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To: President Stevon Cook and the San Francisco Board of Education Commissioners

Paint down Washington High School's racist mural!

Stand up for your Black and Indigenous students and honor your vote to have the racist mural at Washington High School painted over and permanently destroyed before the first day of the SFUSD 2019-2020 academic year.

Why is this important?

Sign now to stand with the Black and Native youth & families who are working to take down the racist "Life of Washington" mural at the SFUSD high school at 600 32nd Ave. in the “Richmond District”, which is on unceded Ramaytush Ohlone Territory. The large-scale painting at this school depicts George Washington standing over the bodies of dead Indigenous people, it depicts Black people as enslaved and docile, and it is a symbol of white supremacy that Black and Native students are forced to walk past every day. It is a, it is a constant reminder that the institution, that is supposed to care for and educate Black and Native youth, them glorifies the genocide, colonization and enslavement of their people.

Over three years ago, Amy and Kai Anderson, parent and student at the school that contains the murals, reignited the “Take It Down” campaign. It first started in 1968, with the school's Black Student Union and the SF Black Panther Party demanding that the district remove the racist murals. During that time, in protest, ink was thrown upon the fresco murals and can be seen there to this day.

For the past few years, the American Indian PAC listed the removal of these murals as one of their top priorities. As a result the district established a “Reflection and Action Committee” to decide how, not if, the murals were to come down. The committee met and studied the issue for months and voted to have the murals digitally archived and painted over before the first day of school in the fall of 2019.

San Francisco’s diverse school board courageously listened to Black and Native students and believed them when they testified about the trauma these murals create for them. The board voted unanimously to follow the committee’s recommendations and paint down the mural (or cover it with panels if it takes more than 3 years to paint down). We are so proud that our school board centered directly impacted student’s voices and voted to “Paint It Down” & give youth a clean slate.

However, the work of giving students a clean slate is just beginning. The Washington Alumni Association has vowed to file lawsuits and use ballot initiatives to try to overturn and silence the decisions of youth, families and electeds of color. White nationalist publications like Breitbart have bashed the decision, using the same logic being used to preserve Confederate statues and symbols across the nation. The opposition is hoping that by pushing the School Board to put wooden panels over the mural instead of destroying it, they can one day remove the panels altogether so that things remain exactly the way they are now.

We call on the San Francisco School Board to show up for Black and Native youth, to tell them that we hear their voices, we believe them, and we’ll continue to show up for them until we get the clean slate they deserve. Sign this petition to let the board know that you pledge to work with these youth and their families, to show up online or in person as needed, and to lift up and amplify their voices until they get the clean slate they are demanding and that they deserve.

How it will be delivered

Petition delivery

San Francisco, CA, USA

Maps © Stamen; Data © OSM and contributors, ODbL

Updates

2019-08-19 14:03:30 -0700

10,000 signatures reached

2019-08-19 11:50:33 -0700

5,000 signatures reached

2019-08-15 15:41:41 -0700

1,000 signatures reached

2019-08-13 16:34:52 -0700

500 signatures reached

2019-06-25 08:48:44 -0700

100 signatures reached

2019-06-24 23:41:25 -0700

50 signatures reached

2019-06-24 20:52:12 -0700

25 signatures reached

2019-06-24 17:06:04 -0700

10 signatures reached