Since July, Sasha Gaona, chief of staff for District 9 Supervisor Jackie Fielder, has been working with parents, staff and city leadership on how to manage the chaos outside Marshall Elementary.
Parents and staff said they love Marshall’s programs, diversity, community and overall ethos — it is a K-5 English-Spanish immersion school that welcomes many newcomer immigrant students.
But the school, located a block from the 16th Street BART Plaza, has been dealt a tough hand geographically. Six school staffers and six parents told Mission Local about their routine sights: drug use, drug dealing, public intoxication, public urination, public defecation, littering, sex, and nudity. All are in the school’s immediate environs.
“My daughter covers her mouth and nose,” said Karen Puc, the mother of a seven-year-old student, in Spanish. “Sometimes we play that we jump poop on the street,” she said — they make it a game, like hopscotch.
Students have come to laugh at how many feces they have to avoid on their way to class, concurred a teacher.
“Sometimes people are blocking the sidewalk and won’t move,” said Edelmira Velasquez, the mother of a five-year-old girl. “They’re peeing as we walk and they don’t seem to care. It’s a little uncomfortable.”
But Marshall Elementary is not the only children’s site close to the 16th Street plazas. Mission Neighborhood Center runs an early education program at 1954 Mission St. The sidewalks outside the building were once similarly chaotic but have become considerably calmer in recent months.
With that in mind, Gaona has requested more police foot patrols around the school — the Mission police station, at 17th and Valencia, is both a few blocks, and light-years, away — and community policing.
So far Marshall parents have managed to get a police officer from Mission Station assigned to be on site most days during drop-off and pick-up hours.
According to a statement provided by the Department of Emergency Management, the city recently expanded community ambassador presence in the Mission, with ambassadors providing safe passage escorts, positive engagements, basic interventions, de-escalation, drug activity deterrence, litter cleanup, wellness checks, and overdose reversals.
While none of those ambassadors appeared to be specifically assigned to Marshall, the department wrote that they are able to move around or stay fixed in one place, prioritizing “flexibility of resource type and location.”
There are at least 12 ambassadors and two supervisors on the streets of the Mission, the department continued, working schedules that “may change at the city’s discretion based on shifting operational needs and street conditions.”
Still, everyone acknowledged that there’s work to do.
“There are mental health issues, there’s defecation, there’s drug usage everywhere. We have had people having sex here underneath the third grade classrooms,” said a school staffer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation. “I’ve worked at different schools and this is the first experience that I’ve had so close to drugs, or people doing drugs within school grounds.”
Over the last three years, 1,946 requests were filed using the city’s 311 report system for the streets bordering the school, according to city data. That’s roughly two per day.
Another female staffer at Marshall, who also asked to remain anonymous, said she’s been followed on her way to and from the school. “I cried the whole first week I worked here because I felt unsafe and I just didn’t know where to walk,” she said. She thought about leaving, but decided against it because she doesn’t want to leave the kids halfway through the school year.
“Maybe it’s a bit better from the time I arrived,“ said a teacher, who also asked to remain anonymous.
“But I still can’t say that I’m in a clean, peaceful environment with the right conditions to develop my work, and for the children, who are the most important, to be safe and ready to learn.”
The teacher said that, on occasion, smoke has come through the windows facing 15th Street. It is not tobacco smoke, the teacher said, and staff struggle to answer questions from children about what it is.
“What can I tell these poor kids?” the teacher continued. “I tell them these are substances people consume that are bad for their health. They tell me, ‘Teacher, the smell bothers us.’”
The fact that nearly 90 percent of Marshall’s student population is Hispanic, and about 86 percent of them fall under socio-economical disadvantage, make the conditions around the school seem particularly unfair.
“It is completely unacceptable the conditions that they have beenoperating in. We live in one of the wealthiest cities in the world and our children can’t have access to good public safety,” said Gaona. “We legally can’t control city departments, but the power we do have is elevating our constituents’ concerns. I’m always happy to do that.”
On Jan. 26, Fielder sent an email to Mayor Daniel Lurie and multiple city heads in an attempt to effect change.
Steven Betz, the mayor’s assistant chief of public safety, replied offering to be the point person problems around the school. Betz told Fielder that he was talking to other city departments to create a plan for Marshall Elementary.
Since Betz became involved, parents and teachers have noticed a few changes.
Betz held at least one meeting with school staff and the Marshall PTA, which has raised hopes that change is underway. Public Works reports that, over the last month, the agency started cleaning the area around the school before children arrive in the morning, instead of afterward.
The department has also been steam cleaning the sidewalks around the school proactively instead of waiting for 311 requests.
And while the adults get to work, children at Marshall Elementary have their own plans. On a recent visit to the school, the windows of one of the classrooms were covered with construction paper cutouts made for a recent class about Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech.
When asked about their own dreams, a few were predictable, like “I want to go to Disneyland.”
A surprising number, however, dealt with the streets around the school.
“For people not to throw garbage on the street,” read another. “For no more unhoused people and garbage on Mission Street,” read one. “For people to have a place to live.”
The 16th/Mission corridor is the most disgusting part of SF! I love it!
“ Parents and staff said they love Marshall’s programs, diversity…”
“…nearly 90 percent of Marshall’s student population is Hispanic, and about 86 percent of them fall under socio-economical disadvantage…”
Very confused about how people are defining diversity here.
Love fielder….she’s done such an amazing job for the mission. Always present, see here everywhere. And comes for a long line of outstanding d9 sups…ronen, campos. Make SF great again 😍