SEC. 16.123-8. ADJUSTMENTS.
§ 16.123-8
The City may suspend education funding if the School District or DEC fails to adopt the Controller's audit recommendations or reserve policies; suspended amounts go to the Children and Youth Fund instead. The Board may also reduce required education contributions if voters approve new dedicated revenue sources for schools or if state funding increases exceed the City's cost-of-living growth.
The City can pause its regular school funding payments if the School District or the preschool agency (DEC) won't follow money-management rules that the Controller recommends. If that happens, the money goes to youth programs instead. The Board of Supervisors can also lower the City's required school payments if San Francisco voters approve new taxes dedicated to schools, or if the state gives the schools or preschool programs extra money to cover costs.
- Complex:The section contains multiple conditional scenarios (audit failures, reserve policy failures, new revenues from voters, state LCFF funding changes, state preschool funding) with cross-references and nested subsections that make it hard to track all the circumstances under which reductions apply.
- Controversial:Suspending education funding based on administrative compliance (audit recommendations, reserve policies) is a mechanism that reasonable people might view differently in terms of its fairness and effectiveness as leverage.
AI-generated · claude-haiku-4-5 · informational only, not legal advice.
Official text
(a) Audit Recommendations. The Mayor and the Board of Supervisors may suspend the City's disbursements from the baseline appropriations or the Public Education Enrichment Fund under Sections 16.123-3, 16.123-4, or 16.123-5 in whole or in part for any year where the Controller certifies that the San Francisco Unified School District or DEC has failed to adopt audit recommendations made by the Controller.
As part of the audit function, the Controller shall periodically review performance and cost benchmarks developed by the School District and DEC, including:
(1) Fund dollars spent for services, materials, and supplies permitted under the Charter;
(2) Fund dollars spent as reported to the City;
(3) Supporting documentation of Fund expenditures; and
(4) Progress towards established workload, efficiency, and effectiveness measures.
(b) Reserve Policies. The Mayor and the Board of Supervisors may suspend the City's disbursements from the baseline appropriations or the Public Education Enrichment Fund under Sections 16.123-2, 16.123-4, or 16.123-5 in whole or in part for any year where the Controller certifies that the San Francisco Unified School District or the DEC has failed to adopt reserve policies recommended by the Controller.
(c) Transfer and Use of Suspended Distributions. If the Mayor and the Board of Supervisors suspend City distributions from the baseline appropriations or the Public Education Enrichment Fund under subsections (a) or (b), the City shall transfer the amount that would otherwise be distributed from the baseline appropriations or the Public Education Enrichment Fund for that year to the Children and Youth Fund established in Charter Section 16.108, or any successor legislation, for the provision of substantially equivalent services and programs.
(d) New Local Revenues. The Board of Supervisors may, by ordinance, proportionally reduce the contribution to the Public Education Enrichment Fund and the disbursements to the San Francisco Unified School District and the DEC required by Sections 16.123-1 through 16.123-10 if the voters of San Francisco adopt new, dedicated revenue sources for the School District or the DEC, and the offsetting reduction in disbursements is specifically authorized by the local revenue measure.
(e) New State Revenues. Following full implementation of the per-student funding targets outlined for SFUSD in the State’s Local Control Funding Formula (“LCFF”), as adopted in 2013, the Board of Supervisors may, by ordinance, proportionally reduce the contribution to the Public Education Enrichment Fund and the disbursements to the San Francisco Unified School District required by Section 16.125 if the percentage increase in per-pupil LCFF funding provided by the State of California to the San Francisco Unified School District in any subsequent fiscal year exceeds the percentage increase in the City’s cost of living during the previous fiscal year.
The Board of Supervisors may, by ordinance, proportionally reduce the contribution to the Public Education Enrichment Fund and the disbursements to DEC if the State of California provides funding to the City for universal preschool, provided that such disbursements are not required to match state and/or other funding.
(Added March 2004; amended November 2014; Proposition J, Approved 11/5/2024)