The Sacramento City Unified School District has positioned the proposed artificial turf installation at Crocker/Riverside Elementary as a routine modernization. A standard improvement. The kind of decision school districts make all the time.
The reality is the opposite. Across California and nationally, school districts and municipalities looking at the same evidence the district is looking at have reached the opposite conclusion. They have banned artificial turf at elementary schools. They have prohibited it in city parks. They have ordered independent studies. They have paused projects partway through to reconsider.
This article documents what other jurisdictions have actually done — because what SCUSD is doing at Crocker/Riverside is not the standard. It is increasingly the exception.
Los Angeles Unified School District: Banned at all elementary schools
The largest school district in California — and the second-largest in the United States, serving more than 418,000 students across over 780 schools — has explicitly banned what SCUSD is about to install.
On November 18, 2025, the Los Angeles Unified Board of Education unanimously voted to prohibit new artificial turf installations at early education, elementary, and middle schools in the district. The resolution was authored by Board Member Kelly Gonez and co-sponsored by Board Members Karla Griego, Dr. Rocío Rivas, Student Board Member Jerry Yang, Board Member Nick Melvoin, and Board President Scott Schmerelson.
The reasoning was explicit. “We must take urgent, equity-driven action to build resiliency, mitigate risks of climate change, prioritize those most impacted by extreme heat, and ensure our students are in classrooms and playgrounds that are safe and comfortable for learning,” Gonez stated when introducing the resolution.
The resolution also commissioned a comprehensive study on the health, environmental, and fiscal impacts of artificial turf versus natural grass for high school athletic fields, with stakeholder input. In other words: LAUSD treated the elementary school question as already answered, and reserved further study only for older students.
The timing here matters. LAUSD’s ban came less than four months before SCUSD signed its construction contract for Crocker/Riverside on March 5, 2026. The largest school district in California reached the opposite conclusion in the same window the SCUSD project was being finalized — and SCUSD proceeded anyway.
LAUSD’s prohibition is now a frequently cited precedent in artificial turf debates across California school districts. It is being cited everywhere except, apparently, in Sacramento.
Boston: Mayor directed no new artificial turf in city parks
In 2022, Boston Mayor Michelle Wu directed that no new artificial turf fields be installed in any City of Boston park.
The directive was first made public in an August 26, 2022 update to the reconstruction plan for Malcolm X Park in Roxbury, which contained the explicit notation: “Mayor Wu has directed that no new artificial turf fields will be installed in the City of Boston.”
In a statement to The Guardian, the Mayor’s office explained the rationale: “The city has a preference for grass playing surfaces wherever possible and will not be installing playing surfaces with PFAS chemicals moving forward.”
The Boston decision was specifically driven by PFAS concerns — the same forever chemicals that independent and EPA testing has found in artificial turf regardless of which infill product is used. Boston became the largest U.S. municipality to take this kind of action, joining a growing number of communities including several in Connecticut, two in California’s Bay Area, and at least four others in Massachusetts.
Millbrae, California: Citywide ordinance ban
The City of Millbrae in San Mateo County passed a clean ordinance banning artificial turf citywide.
On October 24, 2023, the Millbrae City Council passed an ordinance establishing Chapter 8.65 of the Millbrae Municipal Code, prohibiting the installation of synthetic grass and artificial turf. The ordinance became effective January 1, 2024. Existing installations must be removed and replaced with natural landscaping when they show signs of wear and degradation.
The stated purposes of the Millbrae ordinance include “improving public health and safety by removing exposure to potential environmental carcinogens found in synthetic grass and artificial turf products” and protecting water quality from synthetic debris and microplastic runoff.
San Marino, in Los Angeles County, has enacted similar restrictions.
Santa Monica: Independent study, then a city council ban
The Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District commissioned an independent study by NV5, a global environmental consulting firm, to compare artificial turf and natural grass playing fields. The study examined injury risks, heat impacts, chemical exposures, environmental considerations, operational costs, and end-of-life disposal.
The study was commissioned amid intense community opposition to plans to install synthetic turf at Franklin Elementary School and other campuses. More than 1,200 petition signers, six neighborhood organizations, and State Senator Ben Allen opposed the plan.
On January 27, 2026, the Santa Monica City Council voted 7-0 to ban new artificial turf on all city-owned land as part of its 25-year Parks and Recreation Vision Plan.
The Santa Monica school district’s independent study confirmed what the broader research has long shown: artificial turf surfaces consistently reach 158 to 171 degrees Fahrenheit under laboratory conditions, 35 to 64 degrees higher than natural grass. This was found in a coastal climate substantially cooler than Sacramento.
California state law now permits local bans
In 2023, Governor Gavin Newsom signed legislation undoing a Brown-era law that had prevented cities and counties from banning synthetic grass — explicitly returning local authority to ban artificial turf based on health and environmental concerns.
The bill’s author, State Senator Ben Allen, was direct about the reasoning: “Emerging research is making it clear that artificial turf poses an environmental threat due to its lack of recyclability and presence of toxins such as lead and PFAS.”
That law made the Millbrae and San Marino ordinances possible. It also gives every California city — including Sacramento — the same authority to act.
What SCUSD has chosen instead
The district has not commissioned an independent study. It has not consulted a single medical specialist. It has not disclosed the vendor’s litigation history to the Citizens Bond Oversight Committee. It has not presented grass versus turf as a community decision point. It has not paused to consider what other California districts have already concluded.
It has simply proceeded.
Why this matters
When the largest school district in California unanimously bans something just months before SCUSD signs its contract, when the mayor of the largest municipality on the East Coast directs that it not be used in city parks, when a growing list of California cities ban it through ordinance, and when neighboring school districts commission independent studies before deciding — the question the Board needs to ask is not “why are these parents concerned?”
The question is: why is SCUSD the outlier?
The Sacramento City Unified School District Board of Education can still pause this project, commission an independent review, and direct staff to install natural grass with proper drainage and irrigation. The Board has the authority. The funding is allocated. Construction has not yet begun.
Other districts have shown the path. Sacramento can follow it.
Your email is what makes the Board take that path seriously.