CHARLESTON, W.Va. — More than 30 county school systems hope to have their names called when the West Virginia School Building Authority decides later this year who should receive funding as part of the ‘Needs” grants program.
The SBA annually allocates several millions of dollars for new school construction or renovations to existing schools. The SBA’s deadline to submit was last Friday, SBA Executive Director Andy Neptune said.
“We have 32 county requests at over a $170 million with about $40 million of all the locals combined,” Neptune told MetroNews.
School superintendents from those 32 counties will make their cases before the SBA in meetings set for Nov. 3-4 in Charleston. The funding decisions will be announced Dec. 15.
Neptune said like many other yeas they have more requests that money to allocate.
“We’re looking at approximately $43.5 million to give out this year,” Neptune said.
That’s fewer funds than recent years mainly because the SBA agreed last year to fund several new school construction projects over a several year basis.
Neptune said there will be good competition for the limited dollars. The SBA staff will drill down on the requests, he said.
“We will spend time out in the field looking at those. I even go out and look at those projects–to give our authority members the best information we can so they can vote on,” Neptune said.
SBA moves
The SBA met Monday and took action on several other items.
It updated the 10-year facilities plan for Roane County Schools based on plans to close and consolidate some schools.
The SBA decided to give Lincoln County Schools another year to work on a new school for the Duval area.
Neptune said the SBA also announced it is exploring the possibility of including gymnasiums in elementary school projects. He said it would further promote physical fitness.
“We just want to be able to control that cost. We don’t think we’d need a high school gymnasium when we are building an elementary school,” Neptune said.