September 9 Board Meeting Recap

By Anna Utgoff — 13 Sep 2026

Welcome Oakland community members! This week’s meeting covered a lot, from budget numbers to one director’s growing social media fame. But before we dive in, we want to remind you of our new venture: The Dig Speakers’ Bureau. Our editorial team is available to come to your community or PTA meeting and give a 20-minute nonpartisan presentation on what’s going on in OUSD. If you’re interested, please reply to this newsletter.

🧾🏦 Closing the books on 2025-26 finances

Context: OUSD began last year facing a $100+M budget deficit. During the year the district implemented a “Fiscal Stabilization Plan” at the board’s direction. Now that the books have closed on 2025-26, the district knows more about the impact of last year’s work.

At this meeting:

The District’s Director of Strategic Projects Troy Christmas presented the "unaudited actuals" for 2025-26. (“Unaudited” because they will be submitted to the county and our external auditors. “Actuals” because they show what actually happened, as opposed to interim reports that show projections.)

Key points from his presentation:

OUSD had a $91 deficit in 2025-26. That’s $9M lower than projected at the beginning of the year (and $39M lower than projected as of December 2025, when the district expected a $127M deficit).
The district has two types of money: "unrestricted funds," which it can spend on anything, and "restricted funds," which must be spent on specific things. (Learn more at “Understanding OUSD’s Budget.”) In addition to reducing expenses, OUSD moved some costs from unrestricted funds to restricted funds. This kept unrestricted reserves (the district's rainy-day savings) above the required 3% minimum, helping the district avoid insolvency.
This strategy worked for 2025-26 because restricted funds have built up a large surplus, but that money will eventually run out.

Director Comment:

On the vote to approve the Unaudited Actuals, Director Hutchinson voted no, Director Thompson abstained, and all other directors voted yes. (Thompson also abstained last time a budget item came up for a vote, saying “I want to go on record saying I was not at the board meeting the last part of June, so I don't want to be held responsible for a budget I didn't vote for.")

📺Brouhard opened the discussion by describing the situation the district faced at the beginning of the year, and the work the board majority did to stabilize the budget. She confronted accusations of mismanagement head on, saying “We [are hearing] accusations of mismanagement, the lack of transparency, and even accusations of fraud. So let me be very clear tonight: the fiscal team is very confident in the numbers that are being presented.”

📺Hutchinson did accuse the district of fraud, pointing to “disappearing” revenues and expenditures. Christmas pushed back strongly, 📺“This is not [a new financial practice]. In fact, on September 5, 2024… our CBO presented almost exactly the same numbers. $30M of restricted revenue gone, and $60M of restricted spending gone. And Director Hutchinson, the chair of that committee, voted in favor of those unaudited actuals.”

📺Director Williams asked what new investments the district could make in student achievement, since OUSD ended last year with more money than expected. Mr. Christmas responded “Caution, caution, caution! The improvements helped us start 26-27 in a better place. But the better place we’re starting is one where without $30M [in further reductions] we’re still skating at 3% [reserve balance].”

Director Bachelor asked Christmas to confirm that OUSD has turned a fiscal corner, and Christmas declined to do so.

📺 Bachelor: “So if we want to demonstrate that OUSD has genuinely turned a fiscal corner, what specific evidence can we see in the unaudited actuals that demonstrate that this is sustainable improvement rather than a one-year improvement?”

Christmas: “So I'm going to answer the question the way I answered it earlier: this is not sustainable. I'll tell you, you have $91 million of deficit spending in 25-26. We cannot continue that.”

📺Bachelor: “But wouldn't you say before last school year, we were doing the opposite — using our restricted resources last, and our general fund dollars first?”

Christmas: “No, I would not say that.. We've done it more aggressively, and we've gotten more benefit out of it. And that's wonderful… It's just a strategy that cannot continue indefinitely.”

Public comment:

📺Carol Delton: “If further cuts are needed... [you keep saying we’ll hear about them at] first interim. The public does not want to wait that long to hear what the board and superintendent are thinking. What I see every January and February is a lot of frustration and decisions that are made too quickly.”

Our take:

We have spent a lot of time squinting at the budget numbers to try to make sense of them. As D4 candidate Kathryn Camp commented, 📺OUSD finances can be hard to follow because you need to piece together information from across multiple meetings & presentations.

Despite that, we think district leadership is trying to be as transparent as possible, especially since the capable and direct Mr. Christmas has stepped up to the podium. As Mr. Christmas often says, “it’s as clear as mud.” These numbers are genuinely complicated, and a lot of them are moving targets - we already know expenses will change during the year when we do things like give principals the raises they deserve. But we believe the finance team is doing its best, not deliberately deceiving the community. Mr. Christmas answered all questions directly, and was also very clear about the overall situation. As he put it: “Caution, caution, caution.” The work is not done, and the financial ship has not been fully righted.

In our view, it is not helpful when board members try to frame this as a battle already won, as Directors Bachelor and Williams did in their questions to Mr. Christmas. It is also not helpful when members accuse the district of fraud, as Director Hutchinson has repeatedly done. We’re glad Mr. Christmas pushed back clearly on both perspectives.

📱🔥Mike Hutchinson goes viral, the district needs PR Help

Director Hutchinson pulled a public relations contract from the consent agenda (items usually approved without discussion). Hutchinson, explaining his opposition: “I don’t know where this came from or why we’re doing this. This is a contract for up to $114K paying an individual $300 an hour to.. ‘Identify and mitigate reputational risks before they escalate.’”

📺Deputy Superintendent Gard explained the need for PR help by noting the district has reduced communications staff to 1.5 FTE in the recent cuts. She also said Director Hutchinson should understand why they need PR help, “considering that you’re putting out a lot about our district in a negative light - a lot.”

Several other speakers alluded to Director Hutchinson’s social media presence during the meeting.

Troy Christmas, describing the district’s cash flow management strategies: “It's not anything surprising. It's not anything, as I read on social media, implausible.”
Brouhard: “There's been a lot of talk in the news and social media… you can spend a lot of time doom scrolling.”
📺Frequent public commenter Assata Olugbala: “You as a board are getting killed on social media, all over this nation. There's video of Mike Hutchinson speaking to the budgetary issues, and his credibility is being embraced, and you are perceived as a dysfunctional body of board members.”

Directors Berry and Hutchinson voted no on the contract, all other directors voted yes.

Our take:

Hiring PR consultants is not a great look for this board, given their oft-stated goal of reducing outside consulting spend.

We appreciate Director Hutchinson’s focus on the district's financial challenges. He usually begins his comments with a recap explaining how the district got to this point. (Recapper game recognizes game!) His questions and criticisms are, in our view, often spot on. What we do not appreciate are his accusations of fraud, especially when those accusations are raised in discussion of standard practices like cash flow management, or innocuous things like the use of the first person at the end of a memo. We wish Hutchinson focused his critiques on the district’s biggest concerns, rather than applying them indiscriminately. We also fear that his social media fame incentivizes exactly the opposite, given that conflict plays better on TikTok than compromise.

📢👨🏾‍💼Administrators speak out

This week: Multiple United Administrators of Oakland Schools (UAOS) asked the board for a contract. 📺President Cary Kaufman described members’ safety and compensation concerns, and increased workload as a result of budget cuts.

Director Comment: Director Latta alluded to a need to give administrators a raise during her discussion of the budget.

Our take:

We are glad to hear Director Latta say the district plans to give administrators a raise, we agree with her that they deserve one. But we wonder how the board will address principals’ workload concerns. The UAOS has argued that the district cut the budget without restructuring it, and said that makes their jobs harder. (See the principals’ letter to the district last school year as an example.) We hope the district addresses those concerns in addition to raising principal salaries.

👀 Also of note this meeting

We were happy to see the Superintendent call Sondra Aguilera to the podium to speak about school-level goals. Last meeting we wished for less fluff in Saddler’s reports. This report was data-driven and focused on student outcomes, a welcome change. Aguilera’s report showed the district has made progress on attendance and suspensions, but academic achievement remains stagnant. See Oaklandside’s excellent article on the board meeting for an in-depth discussion.

📰 In other news

The Multi-Stakeholder Engagement Group published a tool for exploring Basic School Staffing Formulas. This is a fascinating way to learn how the district allocates positions across schools, highly recommended!
Did you know OUSD’s Parent Student Advisory Committee has 14 vacancies?!? PSAC is the official body through which parents provide guidance to the district on budgets and educational programs. Learn more about PSAC from delegate Matt Glazer’s blog, or join the annual orientation meeting online on Wednesday Sept 16 at 6 PM.

Thanks, as always, for staying with us!

Best,

Anna, Bekah, and Jess