Stege Elementary supporters are demanding that the WCCUSD fully rebuild the school, saying they’re no longer willing to tolerate untenable conditions while other campus projects are a higher priority.
At a recent meeting in downtown Richmond, about 20 people watched a video compiled by Stege advocate Lakisha Mitchell-Keith showing images including clogged toilets and exposed electrical wiring. The campus, built in 1943, had to be unexpectedly shut down last summer due to environmental hazards. Its problems include water damage on walls and floors, no air conditioning in classrooms with windows that don’t open and a shortage of fire extinguishers and fire sprinklers, supporters say.
While the West Contra Costa Unified School district said it closed the school and moved the pupils to a nearby middle school because it only recently found asbestos and lead there, Mitchell-Keith said a 2023 report the district and county filed with the state downplayed long-known problems.
Limited funds mean some aging WCCUSD schools wait years for makeovers
The report, for example, did not mention there were numerous malfunctioning restrooms, where students got sewage on their shoes and pants, nor did it state that the campus is covered in vermin traps. It stated that the school met the minimum standards required to operate, reporting no signs of pests or malfunctioning lighting or wiring, for example. It rated Stege’s restrooms as “96 good out of 100,” which Keith said was not true, citing overflowing toilets and water damage. It also rated the state of the school’s facilities an overall 92%, and structural integrity at 100%, despite the existence of dry rot and other damage.
Finally, Mitchell-Keith said, when staff found asbestos and lead in window putty last summer, they did not properly warn parents as to whether this might mean their children were exposed to anything dangerous (WCCUSD officials have not confirmed whether they notified parents of any potential dangers). Such substances are commonly present in older building materials and, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, are generally dangerous only when disturbed and inhaled.
Mitchell-Keith said that in 2010 the district was aware of Stege’s structural issues and had drawn up an architectural design for a rebuilt campus. When WCCUSD put together a Facilities Master Plan in 2016 to decide how to use bond funds to renovate multiple campuses, she said, Stege was third in line behind Lake Elementary and what is now Michelle Obama School, and ahead of Kennedy and Richmond High schools.
“The district knew buildings and floor structures were failing and unsafe,” Mitchell-Keith said. “They made a new campus design for nearly 500 students, but never built it.”
According to Natalie Walchuk, vice president of local impact for Go Public Schools West Contra Costa, representing more than 30,000 families under a California organization supporting local communities in education, the district launched a Stege Community Advisory Board in 2019 convening parents and other community members to discuss the school’s conditions. The district presented several comprehensive remodeling plans and recommendations that it intended to implement by the 2020-21 school year, Walchuk said.
Stege teacher says repair delays reflect racism in school facilities management
Among those attending the recent community meeting to watch the video were school board trustee Demetrio Gonzalez-Hoy of Area 4 and Richmond City Council member Soheila Bana of District 4. WCCUSD Superintendent Chris Hurst, who is leaving the district next month, and school board Area 2 trustee Otheree Christian, who lost his recent re-election bid, were invited but declined to attend, meeting organizer Rodney Brown said.
Longtime Stege teacher Theresa Griffin shook her head with disgust at the scenes shown in the video, saying that nothing has changed at the school since she began teaching there more than 20 years ago. She said the fact that nothing has been done about the school’s conditions has eroded trust among Stege community members, the majority of whom are Black, and reflects ongoing racism in how California’s majority Black schools are managed.
Griffin said that when she began teaching at Stege in the early 2000s, it enrolled nearly “98% Black students.” It still has the highest percentage of Black students in the district, now at 36%.
“I’ve raised my kids in the community so I know the families,” Griffin said. ”I’m seeing all the stuff that’s come and go, and all of the cover-ups. It’s frustrating, because all we’re asking for is to treat our students right. Treat Stege kids like they treat everybody else. It goes way back.”
Brown said the school board’s voting record demonstrates a lack of urgency to improve Stege. In 2021, he said, trustee Gonzalez-Hoy recommended reprioritizing schools for rebuilding, putting projects at Kennedy and Richmond High before Stege. The measure was approved, with one “no” vote from trustee Mister Phillips.
Brown also questioned WCCUSD’s commitment to its own recently passed anti-racism policy — which says the district commits to the conscious and active effort to identify, challenge, and correct racial inequities in schools and communities — calling it “an oxymoron.” (Kennedy High, which is just a half mile away from Stege and built in 1967, has a student population that is 75% Latino, 16% Black, 4% Asian and less than 2% other ethnicities. Richmond High’s student population is 89% Latino, 4% Black, or 2% or less of other ethnicities.)
“At the end of the day, the anti-racism policy just looks good on paper, but what does it really mean?” Brown said. “We are treating the school with the most Black children in the (district) like this. The majority of people in leadership on the school board and (in) the district are Black — so what happened?”
He and Mitchell-Keith decried the fact that Stege’s pupils will spend years of critical primary education time in a confined space at DeJean Middle School, where they were transferred to when school started last fall, behind iron fences without sufficient playground space and with no dedicated cafeteria and only two bathrooms for more than 200 children.
“We all play a part in helping right these wrongs,” Mitchell-Keith said. “Our kids deserve the same as everybody else. We have to make sure they are not traumatized any more than they already have been.”
Gonzalez-Hoy apologized for his 2021 resolution to prioritize Richmond and Kennedy High school renovations ahead of Stege’s, saying “I did believe there was enough money to rebuild Stege, and I’ve since found out there isn’t.”
He said since the pandemic, the cost of building materials has skyrocketed. Today, rebuilding Stege completely could cost $70 to $80 million, he said, compared to a $30 to $40 million construction cost estimate in 2021.
Gonzalez-Hoy said that he’s been investigating how to find state funding for Stege before his term ends in 2026, including from California’s Proposition 2, a $10 billion bond measure approved by voters in the recent election to improve public school and community college facilities. School districts can apply for and be awarded funding mainly on a first-come, first-served basis.
Anthony Caro, who recently lost his bid for a seat on the Contra Costa County Office of Education board, said he’s been working with the nonprofit Health Contra Costa on a petition that asks WCCUSD to commit to nine requests as official policies. He said that in October, he and Stege parents met with Hurst, who committed to seven of the requests verbally, including one to offer testing for Stege students who may have been exposed to asbestos and lead, and one for the WCCUSD board to prioritize a full rebuild of Stege. (Hurst, who is leaving in December, has not confirmed to Richmondside that he committed verbally to these requests.)
However, Caro said, “If we don’t get the (WCCUSD) board to put this in writing, this may not go through. I trust Hurst’s word, but if he leaves in December there’s no guarantee this will happen.”
Cleare, who was among plaintiffs in a civil rights lawsuit filed last summer attempting to rectify the issues at Stege and other district schools, told Richmondside she’s currently taking time off from teaching to focus on the lawsuit, which was rejected by a Contra Costa County Superior Court judge. Cleare’s lawsuit was filed after the district did not resolve 45 Williams Act complaints filed in June 2023. The 2004 Williams vs. California settlement created legislation establishing standards and accountability measures for educational resources and set requirements for how school districts handle complaints about school conditions.
Despite a judge’s ruling finding the problems at Stege “moot” at this point because the district planned to make repairs, Cleare said, “We’re not going to stop organizing, and we’ll find some avenue to go down. I care about the students so much, and it’s sad to see how they’re being treated every day. It makes doing (the) job extremely challenging.”
Pressure builds on school district, board
Brown’s promise to pressure the district, particularly Kim Moses, who will become interim superintendent in December, to commit to rebuilding Stege was evident at a Nov. 6 school board meeting, which about 50 people attended in person.
Multiple Stege alumni were there to demand the district also find a better solution for students at DeJean. Alum Ebony Blake said seeing pictures of the problems at Stege moved her to tears, thinking of current pupils.
“They’ve been pushed to the back of the (DeJean) school where it looks like a jail … and the district has not done anything. We want to know what’s next. Please do something about this.”
Shaune Vaughn, representative of Teamsters 656 employees at WCCUSD, said that classified employees at Stege, now working at DeJean, aren’t getting paid on time and aren’t supported by administrators.
“Everybody’s pointing fingers, and nobody’s being held accountable,” Vaughn said. “I am so bombarded by complaints, I can’t even represent my other units because I’m so overwhelmed with problems here (at DeJean).”
Neither DeJean school officials nor district officials have responded to Richmondside about these claims.
Stege parent Cristal Banagan told the board she thinks that district staff are not listening to concerned Black parents who have numerous concerns about other schools.
“I’ve watched many Black parents ignored by the district,” Banagan said. “The district doesn’t hear us. There are too many gatekeepers.”
Although many speakers asked the board for commitments, trustees have not brought a resolution forward to discuss funding options for rebuilding Stege. Even with Prop. 2’s apparent win with 63% yes votes, it will take time for schools to apply for and receive the money. Mitchell-Keith said that she hopes to see board members bring a resolution to the board soon to make the Stege project a rebuild, not a “modernization,” to unlock as much state money as possible.
Jillian de la Torres of Healthy Contra Costa told Richmondside that several weeks ago district staff told her and Caro that talks with the city and state officials to explore more funding for Stege’s rebuild “turned up dry.” Torres said that Area 2 trustee Christian, who will be succeeded on the board by parent Guadalupe Hernandez in January, is in talks to find other ways to collect more money for the rehab project.
However, she thinks that, “If there is a possibility of leveraging Prop. 2 funds, that would be the way to do it.”
It is not yet clear if school board trustees plan to pursue that route.
For more information, follow Richmondside’s schools coverage or visit the WCCUSD school board website.
