\t\t\t\t\tWhat’s at stake?<\/p>\n
FUSD Superintendent Misty Her’s office warned trustees that SEDA will erode the district’s already-tipsy finances and enrollment.<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, the trustees punted last night on taking a stance on mayor Dyer’s signature proposal.<\/p>\n
The Fresno Unified Board of Trustees voted 4-3 on Wednesday night to indefinitely table a resolution that would have made the district the first public agency to formally oppose the Southeast Development Area (SEDA) \u2014 Mayor Jerry Dyer\u2019s plan to open 9,000 acres on the city\u2019s southeastern fringe for up to 45,000 homes.<\/p>\n
The district\u2019s own financial team has estimated the project could force the closure of as many as 11 schools<\/a>, drain $200 million a year in funding and push California\u2019s third-largest school district into a new era of mass layoffs. A majority of the board avoided weighing in, voting to shelve the resolution rather than say whether they were for or against SEDA.<\/p>\n Trustees Susan Wittrup, Elizabeth Jonasson Rosas, Keshia Thomas and Claudia Cazares avoided taking a formal stance on SEDA, voting to indefinitely table the resolution instead of taking a position.<\/p>\n Without board approval, Superintendent Misty Her and her executive team are barred from taking any public stance against SEDA, according to FUSD Board Chair Veva Islas.<\/p>\n \u201cThreats from the mayor of Fresno did not deter me from my oath to the students, the families that I represent, or the teachers and staff,\u201d Islas said at the meeting, calling out her colleagues on the board who avoided taking a stance on the plan.<\/p>\n \u2018It\u2019s disappointing, to be sure\u2019<\/p>\n The resolution, which was crafted by the superintendent\u2019s office, according to board documents, had been two weeks in the making. It passed the board\u2019s legislative committee with the support of Islas and Trustee Andy Levine \u2014 Thomas, the committee\u2019s third member, did not attend \u2014 and was placed on the full board\u2019s agenda as a so-called \u201creceive item,\u201d giving trustees ample time to review it before Wednesday\u2019s vote.<\/p>\n But Islas said the four trustees who voted to table the resolution had raised no concerns during those two weeks.<\/p>\n \u201cOur colleagues had two weeks where they could have called, they could have asked questions, they could have said, \u2018I\u2019m happy to support that if we change this,’\u201d Islas told Fresnoland in an interview Wednesday night. \u201cThey didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n Islas said she was particularly disappointed that the board could not even bring the resolution to a straight up-or-down vote. \u201cWe were very careful in the language to say specifically, SEDA, as currently written, we could not support it,\u201d Islas said of the resolution.<\/p>\n \u201cI felt like that left it open to see if there were modifications that later weren\u2019t as detrimental as was proposed. I do think that SEDA is shortsighted. SEDA doesn\u2019t speak to infill, doesn\u2019t speak to removing blight.\u201d<\/p>\n What the resolution would have done<\/p>\n The resolution, titled a formal opposition to SEDA \u201cas originally proposed,\u201d was carefully worded to leave the door open for future cooperation with the city. It did not bar the district from supporting a revised version of SEDA.\u00a0<\/p>\n Instead, it opposed the plan as written, based on the findings of the city\u2019s own commissioned housing market demand analysis<\/a>, which the district and the Fresno Teachers Association used to estimate that SEDA would redistribute \u2014 not generate \u2014 families, pulling roughly 1,000 middle-class students per year out of Fresno Unified and into Clovis Unified and Sanger Unified.<\/p>\n The resolution would have directed Superintendent Misty Her to communicate the district\u2019s opposition directly to the city council, the mayor and all relevant public agencies \u2014 the critical step that the tabling vote blocked.<\/p>\n The Fresno Teachers Association, the largest union in the city, had already voiced its opposition to SEDA. FTA President Manuel Bonilla had been organizing meetings across Fresno Unified campuses to warn families about the plan\u2019s impacts. With the union leadership already on board, the board resolution was the last remaining piece that would have formally empowered the superintendent to enter the fight.<\/p>\n \u201cWithout board approval, our staff has to be flying under the radar,\u201d Islas said. \u201cOur superintendent can\u2019t take any public stance against SEDA.\u201d<\/p>\n Deputy Superintendent Ben Drati had told<\/a> Fresnoland in December that the district\u2019s hands were tied as of yet in publicly opposing the project. The resolution would have united the union, the elected board and the superintendent\u2019s office in a single, coordinated front \u2014 the first time all three would have been aligned against the project.<\/p>\n A contradiction of Dyer\u2019s December claims<\/p>\n The vote also laid bare the gap between Dyer\u2019s public assurances to TV<\/a> and radio<\/a> stations about the district\u2019s internal posture.<\/p>\n In December, days before one of the most packed city council meetings in a decade drew people across town in opposition to SEDA, Dyer went on a media blitz \u2014 appearing on KMJ and ABC30 \u2014 to declare that FUSD\u2019s concerns were \u201coverblown\u201d and that he had \u201ccalmed Fresno Unified\u2019s worries\u201d about the project. In his own telling, Dyer had met with district officials and addressed their fears.<\/p>\n The resolution that the board considered Wednesday tells a different story.<\/p>\n Authored by the superintendent\u2019s own office, it explicitly opposes SEDA as a threat to FUSD\u2019s enrollment, fiscal stability and the long-term viability of the city\u2019s neighborhoods.<\/p>\n The district\u2019s analysis warned that SEDA would \u201credistribute students away from existing Fresno Unified neighborhoods, accelerating enrollment decline rather than supporting sustainable, equitable growth.\u201d<\/p>\n These concerns were not enough for the trustees to take action.<\/p>\n What the trustees said<\/p>\n At the meeting, which stretched past 10 p.m. and required a vote to extend, the four trustees who voted to table offered little substantive defense of SEDA itself.<\/p>\n Thomas, who had skipped the legislative committee meeting where the resolution was approved for the full board, moved to table the item without elaborating on her reasoning. \u201cI think we\u2019re probably all going to say the same thing, so I won\u2019t waste our time,\u201d she said. Thomas is running to represent southwest and downtown neighborhoods in District 3 on the Fresno City Council.<\/p>\n