California Legislature votes to reshape schools chief’s office in budget deal
A plan by Gov. Gavin Newsom to strip the office of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction of much of its power and fold it into the executive branch moved one step closer on Monday to becoming reality. Lawmakers voted to advance related legislation after hammering out a $351.7 billion budget deal on Friday ahead of the new fiscal year starting Wednesday.
Monday afternoon, both chambers voted to pass legislation sponsored by San Diego Democrats David Alvarez and Darshana Patel creating a new director of education to oversee the state Department of Education, who would report to the governor starting in 2027.
In remarks to his Assembly colleagues, Alvarez described the bill as a step toward reforming leadership of the state’s education system but teased forthcoming policymaking, with more input from teachers and other education groups.
“For nearly a century, reports have called for fixing California’s fragmented and inefficient governance system,” Alvarez said, listing areas in which the state’s public schools have lagged behind those of other states.
Under the bill, the 11-member state Board of Education would expand to 13, allowing for the Senate president pro tem and the Assembly speaker to appoint two more members. The superintendent would be responsible for “system accountability” and evaluating state school programs.
Newsom said his idea, which he introduced in his initial January budget proposal, drew from a paper by a Stanford research center advising that a reshuffle would eliminate inefficiencies since the Board of Education cannot implement or oversee programs, which is under the superintendent’s purview.
California is one of a dozen states whose voters elect their schools chief. While state studies have criticized the state’s education governance model, voters have rejected at least four attempts dating back to 1928 to reform the position.
Superintendent Tony Thurmond previously said he was “not aligned” with the governor on the streamlining effort. His office did not immediately respond to a request for comment after the Legislature voted to pass the bill, which now heads to Newsom’s desk for approval.
Thurmond was first elected as state schools chief in 2019 after serving four years in the Assembly as an East Bay-area Democrat, and won reelection in 2022. Earlier this month, he came in 8th in the gubernatorial primary.
Though education unions had opposed Newsom’s proposal to cut back the powers of the elected superintendent, they did not appear to gain much traction with lawmakers. Democrats largely voted in favor of the plan, as they advanced the budget agreement as a whole.
Senate Republicans opposed the bill.
In the Assembly, however, Budget Committee Vice Chair David Tangipa, R-Clovis, spoke in favor of the legislation, saying it would help speed needed reforms to the state’s public schools. Only five assemblymembers, all Republicans, voted against the bill. In the Senate there were four no votes.
A number of lawmakers however did not vote on the bill, a quieter form of skepticism, and Senate President pro Tem Monique Limon noted to reporters that both bills passed via slim margins of approval.
Twenty-four assemblymembers and 15 senators did not cast a vote, though some of those lawmakers were absent from the vote.
The Capitol Bureau’s Andrew Graham contributed to this article.
