San Dieguito Union High School District has approved a new agreement with its four high schools’ foundations to take back control of facilities rentals and require more transparency for their donors, after months of scrutiny from students and a recent rental to what officials called a “highly in appropriate” live game show production. A formal memorandum of understanding between the district and its foundations was one of 17 recommendations to come out of the independent audit of the foundations that stemmed from a report authored by two Canyon Crest Academy students last year questioning the CCA Foundation’s practices. The board had been prepared to vote on the MOU in January but sped up the process in light of an “embarrassing” incident on the CCA campus over the Dec. 4 weekend, when the CCA Foundation rented out the gym for four days for the streaming of an adult game show that contained inappropriate content. The board voted unanimously Thursday for the new MOU to take effect for the CCA Foundation on Feb. 1, 2026, and for the three other high school foundations starting in July, to allow time to adjust and understand potential implications of the facilities rental changes. “We’re bringing forward an MOU that clarifies and re-centers the district’s responsibility for approving and overseeing all non-school-related facilities rentals across our district,” said Superintendent Anne Staffieri. “The activity that occurred on our campus was inconsistent with our community’s expectations and appropriate Civic Center use. It highlighted significant gaps in our shared oversight structure. This never should have happened. And we must move with urgency and purpose to make sure that it never happens again,” she added. During public comment, the board heard the fallout from the CCA event as some parents alternately called for the resignations of CCA Foundation members, the principal, the school board and even the superintendent. One parent lamented the fact that CCA is the highest performing school in the county and among the top in the state, yet the public conversation over the past year has been “bludgeoningly focused on controversy.” As one parent remarked, if you can’t protect the students on campus, who cares about the grades? One of the biggest concerns for parents was student safety, as the production company had rented out and had access to the gym partially during school hours when students were still on campus. In his comments, Trustee Michael Allman also called for the entire CCA Foundation board to resign and for a reset of the foundation culture. The next day on Dec. 12, the CCA Foundation announced Regina Twomey had resigned as executive director. In a letter to the community, Interim CCAF Board President Claudia Kawaii-Bogue said the foundation board was “committed to ensuring a smooth transition and remains focused on our commitment to financial transparency and community engagement.” Per the approved MOU, the district will now handle reviewing, vetting, approving and managing all facility usage agreements, specifically those not directly related to school activities, giving the district full visibility into all vendors and proposed campus usage. Staffieri said the change will allow for a continued partnership with the foundations, whose work is “critical” to support San Dieguito’s students — the four foundations contribute over $5 million a year. “This change is designed with our utmost priority of protecting our students, upholding district policy and community standards and safeguarding the integrity of our schools,” Staffieri said. “This adjustment is not a reflection on the mission or longstanding contribution of our foundations, but rather a necessary step to ensure alignment, clarity and consistent application of district policies.” The practice of having the foundations handle facility rentals began in 2016. All four foundations were able to act as managers of district property and make rentals successful, bringing in more revenue to benefit students. Over the years, some parents expressed concerns that the foundations weren’t complying with the Civic Center Act and were profiting from the use of public assets. The board had previously considered a MOU for facilities rentals in 2023 and was set for it to go into effect at the start of the 2024-25 school year. But the board didn’t act — there was pushback from the foundations, which weren’t involved in preparing the MOU — and the effort was dropped in the leadership transition. At the time, Trustees Michael Allman and Phan Anderson voted against delaying the MOU. “If we had taken care of that and took over the facility rental back then, who knows? We might not have got ourselves into this situation that is quite embarrassing,” Anderson remarked at the Dec. 11 meeting. “Terrible, terrible incident,” said Allman. “Failure systemically on multiple levels, including this board and our prior boards, who failed to take action and to be strong when we knew that the Canyon Crest Foundation had some serious issues.” Per the MOU first reviewed by the board last month, the district will take full control of all facilities rentals. The district will handle scheduling, fee setting and approval of facility use, and the foundation will not be authorized to set, impose, or collect facility rental fees. Fees will be paid directly to the district, and all facility requests must go through the district’s official application system, called Facilitron. For camps, clinics or other fundraising activities that benefit a school-affiliated team, club or program, the foundation may reserve facilities but must go through Facilitron and must pay the district’s rental rate. School or school-related activities will always have first priority for scheduling, per the MOU. The MOU also addresses foundation fees — all donation forms, solicitation materials and online platforms must clearly disclose any fees and explain their purpose. The board agreed that the foundations’ administrative or overhead fee shall not exceed 10%. In reviewing the new MOU, Associate Superintendent of Business Services Stephen Dickinson said the district did hear some concerns from the foundations about the timeline being moved up, as they had been anticipating a longer runway to make the changes. “We want this MOU, too — we want facilities to shift back to a district responsibility,” said Joe Austin, the director of the Torrey Pines High School Foundation. “Last weekend’s situation was not what anybody wants.” “I don’t believe that accelerating this MOU, with regard to my foundation, is going to improve the situation. In fact, it’s going to have an almost immediate detrimental impact on the students we serve,” he continued. He said the changes will impact the foundation’s established relationships with longtime renters like sports leagues and churches, and he has questions about whether they will be able to bill for the extra items they provide for renters, such as the use of lights, the video scoreboard and student interns to run it. Austin said the Torrey Pines foundation has $120,000 in facilities rentals booked, of which they have earned a little less than half to date. He said the foundation will need to make some difficult decisions in this coming year as they may not be able to fund some programs they planned to. Trustee Rimga Viskanta, who later in the meeting was elected the board’s new vice president, said she hopes for a seamless transition and that in her understanding, the foundations will still be able to charge for those extras — they just can’t charge or accept the rental fees. The board overall supported the MOU going into effect earlier for CCA and giving Torrey Pines, La Costa Canyon High School and San Dieguito Academy until July 2026 to make the changes. President Jodie Williams abstained from the 4-0 vote as she was not present for the majority of the board’s discussion. “Our school foundations, their parent volunteers and their staff are indefensible partners in our work. They devote countless hours, raise significant resources and support our programs that directly benefit our students … They deserve our respect and gratitude; they certainly have mine,” Viskanta said. “I support this MOU before us tonight because its requirements are grounded in well-established legal, fiscal and nonprofit accounting standards.” As the board takes back the responsibility for managing facilities rentals, Viskanta also proposed that the district develop a policy for commercial film and production company rentals, to allow for a higher level of review of the nature and content of what is going to be filmed on district campuses. “A deeply troubling incident brought heightened attention to facility rentals at our school sites and while it may be tempting to look for villains, the truth is sometimes terrible events make manifest the cracks in our systems,” Viskanta said. “It is our responsibility as trustees to acknowledge them, address them, and repair them so they cannot widen into something more serious.” ...read more read less