The Boston School Committee unanimously signed off on allowing lease negotiations for the redevelopment of White Stadium to move forward, as community feedback on the highly controversial project came pouring in.

“Tonight, we ask for you to take your vote,” Superintendent Mary Skipper said at Wednesday’s School Committee meeting. “The finalization of the lease agreement will allow the city’s public facilities department to move forward with demolition a part of the existing stadium this fall. White Stadium, as we all know, has been in disrepair for far too long.”

The School Committee vote will allow BPS and the city officials to continue negotiations and enter into a lease agreement for the White Stadium West Grandstand and an adjacent area with the private group Boston Unity Soccer Partners. Demolition work on the stadium, which sits in Franklin Park, would not begin until a lease is signed.

Skipper noted the renovation would include “new community space, strength training locker rooms and physical therapy spaces” and said the project is “a key part of the city’s efforts to improve access to athletics for all BPS students.”

However, a broad group of community members have argued the private partner in the project, who intend to use the renovation to bring a professional women’s soccer team to Boston, would pose a major threat to Franklin Park and the surrounding Roxbury, Mattapan and Jamaica Plain neighborhoods.

At a Franklin Park rally ahead of the Wednesday meeting, neighbors expressed frustration over the increase of traffic and pollution, loss of green space, and lack of neighborhood access to the park they argue would come with a professional sports complex.

City Councilors Erin Murphy and Ed Flynn, state Rep. Chynah Tyler, local activist and former School Committee member Jean McGuire, and representatives of the Emerald Necklace Conservancy attended the rally.

“The city is asking us to give up one of the only resources that bring light and life into our neighborhoods,” said Mattapan resident Pamela Jones. “Would this same proposal be considered in a more affluent part of Boston, or are we seen as expendable, with our needs and voices being ignored in favor of a development that serves outsiders rather than the people who live here?”

The city officials present and neighbors also noted that they didn’t feel there was adequate public outreach to communities affected.

“The fact is, we were never asked if we wanted a professional sports and entertainment complex in our park, and the proponents have made a mockery of public process,” McGuire said. “A public park is not meant for profit — it’s meant for the public.”

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At the School Committee meeting, huge numbers of community members testified on both sides.

“The stadium holds a very, very special place in my heart, in the student-athletes that I serve,” testified BPS cross country program head coach Hatim Jean-Louis. “This investment will empower our athletes. It will empower our community. It will bring a world-class event to our doorstep.”