Kim-Shree Maufas Archives — San Francisco Bay Guardian Archive 1966

Editor’s note: School Board member Kim-Shree Maufas submitted this opinion piece on the upcoming Police Commission appointment.

On Friday, October 11, 2002, what began as an early morning school fight turned into a uniformed police officer-driven melee against students and teachers at Thurgoom Marshall High School. A total of 126 cops (some in SWAT/Riot gear) and sheriff’s deputites (tactical training was nearby) with firefighter and helicopter air support occupied the campus into the late afternoon.

That was so awful — but the real crime and shame for San Francisco was the subsequent behavior of the then Police Commission, which ignored hundreds of requests (delivered in writing and in person at commission meetings) for accountability, transparency, and reform to address ongoing police misconduct and bad practices so that San Francisco and its youth could actually feel safe and secure – not just from the criminals but from the city’s police force.

I recall that one woman, who lived in Pacific Heights, asking the commission to “deal with what happened at that high school across town because we all want to know what happened.”

After attending Police Commission meeting after Police Commission meeting with staff from the Ella Baker Center, Coleman Advocates for Youth and their Families and the ACLU of Northern California, the only response that I ever heard from that commission about the incident was: “We handle things in our own time.”

These painful memories had me in tears as I walked home after attending the recent Board of Supervisor’s Rules Committee meeting on June 2, 2011, where I watched the recommendation for the board’s appointment to the commission go forward.

Back in October 2002, I was the Parent Teacher Student Association president at Marshall, my daughter was a student, and I suddenly thrust forward to a public podium over and over again to demand justice for our families … goodbye fundraising and bake sales.

My social justice journey to the Board of Education is closely tied to the 2003 Proposition H, the police reform measure that gave people a voice for reform and accountability by expanding the Police Commission from five to seven, three to be selected by the Board of Supervisors and four by the mayor. San Franciscans slapped the old Police Commission squarely in the face, screaming that the people MUST have a VOICE.

Because of what my family and countless others have been through and died for, I will forever consider the seats appoinnted by the board as “the People’s Seats for the People’s Voice,” meaning that those seats are for people who openly fight on behalf of disenfranchised community members, for people who stand as unashamed/outspoken advocates for common sense police policies and practices — and as seats for those who don’t get mayoral appointments because they’re a part of the in crowd.

On June 14, 2011, the entire Board of Supervisors will vote for the Police Commission appointment — and it doesn’t have to be the recommendation from the Rules Committee. The supervisors can take a different position – they can stand with the people on this one.

With all due serious respect to the other applicants, this opening on the Police Commission belongs to David Waggoner, who represents that “People’s Voice for the People’s Seat” — and I believe all those voters who reformed the commission in 2003 would say so too.

OPINION I wish that the adults who want to keep the JROTC program in San Francisco public schools would stop throwing the JROTC students under the bus and blaming the bus driver.

In particular, I’m referring to the March 24 Board of Education meeting, where a resolution about JROTC by commissioners Jill Wynns and Rachel Norton was presented as a first-reading agenda item, which, under our rules, denotes that it should be referred to committee for further discussion. There usually isn’t any public commentary on first-reading items because that can occur at the committee meeting, then at the full board meeting when the item is returned for its second reading.

This is the first time that any discussion of JROTC has been on the agenda this year. But adults and kids in support of the program have been turning out to board meetings regularly. And while I’ve been president, the board has offered deference to the JROTC students, moving public comment earlier in the meeting nearly every time the students have shown up.

Before the March 24 meeting, supporters and opponents of the program were warned that it was only a first reading, that public comment would not be taken out of order, and that each side would have five minutes to make its case. Every elected official who planned on attending was informed of those rules. The ridiculousness that ensued as the board’s business and meeting carried on late into the evening came from, and was promoted by, selfish adults interested only in media attention and not concerned about whether this program can be sustained, in its current format, in San Francisco’s public schools.

The yelling and grandstanding by the adults for nearly three of the students’ allotted five minutes was an embarrassment to everyone. And those adults who stepped in front of the children — uninvited — then had the nerve to blame the Board of Education for not bending to their will.

The issues with this program are real — the teacher credentialing, the cost of the program to the district, the accessibility for all students desiring to become potential first responders for their neighborhoods and school sites in case of a municipal emergency, and, of course, the military aspect. The Board of Education, I believe, has to look beyond the glitz of a program that have been with us for eons and beyond the TV sound bites that grossly distort the facts. I’ve been moved to the middle on this issue because of the inflammatory behavior from people associated with both ends — the extreme ends.

I am hopeful that many of you will join me in looking carefully at the alternatives at hand, alternatives that would allow all students to participate. Come to the committee meetings, be informed, ask your questions, and be open to hearing something new.

But put aside the angry accusations and condemnations toward those who want to do the right thing for our children just because they don’t jump when you say they should. *

Kim-Shree Maufas is president of the San Francisco Board of Education.

Kim-Shree Maufas

OPINION: The “people’s seat” on the Police Commission

The JROTC horror show