There’s a Full-Scale Parental Revolt Going on in San Francisco – Opinion

Sarah Lee, my colleague, shared this news on social media. There are signs that California is experiencing a new era of life, not only in conservative parts. In San Francisco of all places, there is a full-scale parental rebellion.

The San Francisco Chronicle reports that three local school board members were removed in Tuesday’s recall election. This was the first in over 40 years. These three members were also the longest-serving, which allowed them to be recall. There are already whispers that a fourth could be on the way.

The landslide decision means board President Gabriela López and members Alison Collins and Faauuga Moliga will officially be removed from office and replaced by mayoral appointments 10 days after the election is officially accepted by the Board of Supervisors.

Mid-March is when the new members of the board will take office. They were the only members of a school board who served for enough time to be eligible for recall.

The recall divided the city for the past year, with a grassroots effort of frustrated parents and community members pushing for the trustees’ removal over the slow reopening of schools during the pandemic and the board’s focus on controversial issues like renaming 44 school sites and ending the merit-based admission system at Lowell High School.

While the far-left Chronicle describes the recall as having “divided the city,” the results say otherwise. All ballot measures showed at least 72% support for recall. That’s overwhelming by any definition and does not point to any serious opposition to removing the board members.

Just recently, three members of San Francisco’s progressive school board were recalled.

The result was even less. pic.twitter.com/CR8xwxeBW9

— Greg Price (@greg_price11) February 16, 2022

The recall efforts were largely driven by the board’s refusal to re-open schools in a timely manner and the fact that during the pandemic, the far-left members chose to focus on renaming “racist” schools instead of handling the crisis at hand.

As RedState reported back in mid-2021, the board actually reversed its plan on renaming schools named after figures like Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and even current Democrat Sen. Dianne Feinstein (that’s how insane these board members are). However, the damage was already done. Parents in the city had clearly had enough, and that culminated in Tuesday’s recall results.

Because of the structure, London Breed (a left-wing radical) gets to choose the replacements. To retain their current seats, the new term expires in January 2023.

Still, Breed herself is up for re-election in less than two years, and she’s already shown some acknowledgment that there are limits to what she can push as mayor, even in a far-left bastion like San Francisco. It could be a problem for her if she names another group of idiots to the school board, after people have been so vocal about it. It’s likely, though, given the partisan makeup of the city, that any challenge to Breed would have to come from within her own party.

If parents and voters want to see real changes in San Francisco they will have to go beyond organizing recall elections for school board members. No matter how important it may be, we need to see change at the top. Otherwise, these same problems will persist.

Regardless, it’s a good sign that even in one of the most liberal areas of the country, people are standing up and saying enough is enough. Whether this grows into something larger, I can’t say, but it’s better that change is happening at some level than not at all.