Notwithstanding worries about a looming recession and misperceptions that schools are swimming in money, California voters approved 71 of 101 TK-12 and community college construction bond proposals last month. The 65 of 94 TK-12 and six of seven community college district ballot measures that won will generate $20 billion in renovations and new construction. 

The overall passage of 71% is below the average approval rate of 80% since 2001, according to CaliforniaCityFinance.com.  The voting margins also “seemed thinner this year,” said Jeff Becker, executive director of facilities for the Office of the Fresno County Superintendent of Schools. He also chairs the Coalition for Adequate School Housing or CASH, the California lobby for school facilities.

With a number of districts just a few percentage points below or above the 55% threshold to pass a school bond, officials were kept in suspense for weeks, until the final votes were announced in early December. 

WASHINGTON — Buried in the 4,155-page omnibus spending bill unveiled in the Senate on Tuesday is a single sentence that’s likely to go unnoticed by almost everyone — except the first-term congresswoman who fought for it with everything she had for the last year and a half.

“For an additional amount for ‘Education Construction,’ $90,465,000, to remain available until expended for necessary expenses related to the consequences of flooding at the To’Hajiilee Community School.”

It’s the only line item in the bill under a section titled “Bureau of Indian Education, Education Construction.” It’s money to rebuild a K-12 school in TóHajiilee, New Mexico, a remote community about 35 miles west of Albuquerque.

The Future Facilities Capital Project presented to voters by the Croton-Harmon Union Free School District was overwhelmingly approved on Dec. 6 by a vote of 808-215.

The $45.5 million project addresses current infrastructure-related items, preserves the integrity of school buildings and property, and creates student learning spaces that allow for collaboration, creativity, and future-driven teaching and learning. The project is tax-neutrala nd was intentionally crafted to not increase the tax levy for the community’s residents.

Superintendent Stephen Walker expressed his gratitude to the community for consistently showing its support to the district, allowing it to maintain and build upon the high-caliber education and school facilities it provides to students.

YORK — South Carolina’s fastest-growing school district has enough money to start building two new schools after resolving a five-year battle with York County over $54 million the district collected in fees placed on newly built homes.
County Council voted this week in a special meeting to end its lawsuit over how Fort Mill School District 4 was spending the fees to cover debt and not to build new schools.
Another legal fight remains on the horizon.
The Home Builders Association of York County is threatening a class-action lawsuit against the school district and county to get the money back, said Michael Pruner, president of the Rock Hill-based trade group. 
York County has been charging builders an impact fee on new home construction since the 1990s. The money is sent to the district to cover the cost of adding classroom space in the fast-growing area just south of the stateline from Charlotte. The fee stands at more than $18,000 for each new home built in Fort Mill, adding about 4 percent on new home prices, according to the Home Builder’s Association of York County. 
 

PROVIDENCE – Thirteen school projects in four cities and towns totaling $331.9 million were approved Tuesday by the R.I. Council on Elementary and Secondary Education.

Among the notable projects are a new high school and a new pre-kindergarten-through-eighth-grade dual-language school to be built in Central Falls. The schools are part of six projects, including renovations at other schools, to be completed in the city for $170 million.

East Providence will undertake new construction and major renovations at Martin Middle School, Waddington Elementary School and Orlo Avenue Elementary School for a combined $107.9 million.

In Westerly, $50 million will be spent to build a new elementary school on the site of the existing Spring Street School, renovate Springbrook and Dunn’s Corner elementary schools and construct an addition at Dunn’s Corner Elementary School.

STAMFORD — Two schools only a few yards away from each other in Stamford are slated to be torn down and rebuilt for about $387 million — and the state has agreed to put down roughly $292 million to get it done.
Both Westhill High School and Roxbury Elementary School, separated only by Roxbury Road, were recently selected by the Connecticut Department of Administrative Services as two state projects to qualify for grant funding.
The Westhill construction is estimated to cost about $301 million, of which the state has agreed to pay $241 million. The price tag for Roxbury is $86 million, with the state taking on $51.6 million.
Westhill had already been selected for reimbursement last year, but at the time, the state had only agreed to pay for 20 percent of the work, or about $51.6 million. That previous submission estimated the full project cost to be $258 million, but that number has since risen because of increased construction costs.
 

Hornell City School District voters Tuesday approved a $32 million capital project that features improvements to the 100-year-old Intermediate School and other buildings.

The measure, which is the first phase of a 10-year facilities improvement plan, passed with 197 votes in favor and 118 votes against.

With about 62.5% support, the capital project exceeded the 60% threshold required for a Small Cities school district.

District officials said four affidavit votes must still be verified before they can be opened and counted. However, even if they are all "No" votes, the percentage will not fall below 60%, officials noted.

"I and the board of education are thrilled with the positive result in the capital project vote," Superintendent Jeremy Palotti said. "The work planned in this project will have a direct impact on our kids and our community. The Hornell City School District is grateful for the support of the community and looks forward to moving forward on this project."

A recent change to Mississippi’s power generation laws, set to take effect in January, will allow over half of the state’s public school districts to start saving money by generating their own solar energy. 

The new rule, which the Public Service Commission agreed to with the state’s two investor-owned utilities in October, paves the way for school districts to earn credits for generating solar power without actually having to pay for the solar panels. 

Starting in 2023, any of the 95 public school districts served by Entergy Mississippi or Mississippi Power can enter into what’s called a power purchase agreement, where a third-party contractor foots the bill to add solar panels to the school district’s property. Entergy or Mississippi Power would then buy the generated solar power and credit the district on its energy bill. For funding the new system, the contractor would be eligible for government tax credits. 

Anisa Heming has been working on making schools more sustainable for a decade and a half, now as director of the Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council, a Washington nonprofit. And she’s never seen a moment of opportunity quite like this. “It’s an out-of-body experience, honestly,” she said. “Communities are demanding it, federal money is here, and the districts that didn’t do the prep work are scrambling.”
Since President Joe Biden took office in early 2021, three different giant federal spending packages have passed: the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, the American Rescue Plan and the Inflation Reduction Act. Each includes grants and tax credits school districts can use to benefit the climate while also, typically, saving money in energy bills over time. There are billions and billions for boosting building efficiency; replacing boilers, ovens and other appliances with clean-running electric models; solar and battery installations; electric school buses; charging stations; and more.
In some cases, districts can make upgrades with no upfront cost at all.
The enthusiasm is palpable: The Environmental Protection Agency received so many applications for electric school bus funding, it doubled the amount it originally planned to award, to nearly $1 billion the first year. (More money is coming, up to $5 billion for that one program.) 
So if you are a member of a school community — student, parent, teacher or leader — here are seven steps to claim your piece of the clean, green pie. “Don’t wait. Don’t hesitate. Act and figure it out,” urged Bryant Shaw, sustainability manager for the Dallas Independent School District.

The Fauquier school board at a special meeting Monday morning voted unanimously to recommend that $4.9 million in carryover funds (money left over from the previous year’s budget) be used to help pay for renovations and urgent maintenance at aging schools. 

None of the unused money from the fiscal 2022 budget will go toward bonuses or salary hikes for teachers or other school staff. “In the original carryover, we had the raises for next year,” school board member Susan Pauling (Center District) said at the meeting. “So is there still a plan for us to be able to follow through with our commitment for the 5% in the ’24 school year?” 

Not with the carryover, said Denise Sandlin, assistant superintendent of business and planning. “We have used up the whole $4.9 million, which will not include the 5% salary increase,” she said. School board members will need to look elsewhere in the budget to help fund those raises, Sandlin said. 

Community Board 8 was forced to cancel a much-anticipated meeting on the public school proposed for 160 Van Cortlandt Park South last Friday when School Construction Authority officials backed out with only a few days’ notice, citing a mysterious lawsuit against them.

“SCA has been advised by counsel that they cannot attend this meeting due to pending litigation.

“Therefore, this meeting with SCA is canceled,” wrote district manager Ciara Gannon in a Dec. 5 email notice.

CB8’s officers could only speculate about the details of the suit emanating from a small group of neighbors on Van Cortlandt Park South, a shady thoroughfare in Kingsbridge that cuts across the Major Deegan Expressway.

“I’ve been told it’s a group of residents representing themselves,” said CB8 chair Laura Spalter. “But I know nothing further.”

Spalter wanted a meeting with the SCA to take place before the end of the year in time to weigh in on the architectural designs of the new school, she said. Now, her hopes have been dashed.

The board’s committee chairs aired their frustration and bewilderment in the executive committee meeting two days later.

Whether or not the litigation has any merit, “it has enabled SCA to hide behind the pendency of a lawsuit and cancel the meeting,” land use chair Charles Moerdler said.

“I sincerely believe they just don’t want to meet,” he said.

And he may be correct. But CB8 has little recourse at this point.

The education committee voted to approve the SCA’s site selection a year ago, concluding the community board’s brief advisory role in the new school construction process. Like other public authorities that maintain New York’s bridges and highways, finance higher education, and run its mass transit systems, the SCA’s public accountability is limited. It does not follow the city’s land use review process or register its contracts in the city checkbook.

Community participation in new school construction is comprised of a series of public hearings and a 45-day comment period after SCA announces its site selection but usually before it begins environmental assessment or design.

NEW YORK -- While New York City may have lost tens of thousands of students during the pandemic, schools chancellor David Banks says new class size requirements are going to force the city to build dozens of new schools.
He spoke exclusively to CBS2 political reporter Marcia Kramer.
When it comes to city public schools, parents have been voting with their feet, pulling more than 100,000 student out of public school in favor of charter, private schools and parochial schools.
Despite the drop, Banks said during an interview on CBS2's Sunday morning talk show "The Point," he's going to have to embark on a new building program.
"There will be dozens of new schools. I don't know the exact number of new schools, but it will be significant, and that's not a bad thing in that we want to ensure that our kids have a great school experience. We don't want kids to be in school where there's 150% overcrowding," he said.
One reason for the expansion program is a new state law that takes effect next year that will require the city to shrink class sizes.
The city has to reduce class size in at least 20% of its schools each year for the next five years. Kindergarten through third grade will be capped at 20 students, grades 4-8 at 23 students.
"I think in the short term, it's not going to be particularly difficult over the next couple of years. We'll be able to do that and I think move that pretty efficiently. The challenge comes two years, three years down the line. I think that's when it's going to be more challenging for us. We've got more classes that we're going to have to ensure that they're smaller and the amount of dollars that we're going to have to spend will be much more significant," Banks said.
In addition to more school facilities, there will be the need to hire more teachers.
 

The School Board adopted the $1.3 billion FY2024-FY2029 Capital Improvement Program and Capital Asset Preservation Program budgets Dec. 13 to cheers from Park View High School community members gathered in the meeting room.

The board passed it unanimously with one amendment from Harris Mahedavi (Ashburn) to add $500,000 to the fiscal year 2025 budget for older elementary schools to get updated signs. That amendment passed 5-3-1 with Chair Jeff Morse (Dulles), John Beatty (Catoctin), Tiffany Polifko (Broad Run) opposed, and Denise Corbo (At-large) absent for the vote. 

Included in the plan is a $221.7 million reconstruction of Park View High School, a $38.9 million renovation of Banneker Elementary, a $20 million renovation of Waterford Elementary and a $271 million to build a new high school in the Dulles north area designated as HS-14. 

The Alexandria School Board approved its 2024-2033 Capital Improvement Program budget on Thursday night, paving the way for construction of new schools, swing space and significant renovations over the next decade.

After a series of work sessions and public meetings this fall, the Board approved the $461 million proposal, with $58.7 million to be used next year.

“It is critical that we give our students the best opportunity to succeed by providing optimal learning environments and the resources to support their well-being and academic achievement,” School Board Chair Meagan Alderton said in a press release.

The fiscal year 2024 CIP budget is $37 million less than last year’s approved proposal, although that’s only because the Alexandria City High School Project funding.

In fact, development costs have risen sharply. The school system is contending with price jumps up to 200%, ACPS reported.

Attempts to repair a hurricane-damaged part of Fort Myers Beach Elementary School are set to begin on Wednesday, according to the superintendent of the Lee County School District.

Dr. Chris Bernier told members of the school board that remediation begins Wednesday at the historic part of the school. It's one of five buildings that make up the school, and it's been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1999. The superintendent said a fence would be put in place around the historic part during remediation. He said the fencing would be a public safety measure during repair work.

Bernier added that district officials will meet with representatives from the register of historic places on Wednesday. He said that meeting is supposed to occur at the school.

The school board held a workshop Tuesday afternoon to consider options on what to do with the facility, badly damaged by Hurricane Ian about two-and-a-half months ago. The school had 77 students before Ian. Most of those children now attend classes at another school, off the island.

The Washoe County School District will build a new Vaughn Middle School and tear down the existing building after an independent audit found school facilities unfit for student learning.

The initial findings came from Cannon Design, an architecture and engineering the district hired in September to create a five-year construction project plan.

Dozens of WCSD schools received poor marks on everything from energy efficiency and bathrooms to safety and classroom sizes.

The report revealed the district’s middle schools are a story of “the haves and have nots,” according to Paul Mills, vice president of Cannon Designs. He said many of the district schools in areas of high poverty that were built more than 50 years ago have issues.

Of the district's 17 middle schools, seven were identified as having inadequate facilities. Of those seven, Vaughn, Dilworth, Traner and Sparks middle schools were also identified as also having students with the highest needs.

On Tuesday night the School Board voted to adopt new secondary school attendance zones, moving students in some areas to new schools despite cries from parents to table that change amid recent shakeups in the division.
The board approved a version of Chair Jeff Morse (Dulles)’s plan, which moved the fewest students to new schools and focused on reducing crowding, at Loudoun County High School in a 4-2-1 vote. John Beatty (Catoctin) and Tiffany Polifko (Broad Run) opposed the plan, Harris Mahedavi (Ashburn) abstained and Denise Corbo (At-large) and Atoosa Reaser (Algonkian) were absent from the vote.
The school district projects Loudoun County High School would have approached its building capacity in the next few years without changes to attendance zones. By the 2028-2029 school year, it was projected to be at 99% capacity if efforts weren’t made to reduce student numbers. That was one of the main reasons the division took up the rezoning.
Beatty sought to postpone the vote, arguing students were still recovering from the pandemic and parents didn’t want the change for their kids at this time.
“Moving students without a new high school based on potential growth, I think it’s better to just delay on this, the timing, as we allow students to recover from where we were,” Beatty said. He added the parents he has talked to don’t see a problem with the school’s enrollment numbers.
 

The Select Committee on School Facilities is recommending the Wyoming Legislature triple the state’s public school construction budget.

The select committee wants to add $148 million to the supplemental budget to fund inflation and major maintenance work, which includes another $117 million for school construction projects.

The state has $44 million in school projects on the books for the current biennium, so the $117 million more for projects would more than triple this cost to $161 million. 

Inflation And Deflation

Inflation continues to be a major factor in the American economy and one of the most impacted sectors is construction. 

When it comes to funding school construction projects, the largest question the Legislature’s Appropriation Committee deliberated Tuesday morning was how much additional money to factor in for future inflationary increases.

Although there was a general consensus more money is needed to cover ballooning prices, a few legislators were skeptical that prices will continue drastically increasing into the future.

The School Facilities Division determined its inflationary numbers based on an anticipated 22.5% increase in total price of projects. Based on that figure, the Appropriations Committee recommended a lower $20.5 million budget supplement for inflation Tuesday.

The Appropriations Committee already included an inflationary component on the projects it approved last year, which was not factored into the figures presented Tuesday.

The new inflation funding would cover projects that have already been approved but have not gone out to bid.

Meg Tarpey and her younger sister survived the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School 10 years ago, then watched the site of that massacre be demolished and a new school built in its place.

In 2016, Tarpey, her sister and their mother visited the new building for the first time along with a comfort dog. Sandy Hook had been reimagined, with community input, incorporating a footbridge leading to the entrance of the school, a gate surrounding the campus and floor-to-ceiling windows for easy views of anyone approaching the school.

“That day was really hard, because in a way I felt like they’re trying to get rid of what happened, like moving on from it,” said Tarpey, who was in third grade, and her sister in first, when the shooter with an AR-15-style semi-automatic rifle blasted into their Newtown, Connecticut, school. 

Years later, Tarpey, now 18 and speaking in one of her first interviews with media since the Dec. 14, 2012, killings, said she's come to realize visiting the new site gave her back a piece of herself.

“There’s an aspect of it that is really beautiful,” she said, “making something beautiful from tragedy.” 

Since the 26 deaths at Sandy Hook, at least a dozen schools, from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, to Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, have been the site of mass shootings or killings, according to a USA TODAY, Associated Press and Northwestern University database. A compendium of guidance has been developed on constructing schools to prevent such killings. Yet no national database tracks remodeled or new buildings that incorporate school safety features.

But many experts suggest the changes are creating a system of haves and have nots, where many school districts, particularly those in low-income neighborhoods of color, are left exposed, unable to afford significant upgrades. In addition, these changes may only slow someone intent on killing others and are unlikely to stop them altogether.

WASHINGTON (DC News Now) — Parents and staff at Whittier Elementary School gathered together on Tuesday to say that conditions in the building are unsafe for students.
“I’m asking for someone, anyone to put students and teachers first,” said Assistant Principal Joshua Wiley.
Wiley spoke during an hours-long oversight hearing on DC’s Department of General Services. The hearing was held by Councilmember Robert White after a November audit found that the government agency was failing to manage work orders.
DGS is in charge of District buildings, including more than 100 DC Public School buildings.
During the hearing, Wiley said rodents are a growing issue at the school, heating problems continue to linger and DGS is slow to respond to plumbing and other issues.
“Three and four year olds have been learning in classrooms with sewage issues for approximately 50 calendar days,” he said.
First-grade teacher Melissa Black said it sometimes feels like a punishment to have to work in the building.
“There have been numerous times where I’ve told parents to pack extra sweaters for a classroom that can get as cold as 65 degrees in the winter,” she said. “Teaching is challenging. If I did my job the way DGS does its job, I would lose my job.”
Keith Anderson, Director of the Department of General Services, said the agency is working to address several issues identified in the audit and respond to and repair work orders more quickly.
“Work that has been prioritized will be assessed, scheduled and completed as soon as possible contingent upon resources, manpower and weather,” he said.