A multimillion dollar lawsuit filed by Academy of Art University students after San Francisco took legal action against the for-profit college in 2016 for converting affordable housing into dormitories has been dismissed.
But on Wednesday, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Suzanne Ramos Bolanos ruled in favor of the university and dismissed the case, finding that the plaintiffs failed to prove that they were tenants as defined by city law. The original student lawsuit was filed in 2016 in federal court but dismissed a year later due to lack of jurisdiction. It was refiled in state court.
and said that the students' lawsuit"piggybacked" off of another lawsuit over the zoning issue filed that same month in 2016 by then-City Attorney Dennis Herrera. The city's lawsuit accused the academy of unlawfully removing 300 units from the city's housing stock and converting them to student housing, accusing the school of engaging in
The San Francisco Chronicle reported in 2020 that the 160 affordable units were never built, and that theto require the academy to instead pay $38 million in cash to the city for affordable housing construction. The school also was required to convert a portion of its properties back to their original uses, restore 12 historic buildings and pay some $20 million in fines.