Phil Kim wins school-board reelection, other GrowSF candidates likely to win

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Incumbent and school board President Phil Kim won his reelection, with Tim Tung and Autumn Brown Garibay in second and third place as of the final vote drop Tuesday night.

Virginia Cheung, leading the teachers union slate, was some 40,000 votes behind Kim, and about 12,000 votes behind Garibay, the third-place finisher.

When the first votes dropped at 8:45 p.m., Kim was deep in conversation at the first stop of his election night party, at Parasol in the Castro.

Once he did, fellow school board commissioner Parag Gupta approached him and said, “You’re killing it, dude.”

Kim celebrated by kissing his partner, Andrew. Soon after, the school board election was called in Kim’s favor. 

Eight candidates ran for three seats on San Francisco Unified School District’s school board. Competing slates offered stark political differences, with the United Educators of San Francisco, the teachers union, calling the race “teachers vs. billionaires.” 

The “billionaires” — GrowSF — endorsed a slate of Kim; Garibay, a senior customer success manager; and Tung, a public-finance analyst.

Kim was also endorsed by Mayor Daniel Lurie, and Garibay and Tung were endorsed by moderate allies of the mayor on the board of supervisors.

SF Parents Action, the advocacy arm of the SF Parent Coalition, shared most of its endorsements with GrowSF, backing Kim and Garibay. But the advocacy group, which was formed during the pandemic and played an active role in the 2022 school board recalls, opted for Alida Fisher over Tung.

The teachers union, which won a four-day strike in February, endorsed Ryan Hazelton, executive director of Mariposa Kids; Reina Tello, a community organizer; and Cheung, chief advancement officer of Open Door Legal.

The union slate was endorsed by progressive supervisors, including Connie Chan and Chyanne Chen, and other labor unions, like Teamsters Local 853. 

The election took place in the wake of the controversial decision to overhaul the district’s much-maligned lottery enrollment system in favor of a neighborhood school model, with choice limited to citywide options, like language programs and K-8 schools.

Kim led the board in a 5-2 vote in support of the change, diverging from SF Parents Coalition, which had favored more parental options for enrollment.

The candidates were split on how much choice should come with a new enrollment lottery system, and the issue promises to remain divisive for parents, teachers and the school board going forward.

Kim has made a balanced budget a high priority and, since he was appointed by London Breed in 2024, has led the district toward earning a positive certification of financial health from the state. 

A point of contention between the slates was whether the district should dip into reserves. GrowSF-backed candidates warned against using reserves for anything other than one-time expenses.

But the teachers union called for using reserves to invest in filling slots for teachers in language programs, transitional kindergarten and kindergarten. Cheung, who lost to Kim in a June primary, campaigned on the slogan “today’s dollars belong to today’s students.” 

The district has about 14,000 empty classroom seats, and state funding depends on attendance. The progressives’ platform emphasized lowering chronic absenteeism to increase the district’s revenue. The teachers union slate, as well as incumbent Alida Fisher, said that the district is leaving money on the table. 

The union ended up spending $135,000 on its slate, which received another $72,000 from labor organizations. GrowSF put $242,000 behind Kim, Garibay and Tung (Tung received the most of that sum, with $139,000). 

SF Parents Action, the political arm of the SF Parents Coalition, spent $62,800 to support Kim and Garibay, as well as Fisher, who did not receive their endorsement when she first ran in 2022. 

Kim did not receive as much funding as he did in June, perhaps due to his landslide win then. He received just $33,800 for this election, compared to June’s $238,800 in third-party spending on his race. 

The dual endorsements from GrowSF and SF Parent Action saw Garibay with $114,000, second to Tung in third-party spending.

Also at Kim’s election party at Parasol was fellow candidate Alida Fisher. When the first round of results dropped, Fisher was placing seventh out of eight candidates, with 7.2% of the vote.

Fisher was disappointed, she said, but  “taking it in stride.” 

Meanwhile, at a party for DJ Brookter held at Standard Deviant’s location at 1070 Maryland St. in Mission Bay, there was no sign that school-board candidate Reina Tello was in sixth place, and almost certainly out of the running.

Tello stood on a bench outside of the bar thanking a group of wide-eyed supporters, along with her close ally DJ Brookter, in Spanish first, then English.

“No matter what happens I don’t care,” said Tello, with emotion. “We left it on the field.”

At a party held by SF Parents Action at Standard Deviant’s location at 280 14th St. in the Mission, Autumn Brown Garibay was teary-eyed at the news, when the first round of votes dropped, that she was comfortably in third place.

“I’m much more at ease,” she said. “I worked really, really hard.”

“A lot of these people worked really, really hard,” Garibay continued, pointing at the SF Parents organizers at the bar.

As the night went on, Kim continued to celebrate with friends, while Brown Garibay kept checking the hourly results. “I want to see it definitive,” she said.

Adriana Gutierrez and Bailey Zitko contributed on-the-scene reporting.