Temprano Resignation Leaves Empty Seat on Board of Trustees

By Emily Margaretten

The resignation of Tom Temprano from the Board of Trustees in February has left an opening on the board with no immediate replacement in sight.

 

In most California community college districts, the Board of Trustees appoints a new member when a vacancy occurs in the middle of an election cycle. But City College has a different process.

 

“San Francisco is an exception where the mayor appoints,” said Trustee John Rizzo.

 

Supervisor Aaron Peskin recently introduced a charter amendment to change this process so that if an unexpected vacancy occurred on the Board of Supervisors, Board of Education or Community College District Board of Trustees, the board members would have the power to appoint a replacement by majority vote, as reported in The San Francisco Chronicle on Dec. 22.

 

The charter amendment also placed limits on recalls.

 

However, the part of the measure that proposed to give boards the power to appoint replacements did not make it into the charter amendment, according to Peskin when contacted for comment.

 

Neither the Mayor nor the Chancellor’s office responded to requests about the timeline of the appointment for the Board of Trustees. But Trustee Thea Selby said that Mayor London Breed likely was focused on filling the three vacated positions on the Board of Education before turning her attention to the Board of Trustees.

 

Temprano was reelected to the Board of Trustees in 2020. He resigned a year into his second term to accept a position as Political Director of Equality California, the nation’s largest statewide LGBTQ+ civil rights organization.