San Francisco school community leaders are reporting that San Francisco Unified School District general counsel Manuel Martinez is on his way out just after completing a year on his 26-month contract. The action, not yet confirmed, comes two days after he received a retroactive salary increase with other top administrators to bring his annual salary to $309,582.
The Voice of San Francisco has asked for confirmation or comment from the school district and school board.
In April, 2025, Martinez was appointed by a 4–2 vote of the school board to succeed the previous general counsel Rodney Moore who was hired in 2024 but served just months. With other attorneys, Martinez filled in as interim counsel both before and after Moore’s departure.
The general counsel oversees a large legal team and hires outside counsel for major litigation brought by and against the school district. One duty that, by its nature, has limited staff support is making decisions and providing guidance at public school board meetings. During Martinez’s service as school district general counsel, school board president Phil Kim has struggled with presiding over meetings. Procedural errors in Summer 2025 forced the school board to revote on a one-year pilot curriculum for Ethnic Studies. This past week, close to the end of the one-year pilot program, the school board’s vote to approve the district’s ethnic studies curriculum sparked a demand letter for again failing to abide by the state open meetings law.
Last September, the school board held a meeting on “good governance” but did not follow its own rules on informing the public. At that meeting, Martinez declared that the school board could disregard its own rules as long as it followed state law.
If his departure is confirmed, what’s next for the school district is unclear. Martinez’s predecessor stopped attending school board meetings in May, 2024 — eleven months before Martinez was appointed. Under Martinez’s contract, he is entitled to three months’ severance pay if he is terminated without cause, a step that requires the school board to act. The school board must also act if Superintendent Su or the school board wants to remove him for cause. He and the school district can end the contract by mutual agreement at any time, or, if he initiates it, he must provide 45 days’ notice.
As the school district begins to contemplate selling off excess property — it held its first study session on the subject last night — and turns to the thorny topics of school reorganization and potential closures, legal advice and compliance will be critically important. The Voice of San Francisco will provide additional information as it is available.
