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Families in Portland Public Schools today began circulating an open letter calling for transparency around the district’s decisions on which schools to buttress against a major earthquake.
The letter amplifies concerns from some parents in recent months that PPS, which selected nine schools for full and partial seismic retrofits using funds from a May construction bond, did so without talking to families in the schools that might fall down when the Big One hits. It calls particular attention to how just one Title I school, Vernon K-8, was selected for a partial retrofit, a decision the letter’s authors termed as running “counter to PPS’s own stated commitment to equity.”
PPS spokespeople did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The campaign for seismic retrofits at some of the highest risk buildings in the district’s portfolio began late into PPS’s May bond campaign. PPS faced intense pressure from some advocates who ultimately helped secure about $100 million of the $1.83 billion bond toward retrofits. A School Board resolution from May directed that money be spent “at the 8–10 schools assessed to pose the greatest risk of injury or death in a significant seismic event.” (That resolution notes there could be exceptions to this policy if the district made consolidation determinations.)
After the bond’s passage, the path to determining which schools would receive that money was also complicated, given that a bulk of PPS’s elementary and middle schools are seismically unsafe. In October, however, some advocates were shocked that a draft formula weighed seismic risk at only 35% of the formula, giving the majority of weight to concerns including equity and consolidation. They reasoned 35% was too low of a weight to assign to risk, especially given how close many schools’ risk scores are to each other.
A second formula presented in November weighed risk at 90%, eliminating several factors entirely. That formula, which the district used to determine its nine schools, riled up another group of parents, who say the district overcorrected. Even some School Board members voiced concerns that the overcorrection would mean that in the case of an earthquake, the buildings with the most students of color in them could collapse.
“Meaningful seismic risk reduction requires more than identifying structural vulnerabilities,” the letter reads. “It should be guided by clear goals, such as meaningfully improving safety for the greatest number of students. Real risk must also account for future school closures, student age and population size, systemic inequities, and the capacity that school communities have to prepare for and respond to shocks without external resources.
Beverly Cleary K-8 and Rose City Park Elementary School are the two schools receiving full upgrades, while Ainsworth, Beach, Capitol Hill, Kelly and Richmond elementary schools—and Vernon and Winterhaven K-8s—are slated to receive targeted upgrades to specific, dangerous parts of their buildings.
Anxiety only grew after Jon Franco, the district’s senior chief of operations, confirmed to some School Board members in January that the schools identified for seismic retrofits would not be candidates for closure. Top district officials have planned to kick off that conversation this spring. The letter, written by some parents who have given public comment with their concerns, emphasizes concern that “seismic funding decisions are being used to influence or obfuscate the separate policy discussion around school closures and consolidations.”
The seismic conversation has not been brought to the full Portland School Board for discussion, but at the facilities committee meeting in January, district officials confirmed that they had started designing plans for the nine buildings chosen, and in one case, already sent forth a grant application for a specific school, Beverly Cleary K–8.
Without an open process and engagement as to how schools were chosen—and with an obfuscation around the relationship between seismic decisions and school consolidations—the letter argues that PPS has deprived many affected community members of the opportunity to participate in either discussion. Particularly, its authors say that communities with work obligations, linguistic barriers, and anxieties around immigration enforcement have not been able to provide input.
“These barriers prevent these school communities from marshaling the same level of advocacy as more resourced neighborhoods,” it reads. “It is inequitable to let these structural disparities determine who benefits from scarce seismic bond funds.”
It continues: “Seismic safety is a matter of life and death and community resilience. It must be grounded in open, transparent criteria that reflect districtwide need, rather than driven by those who have the greatest capacity to organize or make their voices heard.”
