[Editor: An earlier version of this article misstated the given name of a student board member. It has been corrected. We offer a sincere apology to Kathryn Bleeker.]

[Updated]   The Board of Education on Thursday approved a resolution setting an Aug. 13 study session on “district transformation” — a process critics called out as campus consolidation under another name.

The board adopted Resolution No. 2894 (Revised), which rescinds the district’s earlier “optimal school size” framework, Resolution 2852, and directs staff to assemble enrollment, capacity and demographic data for the August session, where trustees will decide how to move forward.

The measure passed over the “no” votes of trustees Jennifer Hall Lee, Patrice Marshall McKenzie and Michelle Richardson Bailey, three of the board’s seven members.

It also passed over an advisory no vote cast by student board member Kathryn Bleeker, who said the student assembly was unanimous in its opposition.

The three dissenting trustees opposed the resolution on overlapping grounds: that it moved to a vote before the board had repaired what several called a broken public trust, and that the timing — during summer break and amid continuing disaster recovery — was wrong.

Bailey said the resolution “lacked transparency.”

“I felt like it was a bait and switch, and I was disappointed, to say the least,” she said, faulting the measure for not creating space “to address restoring confidence and trust in this community.”

She added: “Again, we didn’t learn our lesson. We put another resolution on for action before discussion. … I cannot support this resolution.”

Hall Lee was blunter about the language itself.

“When I see a resolution that talks about transformation, I hear a corporate buzzword,” she said. “It’s from Silicon Valley.”

She argued the timing was wrong, “in the middle of a recovery of a disaster,” and warned that revisiting school stability would hurt families, “not after the fire, not after an entire town that’s been decimated.”

Trust, she said, “is always rebuilt at the dais first. … We can’t expect people out in the community to trust us if we don’t trust each other.”

McKenzie called the central problem “the fracture of public trust” and said the district lacked a baseline from which to even define transformation.

Proceeding “without having good information is irresponsible and reckless,” she said, adding that asking the superintendent’s limited leadership team to take on the work as schools prepare to open “is not the best use of their time.”

Her conclusion: “This initiative and this resolution is a full ‘no’ for me at this point.”

Supporters cast the resolution more narrowly — as a vote merely to schedule a public conversation.

Board member Kimberly Kenne, who brought the measure forward, said “there’s been some conjecture that this means consolidation, but I hope that the words that are in it will speak for themselves.”

The strongest defense came from Vice President Yarma Velázquez, who said silence would not rebuild trust.

“I cannot in good faith say the best way to build trust is to stay silent,” she said.

But Velázquez also offered what amounted to the resolution’s most consequential admission: that consolidation is, in practice, already underway.

“We have schools that have in effect been consolidating starting in August that are going to be sharing principal, that are going to be sharing staff, that are going to be sharing curriculum, that are going to be sharing electives,” she said. “That is already happening in August.”

The vote followed public comment on the item, most of it opposed; of 14 people who signed up to speak, nine did so, with the others absent when called.

The Aug. 13 session falls on the Thursday before the new school year begins the following Monday, a board member noted — timing the resolution’s critics said leaves little room for the student voices the district says it intends to prioritize.

The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education on Thursday, June 25, 2026, named InSite Realty Advisers the preferred developer for the former Linda Vista Elementary School site and authorized negotiation of an exclusive negotiating agreement toward a proposed 99-year ground lease — then amended the action from the dais to require that the developer preserve the existing park in its current location and size, overruling the advice of the district’s own real estate consultant. 

The board approved Resolution No. 2895, which directs staff to negotiate an exclusive negotiating agreement, or ENA, with InSite Realty for the roughly 4.94-acre property at 1259 Linda Vista Ave. and declares the parcel exempt surplus land. 

Before the vote, Vice President Yarma Velázquez moved to attach a new Section 7 ordering that any agreement “shall require the proposed development to preserve the existing park footprint in its current location and size.” The motion was seconded and the resolution, as amended, passed. Board President Tina Fredericks presided. 

That condition runs directly counter to guidance from CBRE, the commercial real estate firm the district hired to market the site and run the bidding.

Asked from the dais whether the board could lock in the park now, CBRE’s representatives said doing so “would really limit what the developer could do” so early in the process and urged the board to route community concerns through the coming negotiation instead. 

Velázquez argued the surrounding neighborhood’s demand had not wavered. 

“We can have this conversation now or in three months, but the community has been consistent in saying” they want to keep the park, Velázquez said, contending that writing the requirement in now offered “our best chances of having a smoother process.” 

Two colleagues urged deference to the consultant. Trustee Jennifer Hall Lee said pinning down the park risked a worse result. 

“If we hem in the developer, we could get something subpar,” Hall Lee said, declining to back the amendment because the board “can possibly have something really fantastic there.” 

Trustee Kimberly Kenne questioned the project’s stated density and warned that requiring the park to remain exactly as it is “could make this deal not feasible” for the builder. 

“You’d be going against what this consultant has said to us, and we are responsible for the finances here,” Kenne said.

Trustee Michelle Richardson Bailey called the move premature and procedurally out of order, saying the board was “almost dooming this process before it even gets going,” and pressed colleagues to start negotiations while preserving the board’s leverage to reject the project later: if a final plan returns without the community’s priorities reflected,”that’s our opportunity to say no.” 

Trustee Scott Harden supported the park condition as “an anchor point” the board had the power to set, but asked for some flexibility on minor encroachment “if it makes sense for the overall development.” 

What the board did — and did not — do 

Trustees and CBRE repeatedly stressed that Thursday’s action authorizes negotiations only; it does not approve a ground lease or the developer’s conceptual site plan. 

Under the process described at the meeting, the district will negotiate an ENA — which must include a developer community-outreach plan — and bring it back to the board for approval. The project would then enter the city of Pasadena’s entitlement and California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, review before a final ground lease returns to the board for a separate vote. 

CBRE estimated the full sequence is “likely to take a year or longer.”

The money at stake 

CBRE singled out InSite Realty from a field of five best-and-final bidders, citing a proposal it described as low-density detached single-family homes — about 32 units at roughly 6.5 homes per acre on lots averaging about 8,000 square feet — backed by institutional capital. 

InSite’s offer carries a starting annual ground rent of $575,000, escalating annually with the Los Angeles County Consumer Price Index, with a 2% floor and a 3.5% ceiling. Using a 2.75% average, CBRE projected the lease would generate about $285 million for the district over its 99-year term — a figure the firm called consistent with the high end of its pre-bid valuation. 

The deal also includes a 90-day feasibility period and a $1 million deposit — terms that let InSite walk away if its due diligence, including the new park requirement, shows the numbers don’t work. 

At least one competing bid offered more annual income: a proposed 80- to 110-unit senior, memory and assisted-care facility from the Lalique/Flatiron/Anthem group listed $600,000 a year. 

Resident Carly Whitney, who urged the board to reject the InSite plan, said the senior-care alternative “offered higher annual revenue” and would create local jobs, while the chosen proposal “generates neither jobs nor the greatest financial return.”

A packed room defends ‘the heartbeat of our community’ 

Public comment ran long and overwhelmingly favored keeping the park where it is. 

Eric Kern, president of the Linda Vista Annandale Association, said the neighborhood was encouraged to see the project advancing but listed preservation of the park as its first concern. 

Resident after resident described the space as central to neighborhood life. 

Eight-year-old Ila Hill told trustees: “Please don’t take our park. It is the best park in the world.” 

Speakers raised public-safety and design objections beyond the park itself. One resident warned the site sits in a high fire-hazard zone and that Bryant Street “is one of the main exit routes,” cautioning that adding 32 homes could choke evacuation. 

Another resident noted the proposal would displace a preschool now leasing space on the site “but provides no transitional plan” for those families. 

Others objected to traffic and density, disputed the developer’s “low density” framing, and questioned whether the design accounts for the natural depression residents call “the bowl,” a graded former creek bed they say gives the park its enclosure and shade.

Mature trees drew repeated warnings, tying the Linda Vista decision to the district’s broader, contested tree-removal and soil-remediation efforts. A former Pasadena city forester who wrote the city’s original tree ordinance testified that the project — like other district sites — must comply with Pasadena’s tree protection ordinance, and several speakers said the plan’s “like for like” park-replacement claim could not be squared with replacing established trees. 

CBRE and trustees responded that no trees are slated for removal under the conceptual plan and that tree, park, density and design questions would all be worked out during the ENA and city entitlement phases. 

The former school has sat largely vacant for roughly two decades, used only under a joint-use arrangement with the city and a small preschool lease. District leaders have said monetizing surplus property is part of their response to declining enrollment, competition from charter and private schools and a shortage of affordable housing.

[Updated]   The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education is scheduled Thursday to consider a resolution that would select InSite Realty Advisors to redevelop the long-closed former Linda Vista Elementary School site under a 99-year ground lease and authorize district staff to begin negotiating an exclusive negotiating agreement with the developer.

Resolution 2895 would also declare the roughly 4.94-acre Pasadena property “exempt surplus land” and clear the district to pursue long-term lease revenue from a campus that has sat closed for years.

The action would not finalize any deal. The resolution states that selecting the developer and authorizing negotiations “does not constitute final approval of any ENA, ground lease, or other final transaction documents, all of which shall be subject to further approvals required by the Board.”

The resolution carries out three steps: it selects the InSite proposal as the one that best fits the district’s needs, directs the superintendent or a designee to negotiate the agreement, and finds the site to be exempt surplus land under Government Code section 54221(f)(1)(L) because it is being disposed of under the Education Code provisions that govern school-district joint-occupancy leases. A prior Education Code provision requiring the State Board of Education to approve a selected developer’s proposal before a binding agreement was repealed as of June 28, 2020, the resolution states.

Under its best-and-final offer, InSite proposes about 32 detached single-family homes arranged around the site’s existing central park, which would be dedicated to and maintained by the district. The plan calls for low-density, detached homes about 25 feet tall with attached garages and ground-level primary bedrooms intended to support accessibility. InSite’s proposed initial annual ground rent is $575,000, rising each year by the Los Angeles County Consumer Price Index — no less than 2% and no more than 3.5% — with upfront payments totaling $1 million. The site is currently partially occupied by the Linda Vista Children’s Center on a month-to-month lease, according to a competing proposal submitted as part of the RFP record. The district estimates the lease is “estimated to generate approximately $285,806,869 over the anticipated 99-year lease term,” a figure the district describes as illustrative and based on assumed inflation.

In its proposal, the Newport Beach-based InSite Realty Advisors wrote: “InSite and its team bring extensive experience in the design, entitlement, financing, and development of residential communities throughout California and the western United States.” The company, whose proposal is signed by Chairman and Founder Tony Ferrero, said it operates senior-living communities under its Clearwater Living brand and listed institutional partners including Goldman Sachs, The Carlyle Group, Harrison Street and PGIM. Its project architect, Mark Kiner of Bassenian Lagoni, has a personal tie to the site; the proposal says his mother attended the local elementary school.

InSite was one of five developers that submitted proposals on April 2, with best-and-final offers due May 4 and oral interviews completed May 12. According to a comparison prepared by CBRE, the district’s broker, the other bids were a 100-unit senior-care facility from Park IV Group/Oakmont at $425,000 a year; 45 rental homes from Woodbridge Pacific Group at $450,000 a year; 23 single-family homes, four of them affordable, from The Olson Company for a one-time $6.15 million payment; and an 80- to 110-unit senior-care facility from a Lalique Properties/Flatiron/Anthem team at $600,000 a year. District staff’s recommendation cites InSite’s projected long-term revenue, its $1 million in upfront payments, its experience and capital relationships, and and what the resolution describes as the developer’s proposed design — language drawn from InSite’s own proposal — for “a low-density residential community that complements the surrounding neighborhood aesthetic.”

The process began Aug. 28, 2025, when the board adopted a resolution of intention authorizing the request for proposals and rescinding an earlier resolution. CBRE marketed the opportunity and administered the RFP, which was issued Jan. 15 and required that the on-site park be preserved.

Even if the board adopts the resolution, the selection only begins negotiations. According to the resolution and the broker’s timeline, the steps that would follow are a separate board vote to approve the ENA itself; then the City of Pasadena’s entitlement and California Environmental Quality Act process, during which due diligence, community engagement and project refinement would occur; and finally a board vote to approve a ground lease.

—

The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education is set to consider approving the district’s special education spending blueprint for the coming year, a roughly $83 million annual budget and service plan that federal and state law require the district to adopt each year.

The item is on the agenda for the board’s regular meeting Thursday, June 25, at 5 p.m. at the district’s Education Center in Pasadena.

The Special Education Local Planning Area, or SELPA, plan sets out how Pasadena Unified expects to fund and deliver services to students with disabilities in 2026-2027. District staff recommend approval and report that the action itself carries “no financial impact,” because the board is being asked to adopt an estimated budget and services plan. The plan arrives as the district works to cut $30 million to $35 million from its overall 2026-27 budget under a county-monitored fiscal stabilization effort.

Pasadena Unified is a single-district SELPA, meaning it operates its own special education planning area rather than sharing one with neighboring districts. As the Local Plan puts it, “Pasadena USD is a single district SELPA, therefore all funds are allocated to the LEA.” The plan projects total revenue and total expenditures of $82,991,011 each for special education in 2026-2027.

On the revenue side, the largest single line is listed as “Other Projected Revenue” of $60,752,093, or about 73%, which the plan identifies as including LCAP, transportation, Workability and a contribution from the district’s unrestricted revenues. State Assembly Bill 602 aid accounts for $13,669,339 and federal IDEA Part B funding for $5,364,053, with a mix of state and federal infant, toddler and mental health funds making up smaller shares. Summarized by source, the plan attributes $16,769,284 to state special education revenue, $5,614,864 to federal revenue and $60,606,863 to local contribution.

On the spending side, services and operations is the largest category at $31,425,887, or about 38%, followed by employee benefits at $18,657,386 and certificated salaries at $18,260,276. Classified salaries account for $12,895,057, with smaller amounts for supplies, capital outlay and other outgo and financing. The plan budgets $990,727 for students with low-incidence disabilities and lists $0 in projected spending on supplemental aids and services for those students in the regular classroom.

The service plan covers a range of supports — including speech and language services, occupational and physical therapy, counseling, behavior intervention, and services for students who are deaf or hard of hearing — delivered at district sites, charter schools, non-public schools and other settings. The plan lists the SELPA’s average caseload for speech, language and hearing specialists at 55, the state’s standard ceiling, and answers “no” to whether the average exceeds 55; in the explanation field, it states, “We are at average in SELPA Pasadena.”

Special education is mandated by the federal Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, which the district’s report describes as originally passed in 1997 and revised in 2004; the report states that IDEA, federal regulations and the California Education Code require each SELPA to submit budget and service plans annually. The report says failure by a local educational agency to remedy required noncompliance could result in withholding of funds from the entire SELPA and/or a reduction from the superintendent’s salary. District staff recommend approval; the report’s recommendation reads, “The Governing Board of the Pasadena Unified School District approve the SELPA 2026-2027 Annual Budget and Service Plan.” The plan reports that it was submitted to the district’s Community Advisory Committee on April 1 and that the SELPA collaborated with the committee during its development. After board approval — along with sign-off from the superintendent and the Los Angeles County superintendent of schools — Sections A, D and E are forwarded to the California Department of Education. The plan’s originator is listed as Julianne Reynoso, Ed.D., assistant superintendent for student wellness and support services and the district’s SELPA liaison; the report is submitted by Helen Chan Hill, Ed.D., chief academic officer.

The board meeting begins at 5 p.m. in the Elbie J. Hickambottom Board Room at 351 S. Hudson Ave., with public comment taken near the start; meetings are broadcast on KLRN-TV and streamed online. The district held public hearings on the plan May 7 and May 28 and made it available for public inspection from May 7 through June 25.

The vote comes during a difficult budget year for Pasadena Unified. The district’s own budget materials say it is reducing $30 million to $35 million from the 2026-27 budget as part of a fiscal stabilization plan, with the reduced budget taking effect in July. EdSource reported in November that the district faces the shortfall because of a structural deficit, rising costs, declining enrollment and uncertain federal funding. The SELPA budget and service plan is a separate, state-required compliance document and is not itself part of those reductions.

If the board approves the plan Thursday, the required sections move to the state for final approval.

Approval would close out the framework that launched the now-paused consolidation review and start a new ‘District Transformation Process’

The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education is set to consider a resolution Thursday that would rescind its “Establishing Optimal School Size” resolution and replace it with a “District Transformation Process,” reopening the district’s stalled enrollment-and-facilities review with a study session set for Aug. 13.

Resolution No. 2894 would designate the Aug. 13 study session as the venue to discuss how to move forward.

The resolution directs Superintendent Elizabeth Blanco to bring five items to the August session: a Facilities Master Plan demographer’s presentation on local enrollment context, including birth rates, housing trends, immigration and private and charter school impacts; projected district enrollment for the next five to 10 years, with individual school-site projections where available; updated capacity reports by school site; background data from the 2026 consolidation process; and current staffing levels for each school site.

The board would also discuss scheduling community engagement sessions with community partners to gather community values and vision for the district in the next five to 10 years, with student input prioritized.

After reviewing the presentations, the board would determine the direction to give Blanco, including the areas the process covers, whether any committee takes the form of a subcommittee, a committee of the whole, or a community committee, and the approach to community engagement, which the resolution says would incorporate feedback from the recent consolidation process.

The resolution pointedly cites declining enrollment, the “significant fiscal and operational challenges” the decline has created, budget reductions already made, projected operating deficits over the next three years and pending facilities-bond decisions that taxpayers will be paying off for decades. It states the board “believes in taking the opportunity to rebuild trust and engage the community throughout the district transformation process.”

The vote would formally close out Resolution 2852, which the board adopted Dec. 11, 2025 to set enrollment guidelines for district schools and which launched the consolidation review.

The resolution notes the district went through the advisory committee and a proposed Equity Impact Analysis “without accepting the report.”

That review ran through the Superintendent Consolidation Advisory Committee, which held its final meeting May 11 and made no recommendation to consolidate schools at this time, the district said. On May 28, the board voted against accepting the draft Equity Impact Analysis, and the district said previously scheduled public hearings, a board retreat and board action on the process would not proceed as planned.

The district is working to cut $30 million to $35 million from its 2026-27 budget under a fiscal stabilization plan, according to the district.

If adopted, the District Transformation Process would formally begin at the Aug. 13 study session.

This week, the Pasadena Unified School District will approve its Budget for 26-27 and its Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP).  The budget document is over 200 pages, and most of it is difficult to understand.  For instance, what is the line for certificated salaries  and who are the people in that category?  Teachers? Librarians? Counselors? Principals? Central Office Directors?  (The answer is all of the above).  What programs do they support and for which students?  It can be difficult to tell exactly how the over $300 million in the general fund is being used to provide an education to the students of Pasadena Unified.

The LCAP document was intended to be the more user-friendly narrative that describes what activities the budget is funding and why.  It includes metrics showing how students are performing and describes what activities are focused on the most at-risk students.  At almost 170 pages, it is not the most concise of plans but at least there is an attempt to link funding to student needs and the strategies to address those needs.

That is why it is so important that the LCAP reflects the actual figures in the budget as it is the more accessible to the public of the two documents.  When the district outlines one set of expenditures in their LCAP and then puts different expenditures in their budget, they are misleading the public.

This mismatch has happened for several years in Pasadena Unified. In the 25-26 LCAP, the district lists funding that is contributing to targeted students and their needs.  But in the district’s financial system, these funds are sometimes budgeted for different purposes.  One culprit is the structure of the LCAP itself that was introduced in 24-25 – the district reduced the number of actions described in the plan which made it more difficult to tell what supports were being funded in each action and ended up commingling multiple funding sources and multiple funding uses in each action.  This resulted in an LCAP that no longer helps the community understand how funding is being targeted to help students and raise achievement.

During the next school year, the district and community will be creating a new 3-year version of the LCAP.  We need a revised document that can clearly show our community what actions are being planned to help our students and how those actions are being funded.  It is a requirement that all our educational partners – staff, parents, students, and community members – are involved in the process of creating the LCAP.  I look forward to an inclusive process that results in a plan that we all can read and understand.  Then the community will be able to fulfill the other part of the intended purpose of the plan – holding the district accountable for increasing student achievement, especially for those students most at-risk.

Kimberly Kenne is the Trustee of Pasadena Unified School District representing District 1.

The views expressed are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education

[photo credit: Families Forward Learning Center]

The special graduation ceremony at Families Forward Learning Center featured a traditional Bridging Ceremony, a meaningful milestone symbolizing each child’s transition to kindergarten and the next stage of their educational journey. At FFLC, parents learn alongside their kids — attending English-language classes, parenting workshops, and adult education courses in the same building. The nonprofit has practiced this two-generation model since 1961, when it began as a small “Mothers’ Club” in Northwest Pasadena. It now serves low-income families in Pasadena and Altadena with children from birth to five years old, according to the organization.

This year’s theme, “Building a Brighter Future,” reflected the potential and opportunities that lie ahead for the graduating students, according to a press release from the organization. Adding to the festive atmosphere, parents of the graduates created colorful LEGO-themed decorations that complemented the event’s theme.

“I’m so proud of our 23 graduates and their teachers, many of whom started our program as infants,” said Elva Sandoval, FFLC’s executive director. “Our graduates are well prepared and excited to take their next big step into kindergarten.”

The center, located at 980 North Fair Oaks Avenue, was founded by Mara Moser, who reached out to a handful of Northwest Pasadena mothers seeking friendship and social support. What began as an informal club grew into a comprehensive nonprofit offering early childhood education, parent education, adult education, mental health support, and leadership training, according to the organization’s website. A 2007 capital campaign funded the purchase and renovation of its current home, the Mary Lois & Richard Nevins Family Learning Center.

FFLC’s morning and afternoon sessions accommodate up to 116 children across five age-appropriate classrooms, from infants through pre-kindergarteners, according to the organization.

For more information about Families Forward Learning Center, contact Development Manager Liz Kwong at (626) 792-2687, ext. 123. The center’s website is familiesforwardlc.org.

Twilight Adult School [photo credit: PUSD]

The district’s evening adult program marks its graduates in a June 22 ceremony at Wilson Auditorium, separate from PUSD’s high school commencements

Pasadena Unified School District’s Twilight Adult Education program will hold its 2026 graduation ceremony at 3 p.m. Monday, June 22, at Wilson Auditorium, 300 Madre Street, according to PUSD announcements.

The ceremony is separate from the district’s five high school commencements, which were held June 3 and 4 at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium. PUSD includes the Twilight ceremony in its official Class of 2026 recognition.

Twilight Adult Education is a PUSD program offering evening instruction for adults, with pathways toward a high school diploma, literacy and English-language skills, U.S. citizenship preparation, and workforce training. The program operates on the district’s Wilson Middle School campus, where 2025 was its first year, according to PUSD.

PUSD’s broader 2026 graduation season follows the January 2025 Eaton Fire, which destroyed five district campuses in Altadena and displaced thousands of students.

For more information, contact Twilight Adult School at 300 Madre Street, (626) 396-5640, or visit twilight.pusd.us. The district can be reached at (626) 396-3600.

The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education votes June 25 on its 2026–2029 accountability plan. The stakes are local, but the moment is national.

This week, the federal government shifted day-to-day management and administration of federal special education programs from the Department of Education’s Office of Special Education Programs to the Department of Health and Human Services, while statutory responsibility under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act remains with the Department of Education. The move has prompted concern among advocates, former education secretaries from both parties, and members of Congress who argue that children with disabilities have a legal right to be educated, not simply treated.

That national debate arrives in Pasadena at exactly the right moment. Because embedded inside Pasadena Unified’s own accountability plan is a quieter version of the same risk: when students with disabilities are absorbed into broader goals, their outcomes become harder to see.

According to the district’s publicly posted proposed 2026–2029 Local Control and Accountability Plan, the four-year graduation rate reached 91.1 percent. That is genuinely good news, and everyone who contributed to it deserves recognition.

But the same proposed plan reports that only 49.1 percent of graduates completed the A-G coursework required to apply to a UC or CSU campus, down from 53.4 percent two years earlier. A high graduation rate tells one story. College readiness tells another.

For students with disabilities—nearly one in six students in PUSD—the picture is more urgent. Reading proficiency has declined. Mathematics proficiency has declined. Only 32.1 percent of graduates with disabilities completed A-G requirements. The proposed plan also reports declines in Career Technical Education pathway completion among several student groups, including students with disabilities.

These are not minor fluctuations. They are a direction.

These results do not reflect a lack of effort by educators. They reflect the need for clearer accountability—and a willingness to look directly at what the data reveal.

When outcomes are declining, embedding becomes invisibility.

During public discussion of the LCAP, it was noted that special education goals are embedded within broader district goals. Inclusion is important, but accountability requires more. Students with disabilities appear throughout the data tables, yet there is no dedicated goal that allows parents, Board members, or taxpayers to track what the district intends to improve and how success will be measured.

Federal protections for students with disabilities exist precisely because, without explicit requirements, schools have historically found it easier to educate students who are easier to educate. The moment accountability structures stop requiring specific attention to these students, that attention erodes—not through malice, but through the natural gravity of institutional priorities.

PUSD’s Board has an opportunity to resist that gravity, even as it is being yielded to nationally.

Before adopting the LCAP, the Board should consider two questions:

First, should students with disabilities have a dedicated goal with measurable outcomes tied directly to the district’s own data—outcomes that cannot be obscured by districtwide averages?

Second, what specific actions will be required to increase college readiness so that more than half of PUSD graduates leave high school eligible to apply to California’s public universities?

At a moment when federal oversight of special education is being reorganized in ways that concern advocates across the political spectrum, local accountability matters more, not less. The families of students with disabilities in Pasadena cannot wait for Washington to get this right.

The data are already in the district’s plan. The question is whether the plan addresses what the data reveal—and whether this Board is willing to make students with disabilities visible enough to be truly accountable for their outcomes.

Dianne Lewis is a community member and special education advocate based in Pasadena, California.

The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education voted unanimously Thursday to continue removing fire-contaminated soil at 11 district sites while authorizing staff to evaluate whether as many as 57 protected trees in the work zones can be spared.

The decisions came in a charged meeting during which a community member announced a lawsuit against the district and district parents, residents, and soil scientists voiced opposition to the remediation projects, during public comment.

The vote on the action item authorizes the district to press ahead with soil remediation tied to the Eaton Fire — work the district says state regulators have determined is necessary to protect public health — while adding two amendments that commit the district to weighing tree-retention alternatives site by site, except for protected trees the board said would disrupt the regular operations of schools and/or student life.

The actions came amid an unresolved dispute between the board and some members of the public over whether the toxic cleanup requires cutting down trees at all.

In a statement issued after the meeting, the district said the board voted “to preserve up to 57 protected trees and to continue the planned removal of other trees.” (The adopted motion, however, directs staff to voluntarily evaluate retention alternatives tree by tree rather than guaranteeing the trees’ survival; a district staff member said a tree whose roots are damaged during excavation would still be removed. He put the number of protected trees in the work zones at “55 trees for sure,” with two more to be evaluated.)

Much of the meeting turned on whether removing the trees is required to clean the toxins present on the properties.

Benjamin Stanphill, a Southern California division chief at the state Department of Toxic Substances Control, told the board the agency reviews the district’s cleanup proposals and “we are somewhat agnostic to the trees,” adding that the state could accept full soil removal, a long-term land use covenant, or a years-long phytoremediation or bioremediation approach.

The vote followed sustained opposition from members of the public in the boardroom.

Kristen Ochoa, a district parent, physician, and professor of medicine at UCLA, said she was representing a new group called Friends of PUSD Trees. Ochoa said the group would seek a temporary restraining order under the California Environmental Quality Act, arguing the state did not require felling the trees.

Jessica Richards, a Pasadena urban-forestry commissioner speaking in her individual capacity, said soil can be cleaned without removal: “That task can be accomplished while preserving the trees.”

Speakers, including soil scientists, said they have used bioremediation successfully, which did not require the destruction of trees.

Board members framed the vote as a balance between safety and the community’s attachment to the trees. District 3 board member Michelle Richardson Bailey cited a past incident in which “a branch has fallen on a student.” District 7 board member Yarma Velázquez urged prioritizing sites like San Rafael Elementary, where she said children had been without playground access for about a year, while revisiting other trees next year. District 1 board member Kimberly Kenne called the outcome “a good compromise solution.”

Work sites will remain closed while evaluations continue, the district said, citing contaminants “at harmful levels.”

The closed session before the vote included a conference on anticipated litigation over the soil projects and a performance evaluation of Superintendent Dr. Blanco. The district directed residents to pusd.us/restoringourschools.