The Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education is set to consider a resolution Thursday that would rescind its “Establishing Optimal School Size” resolution and replace it with a “District Transformation Process,” reopening the district’s stalled enrollment-and-facilities review with a study session set for Aug. 13.
Resolution No. 2894 would designate the Aug. 13 study session as the venue to discuss how to move forward.
The resolution directs Superintendent Elizabeth Blanco to bring five items to the August session: a Facilities Master Plan demographer’s presentation on local enrollment context, including birth rates, housing trends, immigration and private and charter school impacts; projected district enrollment for the next five to 10 years, with individual school-site projections where available; updated capacity reports by school site; background data from the 2026 consolidation process; and current staffing levels for each school site.
The board would also discuss scheduling community engagement sessions with community partners to gather community values and vision for the district in the next five to 10 years, with student input prioritized.
After reviewing the presentations, the board would determine the direction to give Blanco, including the areas the process covers, whether any committee takes the form of a subcommittee, a committee of the whole, or a community committee, and the approach to community engagement, which the resolution says would incorporate feedback from the recent consolidation process.
The resolution pointedly cites declining enrollment, the “significant fiscal and operational challenges” the decline has created, budget reductions already made, projected operating deficits over the next three years and pending facilities-bond decisions that taxpayers will be paying off for decades. It states the board “believes in taking the opportunity to rebuild trust and engage the community throughout the district transformation process.”
The vote would formally close out Resolution 2852, which the board adopted Dec. 11, 2025 to set enrollment guidelines for district schools and which launched the consolidation review.
The resolution notes the district went through the advisory committee and a proposed Equity Impact Analysis “without accepting the report.”
That review ran through the Superintendent Consolidation Advisory Committee, which held its final meeting May 11 and made no recommendation to consolidate schools at this time, the district said. On May 28, the board voted against accepting the draft Equity Impact Analysis, and the district said previously scheduled public hearings, a board retreat and board action on the process would not proceed as planned.
The district is working to cut $30 million to $35 million from its 2026-27 budget under a fiscal stabilization plan, according to the district.
If adopted, the District Transformation Process would formally begin at the Aug. 13 study session.
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