roll call to establish quorum please yes ma'am on the roll call for attendance reconvene of the regular meeting student directors are absent director thompson here director latta present director williams present sir Director Berry Present Director Hutchinson Present Vice President Batchelor President Burrard Here Forum Present Thank you I'm now opening the public hearing

for items R1 and R2, which will have one presentation voted on together and reported separately. That is item 26-1159A, 4217, Energy Services Agreement, Division of Facilities Planning and Management. and our 226-1159 design build contract solar photovoltaic systems division of facilities planning and management we do have a presentation however this um both these items were recommended favorably to the board of education by the facilities committee

Good evening, board, superintendent Sattler, and community. Thank you for the opportunity to present this item. I'm Pranita Ranbuse, the executive director of facilities planning. We're here this evening to present two related energy and sustainability actions in partnership with Wildan Energy Solutions. Along with me, we do have Shaquan Cornish, who is our project manager, and Elliot, who is with the Wildan team. These actions focus on expanding our new solar generation across campuses and recommissioning existing district-owned solar systems that are currently underperforming. These recommendations support the district's long-term sustainability, climate resilience, and operational efficiency goals. Our ask of the board tonight is we're seeking adoption of the resolutions authorizing the solar PV material procurement strategy to secure the federal investment tax credit opportunity and the recommissioning of our existing solar systems. These actions would allow the district to move quickly to meet the federal safe harbor deadline while advancing broader energy and sustainability goals. In terms of the agenda, we will be presenting an overview, but as President Rohan mentioned, these resolutions, I'm presenting them together, and you have in your packets two separate contracts for both these resolutions. So what is the Solar Investment Tax Credit? The Inflation Reduction Act created a significant opportunity for public agencies, including school districts, to receive direct federal reimbursement for eligible clean energy projects. Through the Investment Tax Credit, or ITC, direct pay program, OUSD could receive approximately 40% reimbursement on eligible solar project costs through a direct cash reimbursement from the IRS. To qualify, the district must meet the federal safe harbor requirement before July 5th, 2026 deadline. For projects under 1.5 megawatts, federal guidance requires the district to procure and pay for at least 5% of total project cost and take title to the equipment before the deadline. Under the proposed strategy, OUSD would purchase qualifying solar equipment in advance and safely store the material until installation. Staff believes this is a strategic opportunity to leverage federal funding to reduce long-term utility costs and advance the district's sustainability and climate resiliency goals. So I'm going to talk through three opportunity or three reasons why this opportunity is something for us to consider. one being the cost savings. One of the biggest benefits for this opportunity is a long-term utility saving. These projects are expected to reduce PG&E utility costs of 22 million over their life cycle, hedge against future utility rate increases, support the general fund savings, and create opportunities to continue growing what we have set up as a green revolving fund. The district also expects significant lifecycle savings through increased solar production and reduced energy demand. We also want to emphasize that restoring existing systems is important and to maximize that value prior to any future investments as well. The second reason is alignment with our sustainability commitments. So as these projects directly support OUSD's climate emergency resolution and the sustainability policy, expanding on site renewable energy reduces dependency on fossil fuel based on electricity and lowers greenhouse gas emissions. The projects also create opportunities for sustainability education and certain workforce pathways tied to clean energy infrastructure. In addition, operational savings generated through these projects can help fund future sustainability initiatives district-wide. And then the third reason is our heat mitigation strategy. This ties back to the resolution that we discussed last month as well around air quality and thermal comfort. These projects align with the district's broader heat mitigation and climate resilience strategies. Solar shade structures and canopies can help reduce surface temperatures and improve student comfort on campuses. It reduces electrical demand, also supporting future cooling and HVAC improvements at sites with aging infrastructure, also something that has been identified as a priority in our facilities master plan. Utility savings from solar can also support additional investments in shade, greening, cool roofs, and student wellness improvements. So as I mentioned, there are two contracts that you're going to see in front of you. The first contract is around the new solar safe harbor procurement. This is with regards to the solar PV design, build, and material procurement contract. This contract authorizes early procurement of solar PV modules to preserve eligibility for the federal ITC incentives. Materials would be purchased, titled to the district, and stored in an insured warehouse until installation. The strategy allows OUSD to meet the federal deadline while continuing to finalize project scope, sites, pricing, and implementation schedules. The second one is around solar recommissioning. This proposed action focuses on recommissioning existing district-owned solar systems. So this includes existing conditions assessment, monitoring and inverter upgrades, repair and replacement of failed components, and restoration of our solar production. Current analysis shows that many systems are producing significantly below expected levels, so our goal is to restore these systems closer to full operational performance and maximize long-term savings from prior investments. In terms of the fiscal impact, before I turn this over to Shaquan Cornish, the funding source that has been identified is from Measure Y. This is from the earned interest from some of our Measure Y projects. These do not impact any existing project allocations identified within Measure Y. I'll pass it on to Jaquan.

Good evening, I should say. Jaquan Cornish, project manager with facilities. Wanted to touch on the recommended new solar PV sites. So this slide provides a summary of the seven proposed solar expansion sites. And the proposed projects include rooftop systems, carport, canopies, and shade structures, depending on the site conditions, of course. And these locations are proposed, again, and we will revisit to ensure that we create the most impactful and beneficial location for our students and the school community. The projects are expected to generate significant first savings, first-year savings, as Pernita mentioned, and, again, expending on renewable energy throughout the district. The initial safe harbor material procurement across all seven sites is approximately $669,000. That is the amount that we will need to cut a check for to safe harbor the solar ITC. And to touch on the financials, this slide provides an overall program summary of the financials for the new solar sites as well as the recommissioning sites. The totals you see here represent the 30% phase, which are rough orders of magnitude, and these are the proposed estimates about how much the solar will cost for the new sites, the recommissioning, the first-year savings, the savings over the 25-year life cycle, and the incentives that we will receive from the ITC direct pay. The proposed solar expansion program is estimated at approximately $8.9 million. Solar recommissioning is approximately $1.5 million. And to be transparent, the contracts also include a different amount. So the total contracts that we're bringing to you today for the new solar are 12.5, and then the recommissioning is 2.5. And those deltas provide space for design approvals and any construction contingencies that we may need to tap into during construction. Again, to mention, it's about $440,000 total together for new solar recommissioning for that first year, and then we're estimating approximately $22 million over the 25 years for the seven sites and the 16 recommissioning sites. And to close, we really believe that this is a great opportunity for us and there's a strong long-term operational and financial investment for the district that we can directly put back into our general fund and to essentially include into our green revolving fund that will also just support additional sustainable and energy efficiency projects for the future of the district. And just to touch on the next steps, so last week we brought this to the facilities committee And we're here to bring this to the board tonight. So what we're going to do is immediately after hopeful board approval, we'll be procuring and titling the solar material so that we can secure the ITC by that July 5th date. We'll then work with our partner, Wildan, to finalize the project scope, the pricing, guaranteed savings, and the implementation schedules with Wildan. And then we'll bring that back to the facilities committee for review and hopeful back to the board after that. And we anticipate we'll get through the design phases and get through DSA fall 2026 of this year. And we would love to start installing the new solar projects during the summer of 2027 to obviously minimize the disruption to school session. And we will also be immediately addressing the recommissioning sites as well. That's an effort that will be happening at the same time as the design for the new sites. And we're happy to take any questions if you have them. Thank you.

Thank you. Is there a motion to adopt? So moved.

Not yet. You have to finish the hearing.

Is there a second part to this? That's it, okay. And then, public comment.

The hearing is. Public comment.

Sorry about that. Is there any public comment on this?

We do not have any registered speakers.

Board member comments? Board comments? Director Hutchinson.

Yes, thank you. Especially with what just happened with the vote, the special meeting with the third interim. I can't suspend disbelief anymore. I can't trust the numbers and the documents that were being shown. I can't trust fiscal analysis that's being put in front of us. I also have real concerns about how Measure Y has been used. And dipping into these funds in all sorts of ways. But with the way the district's finances have been managed over the last 16 months, I'm scared to approve anything that's being put in front of us. There was no real work to talk about this collectively or to gain an understanding or for the board to engage to make sure this was the best deal for us or even to make sure our limited facility bond dollars can even be stretched in this way when we still don't even have a new school at McClymonds yet. We just had a third interim where we can see that spending has exploded this year. This is a part of it, that this board keeps taking on new projects and new spending, whether it's in the facilities bond or it's in the general fund, with no real acknowledgement that we have limited resources. With no real acknowledgement that if we spend one dollar over here, that means there's a dollar we can't spend over here. And when we're doing this without a plan, without a framework, without overarching policy that dictates how these decisions should be made and what order we should prioritize things, we're just in free fall. I have real concerns and issues with what's gone on with the facilities department. Once the head of facilities, the former head of facilities, Kenya Chapman, was no longer working here in the district. I have concerns about how the new head of facilities was hired. I have concerns who did the hiring, especially with the way the district is now. You know, I helped author the last reprioritization of Measure Y before. We made certain decisions then. There was supposed to be an overall lead abatement plan for the whole city to address that issue once and for all. Generational work. Haven't seen anything. Projects keep getting added ahead of it. This is not how things are supposed to work. This is not how we as a school board are supposed to decide how to dedicate $15, $20 million of funds encumbering the district for a decade or longer. There's a level of seriousness and work that's involved, and I just don't see it. When staff can't answer basic questions about finances, how can I then trust other staff when they present information? Thank you.

I'd like to hear from the facilities chair I know you guys discussed this in the board meeting and your community meeting

Yes thank you and for those who haven't tuned in facilities committee meetings are fun so please join us and we have conversations about all of these different areas as well as the the next meeting we're also going to have a in-depth conversation about all the different types of facilities restricted dollars that we have and take a deep dive into that as well. So for those who may not know Measure Y dollars there is an allocation for climate resiliency and heat mitigation that's included in measure y already that doesn't touch any of the major projects um that are coming up in the in the y um i'm sorry in the measure y um spending plan um we also in the later part of the meeting will have the opportunity to be voting on items to actually move forward with the different um projects that are part of measure y But I'd like to ask Ms. Ramsey if you can come up and talk a little bit about this specific solar project. How can we use our bond dollars for this project? And again, can you talk a little bit more about the bond interest as well?

Thank you for that question. Certainly, there are two elements maybe that I'll touch a little bit, and this is going to be in the spending plan presentation that we plan to bring back to the full board in June as well. Some of the priorities that we have heard within the master plan and through resolutions and from you all is around heat mitigation strategies, air quality, thermal comfort, sustainability, and our commitment to the sustainability policy and the climate emergency action resolution. and the solar and energy infrastructure. So within the spending plan, staff is bringing that back to be able to allocate some of our contingency funds to some of these initiatives. It's prioritized within the master plan. This is also what we have heard through the community as well. Specifically for these projects, the overall program is proposed to be funded through Measure Y bond interest earnings that we have. And we're not, as you mentioned, Director Abashar, we're not allocating or reallocating any funds from any major projects. As part of the Measure Y cash flow management, the district earned interest on unspent bond funds while projects were in design, DSA reviews, regulatory reviews and approvals, procurement, and as we start now to launch our construction phases. So this interest, this earned interest, is what we're recommending we allocate to the solar infrastructure. So this does not, again, impact any identified projects within the Measure Y spending plan, as well as we have been maintaining a really steady and strong contingency.

Thank you. And we've also, again, been really clear about projects that are supportive of climate, the climate emergency, as well as budget savings. I also had an additional question, but it escaped me. But thank you so much.

Are there any other board questions? Director Berry?

Just two clarifying questions. So one, the $22 million in life cycle savings, that alleviates general fund? And is that the life cycle defined as 10, 20, I can't remember. Yeah.

Good evening and thank you for the opportunity to be here. So the $22 million is projected lifecycle savings over the course of 25 years. For solar projects we use 25 years because that's what the panels are warrantied for. How it's, you know, it is fair to note that these systems potentially could last longer, but we're going to use a conservative 25 years to match the warranty. Those are avoided PG&E costs through electricity produced by the solar panels, both the new solar as well as the recommissioned solar sites. And so that's how we have projected out for that $22 million.

Are there any other board questions?

I can answer part of your other question. It's about the green revolve. Actually, we are trying to use those funds back into the green revolving fund to be able to invest back into energy or sustainability efforts at the facilities.

And then that 5% cost that we incur, do we have to pay that up front or can you commit to paying it and pay it later?

Getting my steps in tonight, thank you. Sorry. So if approved this evening, you are essentially approving for that material order, so ordering the solar panels, which equates to 5% of the total projected cost. That is a requirement from the IRS about how you basically get grandfathered in for the expiring incentive. So if approved tonight, we have an invoice ready to go. We would do everything needed before the deadline to ensure the panels are titled over, and you're essentially in the queue for that expiring incentive. and if the work scope of work or the plans change do we recoup those costs yeah so we we wanted to be fully eyes wide open to the potential risk of that and so what we've worked with district administration to do is that there would be a very minimal restocking fee of 10 percent of that $600,000 approximate if the project doesn't move forward. So the risk is about $60,000, but you'd have the opportunity to return the panels if you decide not to move forward.

Any other board questions? Director Williams.

Thank you very much for the presentation. I think I'm going to speak to the recommended solar PV site details. And Prescott is listed on there. And I just want to get some clarification about shade structure. Prescott has expressed concern about that previously when the first rounds of solar panels went out. because the blueprint proposal was to put it in the middle of the playground. And what we've seen is that has happened in my district. Hoover Elementary, it's right in the middle of the playground, as well as Martin Luther King, it's right in the middle of the playground. So my concerns really is, are we going to have conversations with the Prescott family team, as well as the administrator, Ms. Duana Slaughter, and the community to really try to find the best place to allow the shade structure to happen because it just will be devastating again where it's restricting our young folks to be able to. And I think on this board agenda we have another project that is coming for landscaping, building out a playground for the young folks at Prescott. So there's a couple of things that are happening coming next year. So the question really is, you know, are we going to sit down and have that conversation to see what does it look like? Because the last time it was take this or leave it. And they said, take it somewhere else. Right. So I hope that we're open to have those conversations moving forward.

Thank you for that question. Yes, absolutely. We will be working with each individual site as well as the site administrators and the community to be able to best identify what the design and the layout looks like. Right now, we have just identified the locations and the type of solar installation, and then we would definitely be engaging with the communities to better align with ongoing projects like the Living Schoolyard Project at Prescott.

Correct. Thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Thank you.

Director Berry. Because it's on the agenda tonight, a presentation on the local business utilization plan, can you speak to how that will be applied to this project?

I believe for our bond measure spending or projects within the bond measure Y, the LBO policy would apply just in the same manner that would apply to any of our projects. So we will certainly be

Going through the same process as we would have with any of our measure-wide projects Add a little additional context one of the subcontractors were planning to use for the recommissioning effort lives here in Oakland so we did try to take account and be mindful of your LBU requirements obviously we're adhering to the PLA and part of our you know our

process and approach when responding to the initial RFQ was how we can be impactful and help the local community and so we intend to do that with the first phase of solar projects here that the public hearing is closed is there a motion to adopt the r1 and r2 and report out separately so moves second Mr. Rickstar, can we have a roll call on the vote, please?

On the motion as stated. The student directors are absent. Director Williams?

Yes, sir.

Director Hutchinson? Abstain. Director Lara?

Yes.

director barry yes director thompson yes vice president batchelor yes and president brohard yes motions adopted thank you projects are approved all right we'll move on to o uh with the exemptions of oh one no no no i'm sorry um 021

That's the, this is the next item, the general consent report is the next item. Minus 021. Yes, minus 021. Is there a motion on general consent? Minus 021. So moved.

Second.

Wonderful. Board colleagues, any comments? Director Hutchinson?

Thank you. So I think today with the presentation of the third interim, hopefully it became clear to more people why I haven't voted on a consent report in over a year. So when we saw in the third interim report how spending this year has exploded and how overspending has increased, a lot of that's because of the consent report that comes forward at every meeting. These are additional costs, most of these, above what was budgeted for at the start of the year. Yet they just keep coming forward. And the other thing that is a real concern is when you look through this, there's not a lot of fiscal impact analysis within the consent report. I firmly believe that we don't have the internal capacity anymore in OUSD to do a fiscal impact analysis. And when people can't explain numbers around projected expenditures, I'm really worried that how can I trust those same people then to do a fiscal impact analysis on all the contracts and resolutions coming forward? When we see money getting scooped up from restricted dollars in questionable ways, how can we then trust this going forward? And what should have really happened this year, since we were in a financial crisis and we had a large projected deficit for next year, at some point there should have been a moratorium on new spending. Some accounting of maybe we can't do all of these things in the consent report right now. But no, we've just barreled headlong into this, spending more and more each meeting. And our pie is limited. We have a finite set of resources. So for every dollar we spend on these consent reports are dollars that we can't spend other places. And I hear a lot of talk all the time about wanting to reduce contracts and consultants. I challenge somebody to look through this consent report and add up how much money in contracts there are to consultants and advisors. Because it sure hasn't been items in the consent report to hire more OUSD staff, more union OUSD staff.

It's all of these outside contracts.

And this is what's largely driven the overspending that continues to this point. So hopefully more people will see the through line and the implications of this just wanton spending, just saying yes to every contract that comes forward in a consent report, nothing being vetted, not having a real internal financial team to do that work. This is the outcome. This is the outcome. And this is what happens when you pay Consultants to be your financial advisors for this year eight hundred thousand dollars instead of getting free help from the county from experts But what's really going on who's in charge of our dollars and when are we going to put a stop to them? Putting us in financial ruin, which is what we are facing right now Whether they call it a positive budget certification or not. The numbers are the numbers.

Thank you, director Thompson. I Director Lara Director Williams Director Berry I would just like to uplift the following items on consent 011 which is a skyline high school dining room improvements for some outdoor seating spaces and meal areas this is again going to improve the the life of folks on that campus also 51 which is the pathway summer work-based learning program the echo program which is exploring college career and community opportunities this is through the oakland ed fund that gives our students a stipend to support them through work-based learning for our high school students again at skyline Next, O33, which is EL Education. This is a conference for two of our MLA teachers to attend. Again, I hope that they're able to learn everything they can to bring it back into the classroom and support our students. And then 069 Washington Early Childhood Center and TK space. This is an item that is actually totally funded. The 19 million is funded by the Oakland Children's Initiative. it's the same number because folks might remember the nineteen million that we're getting funded for garfield it's the same number because of the number of classrooms that we're going to be opening up for tk there and because it's a modular build it's going to be speedier we're not going to have to go through an arduous dsa approval like we did for mcclymonds and if the contract is passed today work will start soon after and then the school year twenty seven twenty eight is when we'll be able to actually enroll our tk students into that space so that's i'm really excited about um again the expansion of transitional kindergarten in that way um mr um oh sorry um any public comment on this agenda item mr yes we have carol dunn av ringer and osalo labala great i do see miss stone online i don't see mrs sada in person either

Thank you for calling on me. I'd like to clarify that when I spoke about overspending on contracts, that is a pattern years back. The people who analyzed it went back four years from last year. So we're not actually talking about this year, and I certainly hope that the pattern changes. It's been a longstanding issue. To speak specifically about some of the contracts, I also noticed the two contracts with Open Public Education Fund totaling around $160,000. One of them specifies that 10% of the money will be retained by the fund for administration. The other one doesn't specify. So I'm concerned about developing a better cover sheet for this board and better specifications for this type of contract. And especially what happens if not all of the students are able to take advantage of the opportunity. How can OUSD account for and make sure that the money is refunded to OUSD so that it would be available to others.

Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Sechow, any other speakers?

No, not a couple of speakers.

Can we take a roll call on this item, which is general consent?

Yes, on the roll call to adopt the general consent, this is general consent report number one minus item zero dash dot dash 21. Student directors are absent. director barry yes director hutchinson abstain director williams yes director ladder yes director thompson yes vice president bachelor yes and president brouhaha yes It consent report is adopted minus item 0 dot dash 21.

thank you with that we'll move on to zero dot dash 21 i believe uh director burlhart you're the one who pulled this item this proposed resolution authorizes the superintendent or designee to identify documents and retroactively reclassify eligible expenditures from the general fund to legally permissible restricted funds for fiscal years within the applicable records retention period and generally three to five years financial restatement is a process of revising previously issued financial statements to correct material errors it's in compliance with generally accepted accounting principles The auditor has been involved in this process. Is the auditor available tonight? No, okay. So again, this has been a process that's done with our finance team and with the auditor who audits our budgets. So again, I would encourage my colleagues to support this resolution.

Madam President, we need a motion. Second.

I make a motion to approve 021. Second.

Board colleagues, Director Berry? Director Williams? Director Lara? Director Thompson? Director Hutchinson?

Yes, thank you. I've never seen or heard of this one before. And this is not something OUSD has done. to have an effort to look back over previous years, three to five years, to look to reclassify spending that happened in those years from restricted to unrestricted or vice versa. After those numbers have already been audited, after we've closed the books, past every audit, a lot of these numbers, after we left receivership now and we got the gold seal of approval. So what is the purpose of this resolution? What is the purpose of reclassifying dollars? Is this some accounting trick to generate more money on paper now? So there really should be an explanation. This is not something that should be buried in the consent report. This is definitely something that should have been discussed at the Budget and Finance Committee first. But I'd really like a larger explanation, especially on the financial impact and what kind of savings we're looking to achieve in our unrestricted general fund by doing this. Because again, I've never heard of reclassifying previous year's dollars. I would really like to know whose idea it is. I mean, the memo had Superintendent Sadler, Ms. Gar, and General Counsel Lindsey's name on the document. So there should be something that says what we're looking to gain from this, what dollar amount, why are we pursuing this now, and how are we really doing this when all of these past numbers were already certified? So it'd be really good if there was an answer, because again, I've been watching OUSD's budget and finances for 15 years. I've never seen this happen before, and this is not the normal practice that school districts engage in. So a clarification would be really nice, and I think justified in this case, both for the board and for the community at large. So I'm specifically asking, what are the financial implications? Why are we doing this? How much money is this supposed to free up and where?

Superintendent, may I? uh... and uh... deputy superintendent uh... carl answer any the financial questions but i think i can cover a portion so you mentioned that this is coming from this the superintendent deputy superintendent myself and uh... I want to just share with the board as a part of that, the reason that it's coming from the three of us is that we have quality controls in place such that as we're looking at these type of steps, We have myself reviewing for legal concerns, but behind myself, I also have outside counsel available to check each and every one of these. And for Deputy Superintendent Guard, as she's doing her work, she also checks with the auditor. And then we also have our superintendent who's also in communication with the County Office of Education. and their superintendent as we're taking this walk. And it's essentially a continuation of the primary strategy that's been named in the stabilization plan, which is looking at restricted dollars and rightsizing to ensure that we're using those first where appropriate.

Thank you. My question was specifically about what kind of savings do we look to achieve and from where. I didn't question whether it was legal or not. I just said we've never done this before and it's really hard to internalize it with everything else going on. This is really setting off red flags.

You can come up and answer the question on the finances. That would be appreciated.

I couldn't say whether we've done it before or not. I mean it could have been because again it was in plans from back in 2017 where we talk about the use of restricted funding and prioritizing it. So I'm gonna go back to look to see if we have prior. However, what we're doing is, I'll give you an example. Medi-Cal billing is one where the billing funds that we were getting We weren't getting in time, so we were covering it with general purpose funds. And you can pay back the general fund when those funds come in. So we're looking at what has been expended out of the general fund, and if it compliantly should have been paid by another fund, then you can move the funding back to the general fund. So you're just paying back the general fund.

And I'm sorry, just so everyone's explicitly clear. When this resolution explicitly is looking at previous years. So it's not about a policy of using our restricted dollars first going forward. This is looking at previous years that have already closed their books and already been audited and trying to move money around in those previous years. I heard three to five years into the past.

So it doesn't say use your restricted dollars first going forward, it just says use your restricted dollars first and so what we're doing is looking at it going forward and we're looking at what has happened and that is in our current year and we've looked at it in the previous year and as our general counsel said, we're not just sitting and doing things and trying to make maneuvers, we're looking at what can be compliantly moved and paid moved into restricted funds, how can the general fund be paid back for things that it had covered that should have been paid through our restricted dollars compliantly?

And is there a projected total that we're looking to achieve or that we're hoping to achieve?

We're finding as we're looking through each thing because we don't know if it's compliant. We're not going to do everything. For example, we looked at facilities and it looked like there could have been upwards of $23 million, but we're not going to, we're looking line by line, so it's not a matter of how much can we get, it's a matter of what

the general fund paid for and if there is excess in the restricted dollars and it's compliant to be paid through there then we can pay the general fund back what would be the danger of waiting till we've done the work to see how much we can actually achieve through it and then come forward with a resolution after that work has been done i'm really uncomfortable with uh... voting on something and saying yes let's do this when we're still talking hypothetical and it hasn't been looked through. You don't need this resolution to pass in order to preview that work to see how much savings we could find for the unrestricted general fund. And so this blanket approval, not having any dollars connected to it for something that we haven't done before, I'm very uncomfortable with it, and I think it's backwards. This is not how we should do work. I would expect somebody to say, hey, we found that if we do this one thing, we can free up $23 million in our unrestricted general fund. You bring that dollar amount, and then the board would say, yes, that's what we want to do, especially if it's going to achieve that amount of savings. So it just makes me really uncomfortable to authorize changing past determination, and we don't even have specifics on what we're talking about.

I just want to say in in talking with our auditor and talking with staff and actually having conversations with the county what we're doing is looking at looking at all of our systems and we're looking back and finding that We have spent money in some cases that should have been spent out of restricted funds and we're making plans to identify that and we want the board to know that we are going through that process. We want you to be absolutely clear that it's something that we're doing as a part of becoming more fiscally solvent but also looking at our systems around making sure we're very clear about how we spend every dollar. And we looked at the funds that were listed in this report, the third interim report. We're looking at all of those funds, the cafeteria funds, facilities funds, what we're spending in the academic side, things that could've been spent, special ed, all of our funds, to make sure that we're booking them appropriately. And we have identified some areas where we haven't consistently. So this is something that we want you to be aware that we are looking at this process. We're going to have specific information to bring back to the board once we complete the process.

So why are we being asked to vote on this now if that list and that hasn't been determined? You say you're finding these dollar amounts, then all I'm asking for and all I've been asking for is then produce what's been found so we know what we're talking about.

I'm just saying we're asking you to ratify the process that we're using. That's all.

And I would say I want to know numbers and what this could achieve before I might give a blanket ratification to go back and change these things. When you say that you've done work and you've identified things, but nobody has any numbers or documents to show that.

Thank you. It's backwards. Director Berry, you're next.

Yeah, I just wanted to clarify because I've read the resolution in that way and I think you were starting to explain it. So the way I read it is that this resolution gives you the authorization to do the work and any retroactive reclassification would have to come back to the board for approval. So we're not approving any action today except to allow you to do the intellectual exercise.

May I? So just to be clear, because there's different funds involved, there's also different rules. There's a different California code and federal rules associated with Fund 13, for example. And for Fund 12, there's CFR. That is for Fund 12, early childhood education. and for fund 25, for building, there's all different rules. So that's the reason why there's a three to five year period look back that is applicable depending on the funding source. Some of them require specific action to come back to the board as you ratify or approve certain line items and amounts. And others, if it's within a certain time frame, it does not. And so, but in any event, the board will have all of those numbers before him. It'll depend on the funding source. So that's the reason why.

So essentially, I'm going to try to do it in 25 characters or less. Some will come back for board approval and others won't. And it depends on the fund.

yes and this is you're ratifying the process here you're approving us to move forward with the process but in any event everything that is um done in the budget is a part of budget adoption so it all got it thank you thank you director brohard

okay director williams yes just real quick i do want to thank the superintendent as well as the deputy superintendent for moving this forward what we did realize in january was that there were transactions that were miscoded We identified that and we've saved multi millions of dollars because we identified that the monies that we were using our general funds were actually reducing our particular ability to pay our deficit. Thank you for identifying that in January. And I think this is just an extension of the process. If we identified it in January, then there's possibly opportunities to look back in the past to really address some of the issues that may have been miscoded. And I think you should have the authority to actually go back over the last three to five years see what particular funds have been miscoded and if they have you bring that forth if not then move on but I appreciate that you're thinking about ways of being more accountable and this is really not like about a not a budget cut but a budget correction that every dollar recovered through reclassification is a dollar that goes back that works for our students so i really appreciate that you're trying to find more money to invest into our schools and our students thank you very much

And my only comment will be I appreciate Director Williams for being the one that rang the alarm ever since I've been on the board around the transfers of monies from the unrestricted fund to the restricted funds, and I think this is another course correction that we are making, and I think it is about time that we make some of these course corrections. So with that, can we go ahead and take a vote on O21? Public comment on this item? Any public commenters would like to comment on this item?

Yes, we have Carol Dilton.

I'd like to remind folks in public, if you would like to get up and make a public comment, you can, since this item was pulled. But go ahead.

Thank you. So I have attended a lot of audit committee meetings over the last decade. The auditor is always very clear that the section of the audit, the fiscal audit, is looking at the transactions. Did you cut this check? Did you cut it from the fund that you said you cut it from? Was it correctly deducted from the balance? And so on. Since the general fund can cover so many different things, it's a business and management decision in discretion to decide for some expenses whether they charge to the general fund. And in some cases, there have been emergencies where certain facilities issue needed solving right away because it was a sewer main at first. And that would be an example of going to the general fund. So I very much hope that you will vote in favor of this motion. and the systems that will keep all of the funds used to the maximum possibility for the purposes for which they were designed. Thank you.

Thank you. Seeing no other folks in public, anybody raise their hand online?

That was the only hand.

Thank you. We'll go ahead and take a vote on this item.

on the roll call to adopt item zero dot dash thirty one which is file id twenty six hyphen thirteen sixty two as stated director thompson yes director barry yes director hutchinson no director williams yes sir director lauder yes vice president batchelor Yes. President Brohard.

Yes.

Motion's adopted.

Thank you. And as chair, I would like to go ahead and move T up. And we'll take T2 first, since we have some local business owners that have been patiently waiting in this board meeting. And then we'll take T1 and then T3. Apologies, everyone, for the last minute change.

Thank you.

Madam Vice President, what that item is? Yes, T2. I heard it was the T's.

T2, capital programs and construction-related local and small business and small local residential, resident business enterprise program.

Thank you. Good evening, Madam President, Board of Education, and Superintendent. Thank you for the opportunity to present the annual local business utilization report this evening. I'm happy to share that the report's findings will be positive news for the Oakland Unified School District and the Oakland community. I'm Shonda Scott, CEO and founder of 360 Total Concepts. second-generation business owner in oakland i was born in oakland oakland naval hospital uh... i was with the public public schools and when i was growing up my mom was a school nurse in the district as well uh... i started the company twenty years ago and for two decades we have been doing the monitoring compliance for service uh... for small business programs for both public and private entities most of our team are from oakland and raised in oakland and many of us still live here uh... tiffany knuckles who will present with me is an Oakland resident. She went to Oakland, grew up in Oakland as well, and she's a lead on the district's project for us overseeing the monitoring compliance for the board's local business utilization policy. Because of this shared connection, I'm truly honored to be here and to do this work with the district to ensure that local businesses have the opportunities to participate on district projects. And just to start, we have a few local business owners that are here that we have spotlighted in this video, and some are here as well. So if we could just start our presentation with the first slide, or do I do that? Is that okay? Thank you.

For nearly two decades, Oakland Unified School District has remained committed to ensuring that public investment in school facilities also supports Oakland communities. In 2008, the district established its local business utilization policy to intentionally expand opportunities for Oakland-based businesses. Since then, local business participation has increased from 6% to 50%, with a reinvestment of over $500 million back into the local economy.

Born and raised in Oakland, went to Oakland schools. My mother actually worked for the Oakland Youth Pride School District as a cafeteria lady for 24 years. She stayed in Oakland, and the fact that we can stay here, contribute back, and make a living here, you know, send our kids to school here is everything.

You know, the ability to actually open opportunities for others to carry the torch forward into the future, as folks did with me coming up, is a big deal for me.

I was a part of the Oakland Unified School District. I went to Fremont High in 2005, and I just remember the sense of anxiety that I got when I was arriving at school. And when I look at Fremont High now, it looks like a safe environment, and that's something that I'm proud of. We are currently on that project, yes, for both phases.

Having been a student at OUSD, to take pride, okay, in making sure that we participate in projects that will benefit students, the community, workers, and we get the word out.

The small local business program has really given a foothold to those companies that are interested in construction and engineering. At Tulum, we have 65% of our employees are Hispanic. 30% are black. Okay? And the other percentage are women. So we've been able to blend our communities in a strong company because we have a vested interest in what the city and the opportunity OUSD has brought to us.

And to help, uh, and to implement the board's policy team 360 acts on behalf of the district at handling the compliance and monitoring and working closely with the superintendent's office and the facilities department to ensure that the program is executed based on the board's policy and with fairness. Just a little bit about how the program came about, a little background. Like Tiffany mentioned, in 2008, the board passed their first local business policy, but it was based on the fact that communities came and raised the issue that Oakland businesses were not participating on Oakland projects. And then when the board gained local control, they looked at the data and saw that 94% of the district dollars on the book on the bond side, as well as the general fund side were being spent with businesses outside of Oakland. And on the bond side, we know that's the voter approved bond dollars. So the local businesses and the local residents that are paying the property taxes, all that money was being spent out. But in 2008, as a response to the findings and the community's concern, the board established its first race and gender neutral local business utilization policy modeled after the city of Oakland's policy. Oakland Unified School District's program has become a strong model to have to continue investing in economically challenged communities through the utilization of small local businesses and how that impacts the diversity of the contracting pool as well. And that is a direct success credit to the district and its leadership to continue to have a program such as this. This program during financially challenging times actually help local dollars and local businesses when there were times where federal and state dollars were not coming back to the city. So that's what 2008 looked like at the time, and that's what we continue to see. I'm happy to see former board member James Harris here. He was actually, he and Director Torres led the effort to have the policy then increased from the original twenty percent local participation to the now where it's fifty percent participation as a requirement. So that happened in 2014. And now I'll pass it to Tiffany and Tiffany will go through more of the project details, the implementation efforts and the outcomes from the local business utilization program.

Good evening, everyone. As Shonda mentioned, my name is Tiffany Nichols. I am with 360 Total Concept. I am community relations manager as well as a project lead for the LBU compliance program for OUSD. Our presentation today is organized into six sections. We will briefly provide an overview of the program and policy history. We'll share the 2025 annual priorities. We'll take a look at program performance, outreach efforts, and end with recommended next steps. Gonna skip this slide because we covered this in our intro. This here is our team. Our work is supported by a multidisciplinary team focused on compliance oversight, community engagement, media communications, and strategic program development. I will say that in the interest of time this evening, some of the slides will be skipped during this presentation, but the full deck is available online. Slide here. Um, so our team partners with the facilities planning and management department to oversee implementation of the district's local business policy. Um, BP seven one one five. Our role includes compliance monitoring over the life cycle of contracts, contractor outreach and engagement and technical assistance. We also work with the district to ensure the policy evolves and is responsive to changes in government contract code, as well as general best practices for local business programming overall. The district already sets a model for this type of program, and we want to continue to ensure that we strengthen the program, whether that be through the use of innovative tools, creative outreach strategies, or useful and supportive resources for the contractor community. All right, so now we're just gonna provide a brief overview of the LBU policy over time. Shonda briefly spoke about this already. This slide just outlines common terminology found throughout the presentation for your reference. In here, to explain the LBU requirement a bit more, we have this slide. Currently, and as of 2014, the district local business requirement is 50% for projects funded through bond measures. That requirement includes a 20, That requirement includes a minimum of 25% local business participation, along with at least 25% participation from small local or small local resident businesses. And we'd like to clarify that the district is not a certifying agency. However, the district does recognize certifications from multiple approved agencies in order to expand access and increase the pool of eligible Oakland-based firms. These agencies do the due diligence and complete site visits to verify that firms meet the local and size standards. And those agencies are listed here on the screen. However, unique to OUSD is the SLRB, the small local resident certification. So OUSD does certify firms as SLRBs when they are a small local business and the owner of that firm is an Oakland resident. This slide here outlines the benefits and some myths of the LBU program. What we know is that the LBU program generates multiple community benefits, including economic reinvestment, local job opportunities, and stronger partnerships between diverse firms. However, some of the common myths and misconceptions regarding local firms have no basis in data and are often naturally mitigated by the development of actual partnerships and management of logistics. What the data does consistently demonstrate is that local firms are capable of successfully delivering on large scale projects, again, particularly when supported through intentional partnerships and outreach. All right, and so now we're gonna move into just looking at some of the major priorities and accomplishments from 2025. In 2025, our program priorities focused heavily on strengthening compliance systems, refining policy recommendations, and improving transparency. We conducted an audit of board-approved contracts to ensure that contracts were following the proper LBU protocol for documentation. We advanced recommendations for modernization of the current LBU policy based on evaluations of the program and identified ways to enhance the policy. And we also streamlined the verification procedures for non-City of Oakland certified firms to create, creating a digital application process for ease of use and data collection. Did I turn it off? Okay, all right. So this slide here reflects just a cumulative monitoring of LBU data between June 2022 and December of 2025 at the close of Q4. During the reporting period, the district monitored approximately 377 million in contracts where LBU was monitored, with a cumulative LBU spend of 175 million. Based on what was contracted through 2025, upon contract completion, the estimated local participation projections are approximately 244 million, and that's tracking at 64%. significantly above the district's 50% requirement. And for us, this demonstrates sustained program performance even as project scopes and contract values change over time. This slide here, several major capital, this slide highlights several major capital improvement projects that are currently underway or recently completed. the projects listed here are all projected to meet or exceed the district's 50% requirement. And these numbers, again, I want to reiterate that they're based on work that was completed through Q4 2025. All right, and then here we have a slide that highlights two of our outreach engagements in 2025. We hosted multiple workshops and matchmaking events focused on improving contractor access and strengthening understanding of the local business policy. Our matchmaking events allows small businesses to connect directly with projects teams and prime contractors for possible teaming opportunities, and our technical assistance workshops focus on clarifying LBU protocols, expectations, and available resources. gallery of photos here, but we're going to skip that. So now we're going to start to wind down with our next steps. Moving forward, the focus is to continue refining the policy recommendations, support the build out of the student career development program, expand opportunities for local firms through trainings, workshops, and compliance support. And we plan to continue quarterly leadership briefings to ensure ongoing accountability and program visibility. Ultimately, the goal is continuous improvement and long-term community impact. All right, one exciting next step is the OUSD Career Development Program. So in partnership with the superintendent's office, this program would be where students would work hands-on with the district This initiative creates direct pathways for OUSD students into construction and facilities careers through stipends, course credit, and hands-on project exposure. This effort reflects the district's broader commitment to connecting capital investment with student opportunity. The recommendation would be to start the pilot program with two high schools, one in East Oakland and one in West Oakland. All right, and in closing, the LBU program continues to demonstrate measurable economic impact, strong compliance outcomes, and meaningful community investment. We appreciate the board's time tonight, and we look forward to developing the program further.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

We'll now go to board comments. Director Berry.

So I did have the benefit of seeing a preview of this presentation and I was wowed then, I'm wowed now. I think it's really awesome and that the progress has been amazing. Former director, I didn't know that you were responsible for some of this work, so shout out to you. One question I have is what the day-to-day relationship looks like between 360 the district and the potential um uh not vendors but companies who work or hope to do work in the district

We're in communication with the district daily. So the folks who are just up here presenting and talking about the solar projects, we were reviewing their LBU documentation. I'm on the phone making sure they understand the various components of the program. We're very much involved. It is very much a partnership, I would say. in my experience.

So we work with the facilities team and then we work with the contractors too. So we're monitoring the whole program. So in some cases that the GC's are the ones that are being monitored and sometimes it's the district work too because it's all cohesive to how the program is successful so we interface with the facility side as well as the contractors and part of the outreach some of the matchmaking that we've had have been where we have set up one-on-one meetings with small businesses and large contractors for the district projects to get them to have part to to allow the Um, possibility for them to team on the district projects. And many of them have been selected through those round tables to be on the teams for like the McClimans project over a said that some of their small local businesses they've met at the matchmaking. Um, because it's not just a pool of people that's like intentional to make sure that they can tell them about their firms and they can actually build relationships to work on future projects. And some of the people are here. that have actually teamed on some of the larger projects with the district, which have given a small business the ability to have the past performance of a large ten seventy million dollar project because now they're part of the prime contracting team not just the subcontractor so we're in partnership and tiffany's the lead on there so she's on project full-time others are just part-time as needed uh... in order to make sure that we've been efficient with the bond dollars i'll also add to that

So weekly, for many of the active projects, there are OAC meetings, and so I attend all of the OAC meetings, and so I'm hearing how the projects are going. I'm able to provide LBU updates in those meetings, and if there's ever any concerns, either on the small local side or from the prime, we have those conversations in those meetings.

We have resolution meetings as well.

where it's a full cycle, a part of the full cycle of the projects.

Thank you. And part of the procurement cycle, too, to make sure that the program's being applied to the contracts. And then in cases where there's not enough availability, then those cases, there wouldn't be a local business compliance, because this has to be three or more firms that could meet the requirement. So all of that assessment is done, too, before the contracts are awarded. It's all part of the cycle.

Just two quick comments. The $500 million reinvested in communities, and thank you so much for the first answer, it would be nice to see that data broken by the bond measure, especially as we intend to go back to community and ask for more resource to invest in more projects, like demonstrating to them that not only did you help us get a new field at Fremont, but also this money is being poured back into your community as well. And then the differences between the rate at which different people, different projects are making use of the LBU, I wanted to understand why, but question for another day.

Okay, now what was that question though?

like why it's 38% for this project and 21% over here, like what some of the, yeah, the context there.

Some of that's based on the availability. So if there's not enough firms, you know, there's not enough firms in a certain area, then that's when the 50% would be adjusted for that project.

Were you talking about the major projects slide? So I think it's just scheduling, like where they're at in their schedule when they start. Some of the projects are finished, and so that's when those projects are over 50%. Yeah, I think it's just around.

uh... the scheduling talk closer thank you don't don't don't don't sorry yeah yeah so in some cases that's the case but in some cases there it may not be a fifty percent for that project because availability might be different so some cases you will see no participation or you'll see thirty percent like on the solar or on the other cases that may not always be fifty so but in the case Tiffany's talking about on the on that slide It's in the cycle of where that project is, but they're all, like she mentioned, they're all projected to meet that 50% on those on that slide. For the full project.

Thank you. Director Williams?

Yes, thank you very much for this. It's really nice meeting you again, Scott. In person, not on Zoom. In person, yes, on Zoom, first time, which is fantastic. And also for... You know, you're really understanding this gentleman Eddie Dillard's vision about really trying to bring some equity to this process to local communities and it really touched my heart because when i first started on the board he was really schooling me up on how the game is played and to see that you've stepped into this position you're hired in this position and you're really holding integrity in this process it is really i know he's smiling i know he's happy that we have that because We were a little worried there for a bit. Right, right.

Because we were here before, and then we left, and then that was the gap that Ed was upset about, and then we ended up recurring again.

Yeah, so I just really want to thank you for the work you're doing. All I ask is whenever you have another showcase of local talent, I'd love to come and just really see the work that is going on. One of the things as a district, We get a lot of negative criticism and just constant planting seeds of fear and uncertainty and doubt, but we don't really show the roses that grow from the concrete right from our district from our school sites. We don't show that we don't. even the work that is going on at school sites, right? We don't have a sign that's in front to say, these are your Measure Y dollars, look what we're doing, or it's an open house, come check it out. See, we don't promote ourselves enough to really show like, or these are the contractors, right? We have these local contractors. People know, you know, if you're doing business in Oakland, we know that you're doing it, but we got to showcase some of our folks and we just don't do a good enough job. So hopefully there's an opportunity that we can like really take that on as a partnership and say, how can we help you? Promote us all over the place, right? If we have to, you know, have a convene a larger conference of local folks to come together, we need to really try to do that. So I just want to thank you for all that you've doing and the integrity that you're bringing to this process and really excited. Thank you.

Thank you.

Director Lotta, Director Thompson, into the microphone.

Just real quickly, I too immediately thought of Ed Dillard when you guys were presenting. And it makes me feel really good because just like he did you, he also kind of like took me under his wings when I first ascended to the board and helped me understand local business. But I noticed something that you didn't say, but I think it's part of what you actually do. You make sure that it takes place. Are there paid internships for kids?

I believe the facility does have, they've had a paid internship for first kids for a number of years. The career development program, we're saying it should be more than the summer. It should be something that they actually are working on site and getting credit, school credit, and then they'll be part of the study like the climate students can work on the climate projects with the contractors in a way that's part of the district cycle so the superintendent you know that's all for it because it's like we're not just building schools to build schools we're building schools for the learning and development of the students and the more we can help them like students that went to oakland public schools the way we can help them work on projects where they went to school it just really makes for a good story and and helps us evolve the next generation of leaders in our community and give them that foothold that they need, that experience that they need to be successful.

I think that's outstanding. I went to Castlemont, and I have a chance to see how kids were using the design of the Coliseum, their ideas of the design of the Coliseum area, also the transit from the airport, so that whole thing. And so I think you're right. You hit the nail on the head. You're right there. If kids can help design what they could actually use, we can take their concept of what they think should take place for our businesses.

And speaking of Ed Diller, too, just real quick, is that some of the policy recommendations that we have are to bring the policy back to the robust policy that the district had. uh... so that in his honor would be as huge accomplishment to get those things passed for the board in this okay director hudson

Yes, thank you. As we're remembering people, I also really want to give a big shout out and rest in peace to Alice Spearman and Daryl Carey.

And Noel Guile.

And Noel Guile. And especially with Ms. Spearman and with Daryl, I wouldn't be on the school board now today if they hadn't supported and encouraged me many, many years ago. And hopefully some of the folks who came out tonight for this exact item, hopefully some people had their eyes open to what's really going on in OUSD these days. We need help from everyone. Some of us in the past were on different sides of some of the construction projects. In my opinion, largely because I was always fighting for us to manage our dollars well so we can maximize our scarce dollars that we have. And I think having this presented at the same meeting that we had the third interim report and some of those budget numbers, hopefully it does open some more eyes and that we just need more involvement and more engagement from all of the different constituencies in Oakland to get us back on track. And I am glad that you all have the contract now again, but I really want to, it's always important to me that I honor the work that Alice Spearman and Daryl Carey did both for our community and for me personally. And I wish we had more of that energy around right now. So thank you all. And please, everyone who came out there in the audience for this item, Please come back again. We need real help here across the board for everyone. Because if this district tanks, I cannot imagine the trauma and the harm it's going to cause all of us. And when we mismanage our finances, there's less contracts to go around for everyone. And it's just a real problem that we're facing right now. So thank you all for coming and giving me the opportunity to shout out some folks.

Thank you.

All right, thank you so much for that item. Now we're moving to T1, which is the Local Control and Accountability Plan. Oh, I apologize, public comment, yes. I'm sorry, we are just running so quickly at a time. Yes, public comment on this agenda item, Mr. Sechow, thank you.

Yes, we have 10 speakers, and those 10 speakers are Gloria T, Marissa Zumara.

Come on up, everybody.

Raphael, is it Zamora, do I mispronounce your name? Christian Gonzalez. Nader Bey, Kyle Williams, James Harris, Aaron Gabriel, Ronald Muhammad, and Jack Nelson.

We'll do one minute each.

Noted.

Quick. Thank you very much for allowing us to come here today and share with you our experience for this wonderful program that we continue to have the board and current board members, thank you so much. Dr. Sandler, superintendent, it's been wonderful to hear all the support for 360 and for the program. I've been around for many, many years. I grew up in Oakland since I was three years old from a large family and decided when my brothers decided to open a business here in Oakland because our heart is here. We belong here. We want to give back to our community. We want to open jobs, opportunities, and if it wasn't for this program, as a small local, we wouldn't have had the opportunity to continue to work on larger projects. And this has really opened it up. Why not just to improve our knowledge and skill to provide and enrich our schools, make them better for our students like they were when I was in school. I'm so proud to see, and you have to be proud, that there are so many schools out there that are beautiful, and I just glow when I see those little ones in there, these powerful magnet schools. You just have to walk them, and I did that as I walked in at Holy Names University when I went to observe teachers in action there because I supervised them. And so I am so proud to continue to work here in the capacity of VP of Operations for Digital Design Communication, where you have given us the opportunity, been a long partner with you guys, and in other projects in Oakland, that I am Proud as a student here, proud as a community member of my family, and now you, Oakland, is our family to continue the work that we need to. Despite the issues that come, as a family, we can get there. And we're long gone, past whatever anybody could have imagined. So thank you so much. And thank you for having 360 participate and work with us so that we can develop what we need for creating jobs and good schools for our kids. Thank you.

Thank you. I would just like to please have one minute for comments so that we can finish out our meeting. Who's next? Just come on up. Come on up, whoever is next. Just come on up.

Mexicans and black people don't talk for one minute. Michael. Thank you, Board, for having us. It's a great honor to be here. You mentioned Daryl, Alice Spearman, Noel Gallo, Nadar Bey, and I think I'm the last one of the old guards. They're standing behind me. They're standing behind me. Because this program, we started pushing it in 2002 with the City of Oakland. Here we are, 2026. I get discussion last, two weeks ago, with somebody who says, you know, if we weren't mandated to use Oakland companies, we wouldn't use you. Two weeks ago. I raise that point because the struggle continues. The struggle continues. The struggle continues. And we have to prepare our next generation to understand that equity is ownership and economic. With that, we can meet anything. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Next, come on up, come on up.

Good evening. Thank you for allowing me the time to speak today, and I appreciate you guys taking the time to listen. My name is Marissa Zamora. I'm president and CEO of Tulum Systems, a small Oakland-based contracting company. Programs like the LBU program create real impact because they give businesses like mine the opportunity to grow, hire within the community, and reinvest back into the people who live here in Oakland. Not only does this create, sorry, Because of the opportunities created in this program, our company has grown significantly. Today we have about 30 employees with 85% of them being of our workforce are Oakland residents. Many of our employees grew up here and now their children attend Oakland schools. When businesses like ours are hired, we create jobs for people who are personally invested in the neighborhoods they work in every day. This program works because it keeps opportunity, investment, and growth within the Oakland community it's meant to serve. The impact of this program goes far beyond a single contract. It strengthens small businesses, supports working families, and creates a stronger connection between our schools and the communities around them. Thank you.

Gotta be quick, but this is a... really personal to us uh... we're glad that three sixty years back on the project that was one of the best moves you guys could do small businesses are crushed because they don't have the capacity and when you're working with general contractors and general folk who are in the prime position who don't see uh... the the the the importance of dealing with you with equity. They can slow up payments that can crush a small business. And 360 has always stood in the gap as an advocate from the district side, from the subcontractors who this program was designed to grow the small guy into a competitive state. And that only happens with a certain kind of mindset. We just want to say thank you. I could go on, but thank you, thank you, thank you. And I'm a homeowner, so I'm paying into my own stuff. Thank you.

Come on up.

Y'all going to really do me with one minute, huh?

Yep.

As much time as I sat there. Yeah. So I just wrote a little statement for you, and I will go a little over by about 15 seconds, but this is special, as everyone has said, because of the people who made this happen. And as we all know, public money is a public promise. Regardless of the politics and turmoil that we witnessed earlier, Oakland Unified has chosen to keep that promise through service, service to our neighborhoods, to our families, services to the businesses that are woven into the fabric of this city. I want you to think about them when you do your work. When Rosie and I championed this expansion of this policy, we stood on the shoulders of the people that fought for this. People like Tim White, Alice Spearman, my predecessor on this board, who championed it with conviction, my brother, my long gone brother, Nadar Bey, who showed us every day in his work why this matters. When I joined this board, As I said, one of my first acts was raising the threshold from 30% to 50% because I believe then and I believe today that black and Latino businesses in this city deserve more than access. They deserve a real seat at the table, and I am proud that we continue and you continue to honor their legacy and the opportunity this policy creates. That the policy lives on today tells me that this district can keep its word. Tim, Alice, Nadar would be proud. To the board, remember, whether you like it or not, you are a team. This city needs you. The students need you to work together. Let's keep it going. Let's go, Oakland.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Good evening. My name is Kyle Williams, and I work for a electrical contractor and I started as an apprentice you know working in schools and over the years I grew into a foreman and was able to buy my home I'm an Oakland resident and I'm just stuff like this is important you know it's made me who I am and I just I think it um it's just something that holds dear to me and it's important and It's important for people like me that grew up here to represent and build this community and just have programs like this to keep things going. And yeah, that's just how I feel. Thank you.

Thank you. Next speaker.

Hi, my name's Aaron Gabrielle with Light Frame Construction. Born and raised in Oakland. We've been on a couple of OUSD projects called Claremont, but the project that I hold personally to my heart is Fremont High. I was a student there, and just being able to be a part of that project, invest back into my community, the students being able to see me, a young black contractor, it means a lot to the community and the students, and I believe that they're our future. I would love to keep that going. So it was a pleasure just making Fremont. It just looks different, totally different school. I was a pleasure to be a part of that school, that project, so thank you.

Thank you, and so last two in-person speakers come on up. Is there anybody on Zoom, Mr. Sacho?

No Zoom speaker.

Great. Go ahead, Jack.

All right. Yeah, you guys have done a lot of things right. Number one, working with 360, and I actually am an Oakland businessman, and I do some work with Tulum, with the Zamoras, and... Their integrity level is sky-high. They're really great. So keep working with them I see you're gonna be working with them at McClymonds and Sequoia. That's great Second off the cuff since I got 30 seconds left Don James boy, you made her teacher of the year She's probably gonna be Alameda County teacher of the year She's going against Tony Farley who I worked with for years at San Leandro but Tony's good, Don's great, there's a difference. Oakland, we're on the rise.

Thank you, last speaker.

Good evening, my name is Nate Arbay. Thank you for having me, members of the board, President and Superintendent Sadler. I'm an Oakland native and a second generation Oakland contractor. This program has allowed me to work for multiple different companies in oakland and work on a lot of the communities that i grew up in i grew up across the street from fremont high school and we've had the opportunity to work on that campus i currently live near castlemont i was able to work on that marquee last year so it's It's a beautiful thing where the people who live in their community can give back to it and do things for the next generation. I want to be where I am today if it weren't for this program. So I wanted to give appreciation to all of you here and of course to 360 Total Concepts for keeping this going. So thank you guys.

Thank you. And with that, I'll hand the chairmanship over back to Director Brohard.

Thank you. Thank you, 360. Our next step is our LCAP presentation, which is a first read, introduction.

Good evening, board. My name is Sandra Aguilera. I'm the chief academic officer for our district. I'll be taking us through the overview of the local control and accountability plan. And for our board office staff, can you please promote Diana Sherman in case there are questions? Thank you. All right. So we're kicking off the LCAP season. We're going to do a brief overview tonight. And there will be two other opportunities to see the LCAP publicly. We have the public hearing and then we have final adoption. But this season really opens up the opportunity for not only our board members but for our community and staff to give us feedback on the LCAP items. So the Local Control and Accountability Plan is a description of how a district will use funds to meet student goals. This is part of the local control funding formula legislation and every district in the state must produce an LCAP. The LCAP focuses on low-income students, English language learners, and foster students. What you'll see in our LCAP are a description of student needs, our goals, which are broader goals that groups together specific actions, and the actions is what you can expect to see in our classrooms and at the district level. When you then go further down, you'll see line items, so all the specific investments that are made using school or district funds, I should say. Implementation at the end of every year you see an update as to the implementation of those actions and the associated metrics that are being met after one year. And of course we have the progress which I mentioned in terms of our metrics. We have a large number of metrics in our LCAP because we not only look at An overall area, we also disaggregate the data by our student groups. And then, of course, we have engagement. You have a large portion of your board meetings dedicated to PSAC, and there are further engagements that happen throughout the year to collect input on what we should be focused on in terms of our goals for student learning. A reminder, LCFF replaced an old outdated system around categorical funds. The LCFF gives you a base grant and then applied on top of the base grant is a supplemental fund and then a concentration grant. And you can see the breakdown provided for you for each of the grade spans, how much money you receive per student. And again, we're focused on English language learners, foster youth, and our low-income students. All right, so in our LCAP, it is meant to describe above and beyond the base funding. We are not going to list out all of the unrestricted base resources. And so if you're thinking about what actual positions that would be, your teachers, your principals, your special education costs, those will not be described in the LCAP because those are base funds. What you will see is a description of how we're using the supplemental grant, the concentration grant, all of our federal funds, the local parcels, so measures G, G1, state and federal grants, and we'll go a little bit more into equity multiplier, and then we receive grants from our private donors. So if you think about Kaiser, Salesforce, Eat Learn Play, those are examples of our private donors. We are entering in our third year of a three-year cycle, and so the board will have an opportunity in the upcoming cycle to re-look at the goals and possibly change the goals. So that is open to us after every three years. And so we have one more year of this cycle and then there'll be an opportunity to update those goals. So for goal one, students graduate college, career, and community ready. And you can see the actions that are listed below. Of goal two, we focus on our focal students so that they're demonstrating accelerated growth. And again, the specific actions below. Goal three, students, families, and staff are welcome, safe, healthy, and engaged in joyful schools. So you'll see all the associated investments and actions to reach that goal in goal three. And then goal four, our staff are high quality, stable, and reflective of Oakland's rich diversity. And then again, the investments and the actions listed there. For the next goals, goals five, six, seven, and eight are focused on equity multiplier. This was an added item for the LCAP. When there was the legislation that was passed, it was added on to the LCAP goal areas. And so you will see the investments for equity multiplier specific to these particular schools that receive this grant listed out and we have grouped them. I want to point out the schools, looks like a reddish orange color, these are new schools that are receiving these grants for the upcoming year. And just a quick reminder about the equity multiplier, schools receive this fund because they have high attrition rates among their students. So there are a few other indicators that identify schools, but that is the one that will tip schools into receiving the grant or not. And so it means that year after year, there's a high amount of students moving from school to school. So the schools that are continuing are listed in the black color script, and then we have Hoover, MLK, Martin Luther King Elementary and West Oakland Middle that will be receiving the funds for the first time. And then for our high schools, Matt West will be receiving the funds for the first time, and so on and so forth. Just to close out now, again, we're opening the season for collecting feedback. We have a few engagement opportunities. We use our PSAC meetings to collect feedback from families and from committees on the specific investments. And then we are having this first draft read tonight. Next week, there will be the public hearing on June 3rd. And then ultimately, the board will have before you the LCAP and the budget to adopt for June 24th. And so that's our overview. Again, Diana Sherman, our LCAP coordinator, is here on Zoom as well to answer any questions that you might have. And I'll pass it back to you, President Brohard, for any questions.

Thank you, Dr. Aguilera. Before we take any board comments, if there are any, I need to have a motion to extend the clock.

Motion to extend until 11.45. Second.

And Mr. Rick Stark, we have a roll call on the vote, please.

On the motion to extend the meeting to 11.45 p.m., student directors are absent. Director Ladder? Yes. Director Williams?

Yes, sir.

Director Hutchinson?

No.

Director Berry?

Yes.

Director Thompson? Yes. Vice President Batchelor? Yes. And President Brohard? Yes. Motions adopted.

Are there any board questions? Director Hutchinson?

yes thank you uh thank you dr aguilera it's not actually uh i don't think a question directed towards you specifically um but that i really want to put out there again i think there's been problems over the last few years of um of the district having real fidelity with the lcap plan especially as there's been budget adjustments and things have changed It seemed like the, and I know PSAC has not been happy with, it seems like it's always been a move away from what was actually laid out in the LCAP. And so I just want to put out there, especially for this year, I'm really concerned. I don't think the reduction in force, the layoffs, that list wasn't done in conjunction with looking at the LCAP and considering the goals that are listed there and just quickly reading through some of the goals and some of the successes of the past I'm really concerned because I don't think we're going to have those staff people next year and so when the two staff people who were in charge of the school improvement work and the school redesign work are no longer going to be in the district when that's one of the goals in the LCAP i don't know how we're going to fulfill it so i just want to put out there publicly and for everyone um i'm really really concerned about that and and just the second thing i think um waiting for this until almost 11 o'clock at night by doing it at a time when there's no community here let alone the community that was involved with developing the lcap is not a good message to send to the community on top of it So I know the last two years we've heard from the PSAC committee where they've come and complained that they felt like their plan wasn't adhered to and wasn't followed. You know, I'm concerned about going forward and so I appreciate this document, but how do we keep fidelity to it and how do we even get some kind of document to show, you know, like the delta, the changes that, the changes in the budget are going to impact the LCAP. especially when it comes down to specific positions. And just lastly, when I was on the last PSAC meeting, I was very surprised when listening to, I think it was Diana Sherman go over all the specific cuts that were involved with the reduction in force list. That was the first time I had seen those specifics in that sort of way. And again, if we are going to lift up the LCAP and the PSAC, as a real place to do work and set policy and set agenda, then we must have some accountability and some insurances when it comes to implementation. So again, that's not directed towards you, but I really just want to put it out there, and this year I'm more worried about it than ever before.

Thank you. Thank you, Director Hutchinson. Director Berry?

Yeah, hi, thank you. I wanted, in the last budget and finance meeting, we spoke about my desire, and I think it's shared, I don't think it's unique to me, for the budget stabilization work, fiscal solvency work, to be anchored in vision for teaching and learning and One of the comments that came up in the meeting was how core the vision for the LCAP and the decisions related to the LCAP was to that work. So I just wanna hear you share from your perspective how you see the relationship and what drives what and what information you would want going into LCAP process. Yeah, I'll stop there.

So thank you for the question. One of the areas that we considered was collecting input from school sites to hear from their perspective what investments they valued the most. And it's always a little bit of an awkward conversation because they feel like they're ranking people that they work with. But I still requested that they work through that. And what they lifted up were more of the student-facing services and trying to maintain those student-facing services. So when you think about the quality teaching, There was a holding on to the literacy investments because we need to ensure that our students can read at grade level each time that they are ascending into the next grade level. And so you do see that investment maintained. You also have attendance work that we need to ensure that students are attending. We have been able to connect the amount of time that students are coming to school with their actual improvement. There has been a direct connection there. And so we still have our attendance specialists that are invested. So we did collect some initial information from our schools to ensure that what we were trying to maintain were investments. And of course we weren't able to do all because we had to make reductions. there were a large amount of the staffing that the school sites lifted up as being priority.

Any other board comments?

Yeah, thank you very much. Thank you for the LCAP presentation. I was actually going through the agenda and I saw a few items that kind of really fit with the LCAP, which was for Gold I, high quality instruction and academic acceleration. I think in this particular agenda, there are investments in summer learning and instructional support. So thank you for moving that forward, which helps out the accelerated literacy. For goal two, safe, healthy, and supportive learning environments, seeing a couple items that really reach to that. Expanded learning programs that are engaged in there. Bay community resources and such. And some after school enrichment, which is good. And goal three, I see that college career and community readiness. You have some career pathway internship investments. in this particular agenda. So I just want to thank you for that and the supports as well as student stipends with the ECHO program and work-based learning experiences as well. Further, and goal four, organizational effectiveness and fiscal responsibility. has a strategic use of our ELOP funds as well. So what we know is that we're moving more towards the El Capaline than our particular budget agendas. And I appreciate you thinking about that and moving those items forward. Thank you for the work.

Thank you, any other? Look forward to the hearing on June 3rd.

Thank you.

Is there any public comment on this?

For public comment, we have one registered speaker, Carol Dilton. President Brewhart, no hands for Carol Dilton.

Okay, thank you. The next item on the agenda is item T3, Application for Provisional Internship Permit, California Commission on Teacher Credentialing. Is there a motion to adopt? So moved. Second. And is there any public comment on this?

No public comment.

Thank you. Is there any board comment? Mr. Baxter, can we have a roll call on the vote, please?

On the motion to adopt the motion as stated, student directors are absent. Director Thompson? Yes. Director Berry? Yes. Yes. Director Ladder. Yes. Director Hutchinson. Yes. Director Williams. Yes, sir. And L.A.'s President Baxman. Yes. And President Brewhart. Yes. Motion's adopted.

Thank you. Next, we have item P, consent items, agenda items, facilities, minus P8 and P12.

Point of clarification, do we have 01, the consent report number 2?

We do, but.

People forgot to include it even though it was pulled when Vice President Batchelor was running the meeting. We didn't discuss it separately and it wasn't mentioned.

Can we just, we'll take item 01. Is there a motion to adopt, please? Is there a motion to adopt 01? So moved. Second. Is there any board comment?

Yeah, I just want to state for the record that when you pulled items at the start of the meeting, President Brohard, you said you were pulling 01 and 021. So I just want to make that clear. That's what you read out in your modifications to the agenda. Then when the consent report came up, 01 wasn't pulled and it wasn't discussed separately.

Okay, that's noted, thank you. Is there a motion, I mean, can we take a roll call on the vote, please?

President Batchelor? President Burlhart, I thought I recall that you meant O21, and Vice President Batchelor corrected you, that you didn't actually pull O1.

No, there was O1. Okay, can we take a roll call on the vote, please?

Action of consent report number two, which is 01.

Mr. Rickshaw, just for the record, we have no public comment on this item.

Thank you very much. On the roll call, student directors are absent. Director Berry?

Yes.

Director Hutchinson? Abstain. Director Williams? Director Williams?

Yes, sir.

Okay. Director Lott is recused. Director Thompson? Yes. Vice President Batchelor? Yes. And President Brohard? Yes. Motion is adopted.

Next item is item P minus items P8 and P12. Is there a motion to adopt? So moved. I'll second it. Is there public comment?

No public comment.

Thank you. Can we have a roll call on the vote, please? P minus P2, I'm sorry, minus P8 and P12.

Yes.

Yes, sir. Abstain.

Yes.

Yes. Yes.

Yes.

Yes. Items, okay. Items P8 and P12 both have to do with 1025. Director Hutchinson, I know you pulled them. Do you want to take them separately or do you want to take them together as one? Okay, I'm going to make a motion that we adopt items P8 and P12.

Second.

Is there any public comment?

No public comment. No public comment.

Director Hutchinson.

Thank you.

Welcome.

As my mom would say, I can tell who didn't have my mom for kindergarten these days. So I pulled these items to make sure I could explicitly vote against them. One of the many problems that we have going on in OUSD right now is past legislation and resolutions aren't being enforced. So for example, we have a resolution for the three R's that called for action last June that was never enforced. i mentioned earlier today we have a board policy thirty one fifty that requires the superintendent to bring forward a draft agenda by this meeting nobody enforces it this demolition of second avenue not only is it offensive we had previous standing resolutions that prevented this but this was still allowed to go forward And for that building in particular, that building's a historic building. It has certain status and recognition because of that. But the way the board has operated this year, we've just ignored all of those things. So I'm going to do what I can to push against it. I'm really disappointed that we haven't gotten stronger legal advice to prevent these things from happening. And people aren't going to be able to get away with it for much longer. But it's definitely offensive that people are missing with our traditional properties and a building that's named after Paul Robeson for a reason. And that has meant a lot to a lot of people in the community. And to think at the end of the night, you can just slide through something that's on call for the demolition of that building. and that we're gonna use money out of our facilities bond to do it instead of using those dollars to actually improve our schools and rebuild them is even more offensive. And if people think that by having this demolition done now this summer, that's gonna free the way for anyone to take that property and move it to outside hands through a 7-11 committee, that you weren't around before when we had these fights. So I'm going to be voting strongly no. This is offensive, and there are legal implications to a lot of these decisions, and the day of reckoning is coming.

Thank you. Mr. Rakestar, can we have a roll call on the vote, please?

Mr. Slater, are you going to get no public speakers? Okay, all right. Director Lotta?

Yes.

Student board members are absent. Director Williams? Yes, sir. Director Hutchinson? No. Director Berry?

Yes.

Director Thompson? Yes. Vice President Batchelor? Yes. And Vice President Brewhart?

Yes.

All right, motion is adopted.

Thank you. Moving on to item S, unfinished business. I would like to take up S1 through S4 together and report out separately. Second. Thank you. Is there any public comment on this?

No registered speakers.

Thank you. Is there any board comment? Mr. Rakestar, can we have a roll call on the vote, please?

Yes, on the motion to adopt S-1 through S-4, the student directors are absent. Director Thompson? Yes. Director Berry? Yes. Director Hutchinson?

I'm not comfortable lumping all of these together, abstain. They're not all the same thing.

Director Williams? Yes. Director Leiter?

Yes.

Vice President Batchelor? Yes. President Brewhart? Yes. Motion to stop it.

Thank you. With that, we move on to the president. And I do have one.

I think it's the president's report. It is.

I just had it. All right. Thank you. As we close out the 2025-26 school year, I want to begin by recognizing an important milestone for thousands of Oakland students and families. Tomorrow, May 28th, is the last day of school. and I want to congratulate graduates from Castlemont, CCPA, Dewey, Fremont, McClymonds, MetWest, Oakland High, Oakland Tech, Ralph Bunche, Redsdale, Skyline Sojourner Truth, the Young Adult Program, and the Oakland Adult and Career Education. Graduation is a powerful reminder of why we do this work. This is an exciting time as students head off to college, careers, apprenticeships, and new opportunities. I also want to congratulate our middle school students who are promoting to high school, our elementary students who are promoting to middle school, and our TK students who are promoting to kindergarten. These transitions matter and they reflect the hard work of students, educators, staff, and families across Oakland. The past several weeks have also shown what collaboration and advocacy can accomplish when we stay focused on students. On May 7, Oakland Unified joined with LAUSD in Sacramento to advocate for the full funding of Proposition 98. Superintendent Sadler, Vice President Batchelor, and I were joined by representatives from OEA, AFSCME, SEIU, and BCTC. In room after room with state senators and assembly members, labor and district leadership stood together to explain how education funding impacts our students and school communities and shared stories of what it means when we don't have stable funding from the state. That level of unity matters, and this is what working together looks like. I also want to acknowledge the May 18th press conference at 1025 2nd Avenue in support of Senate Bill 492 and the proposed CTE Tay Hub. I was proud to stand alongside Mayor Barbara Lee, Senator Jesse Aragon, Superintendent Sadler, Director Berry, and the youth who have been organizing for this vision. OUSD has a clear goal that every student graduates college, career, and community ready. But we also know that for some students, a diploma alone is not enough. Many young people need stable housing, mental health support, career and technical education, and pathways to employment in order to fully succeed. Senate Bill 492 would help fund those supports. On May 14, the Governor released the May Revise, and while the full $5.9 billion Proposition 98 Settle Up was not included, $3.8 billion was restored, and the fight for the remaining funds continues. There were also several positive developments for districts across the state, including increased special education funding, one-time discretionary block grants tied to ADA, and expanded learning recovery grants, the continued funding for literacy coaching and training, ongoing support for community schools, teacher residency programs, and increased funding for ELOP. Because OUSD already has a literacy grant in place, our district will also be eligible for additional literacy funding through 2031. While these investments are important and encouraging, we still have significant work ahead as we continue developing a balanced, student-centered budget for the 2026-27 school year. The work will require continued collaboration, transparency, and a focus on the needs of students and school communities. Thank you to all our students, families, educators, staff, and community partners for another year of hard work in support of Oakland's children. I wish everyone a safe and restful summer. And finally, I want to remind the public that there will be a board retreat on Monday, June 15th from 9 to 3 in the committee room where we'll discuss our goals and work plans for the 2026-27 school year. Board reports. Board member reports. Director Batchelor.

thank you i'd like to thank district staff educators and families our labor partners and community members who pushed us through this the last few years to help us get to this point of having a positive certification of our third interim while the work is not over the report shows that ousd is now projected to meet its fiscal obligations this year and over the next two years while continuing to protect our reserve requirements and stabilize the district financially this is important This means that Oakland maintains control of our schools, ensuring that only Oakland voters and community members have control over what our Oakland students have, not state or county officials. We also know that long-term stability requires continued innovation and restructuring across the district. That includes expanding transitional kindergarten opportunities, exploring in-district non-public school options for disabled students, and continuing district restructuring efforts to align resources with students' needs. For too long, Oakland students and staff have lived through financial crisis after financial crisis. Achieving financial stability is not the finish line. It is the foundation to invest in our students' success, academic achievement, stable schools, and rebuilding a strong public education system. The report makes it clear that we need to stay disciplined and tackle the challenges head on. but tonight really marks a genuine turning point and proof that Oakland can move forward responsibly and sustainably.

Thank you.

Dr. Berry. Just a few quick things. One, my office hours for the month of June is changing again, so I apologize for the inconsistency this month and next, but my last office hours, will be on june 27th so it's just the last before we recess in july and then we'll i'll reconvene and then also in june date tbd um there will be a virtual event and we're going to be hosting some folks from mississippi so if you all have heard of some of the literacy and math success that they've seen there there are a few stakeholders who are willing to talk to members of our community so it's open to all of oakland and i will have that information Post it online, but I'll also send it out so folks can circulate it. And I also wanted to give a shout out to the Fremont seniors I saw at Singer Night last night. It was a really special event. I got a chance to talk to some of the families and seniors, and I just think this is a really special time of year. So despite all that is going on in the world, really hold on to the joy that we all have right now as people are being elevated into their next chapter. It's really awesome.

Director Vang?

Yes, I really want to give a shout out to Oakland Natives. Dr. Naisha DeWitt really has been a strong fighter for our students, fighter for our district, and really addressing and bringing solutions to the table for chronic absenteeism. Today I actually went to McClimates to witness her Oakland Natives Give Back, give $5,000 to one of the McClimates students, Hannah Jenkins, for the attendance challenge for chronic absenteeism at McClimates. The attendance has increased. Students participating in the program, they get $500 a month. If they actually, you know, show up on time for the month, that's a great incentive. And at the end of the year, they were enrolled in a raffle of $5,000. So Dr. Naisha DeWitt, I just can't thank you enough for your belief and investment in the district and into our students. and secondly she also held a convening of local political leaders Dr. Sattler was there to really lead the work with Dr. Newitt and just talking about what strategies OUSD and the community can work together and really addressing some of our chronic absenteeism that's happening in our district and affecting our student outcomes what we do know is we have On average, minimum 3,000 students that have come to school on a range between 20 and 80%. uh... and if we can get that number down as we have pledged to support our superintendent in moving that number down that actually will bring additional resources for us to reinvest into our students so knowing that dr sadler and dr naisha dewitt are partnering and really elevating the chronic absentee issue but also the partnership of Oakland Gives Back. It's just really a wonderful end of the year gift, not only just to Hannah Jenkins, but to all the students that were participating in the program and all of the parents and all of the students that supported that. So I can't thank you enough, Dr. Sadler, for continuing to push that vision that you are addressing chronic absenteeism. I've been on the board for two terms and I have not seen very much movement. And you step in and we're starting to really make some stuff happen. So thank you very much again for your leadership. I'm out.

Just a couple of quick things. First off, tonight, while we were having our meeting, folks graduated from Oakland International and Oakland Tech, so I want to congratulate them, including our student board director, Director Mariana Smith. who um is celebrating uh after graduating tonight from oakland tech um and i want to just say that the other event i want like to uplift is um coming on june 1st so that's this monday at 5 30 to 8 at the fremont cafeteria it's the um ousd multi-stakeholder engagement group which is a group led by members of psac and cac um also supported by some of our staff in a volunteer capacity cynthia molina and troy christmas um and um as the cac and psac our liaisons both director brohard and myself are assisting um and it's going to be the the previous um five engagements have been really around what makes a process um truly community centered and reflective of the input from communities and there's been uh and it's been there's been multilingual events the most recent event was last tuesday and there was 44 parents and family members at the arabic only speaking zoom which is i think a pretty just a testament to the um i think the leveraging of relationships that's happening i mean i it's not very often that we get that many folks in one language speaking we also had a mom speaking only engagement so there'll be interpretation in arabic mom spanish and mandarin at the event on monday and it's going to be about what matters most and what's working in our schools so we know what what our community wants to protect so if you're interested um it would be great if you rsdp at ousd hyphen mseg.org or dash mseg.org because then we can make sure that we have interpretation child care and food for you And then next Thursday we'll have our next and final budget and finance meeting and we will be talking about some of the specific reductions and the numbers that came up multiple times tonight. So I hope you all can join, thanks.

Director Thompson.

Yes, I'll try to make this very quick. the custodial department under the leadership of Roland Broach had, you and I attended the graduation ceremony that they held at Fremont High School and it was very good and I'm really excited because the things that I'm mentioning go beyond just the single entity itself it actually encompass the entire community uh... with that castlemont also hosted the voices uh... a couple weeks ago and uh... there were kids from elementary school through high school represented uh... and there are a lot of different schools there so that was very good uh... also i did attend um prior to the board meeting tonight i did attend um the 11th graders at castle mod who actually uh presented projects again focusing on how um our students are working to encompass the entire community making a change in the community they actually design projects for the actual airport corridor. And I just kind of thought this is really wonderful because they talked about addressing homelessness, kids in school, air, air quality and creating shaded spaces. And so I just thought it was absolutely wonderful. And the very last thing, Castlemont is having their graduation Thursday, and I shouldn't say the last thing, and one other thing, and MPS, Madison Park, yeah, they had their graduation Tuesday.

Director Hutchinson.

Thank you.

A reminder to everyone, we still have another month of board meetings, so we have a regular school board meeting on June 10th and on June 24th. You know, like I stated a couple times tonight, board policy explicitly calls for the superintendent to present a draft agenda at tonight's meeting. Didn't happen. It sounds like there's not even gonna be a draft agenda ready for the next budget and finance committee meeting next week. And this has never been how things have worked in the past, where people just refuse to do the work. And then on top of that, now tonight, this board voted to certify our budget as positive. even though we know we continue to overspend more and more every month, and even though nobody could answer what the number for projected expenditures is for next year. So I don't understand how when we don't have a staff person who can answer basic questions, when the third interim report was only posted and given to board directors 24 hours before the meeting, when really we should have a draft budget already ready, and people are still talking about working on it in the future. Even with the numbers presented tonight, there's a deficit projected for next year, which means we can't pass a balanced budget, as we're required to by law, which also means if we pass a budget with a deficit in it, that ensures insolvency next year, because we have no cushion on top of that. And these are standard financial and budgetary principles. Just like County Superintendent Castro sent us a letter in September, early September, telling the board we needed to address the budgetary shortfall of 25-26 and 26-27 by October 8th. Superintendent Sadler, you also sent the board that message. The board took no action on October 8th. On December 10th, at the second interim, you presented scenario three, which you explicitly said was not a plan. Now in your press release from this week, you said that was the plan. It was approved in December. Well, scenario three called for $27 million in cuts this year. Didn't happen. Called for $103 million in cuts for next year. That didn't happen. Yet a budget number was put in front of us that reflects a difference of $100 million that nobody could explain. I'm sorry, this isn't rocket science, but we've lost our CBO. We moved somebody from the head of HR in charge of our finances, hired consultants with an awful reputation that weren't vetted instead of taking free help from the county. Can't get a third interim report out in time where I can even see it more than 24 hours before we're asked to vote on it. And you all want to call this positive and think, we did it. We're the first ones in decades to do it. That sure isn't what I've experienced. And when you have people like Director Williams seconding it, That just proves my point. I hope everyone sees this and is watching. This is going to be explosive and scandalous, because we're talking about $100 million, and nobody can explain where it went.

We are adjourned. Oh, in honor of, all right. We are adjourned in honor of Max Robinson III and Deborah King Cooper.

I will bring up some specifics next week, but the acknowledgement of Max Robinson III will be at the Chapel of the Times on June 2nd.

Our next meeting. Thank you. And thank you to my board colleagues for...