Bill Setting Safety Standards For School Buildings Advances
The Senate Education Committee took one more baby step Thursday toward passing the House’s trilogy of bills that deal with school building safety.
The committee passed HB 678, which would create an Idaho Uniform School Building Safety Code Commission. The commission would write and enforce a statewide school building safety code.
Sen. Jack Riggs, R-Coeur d’Alene, made the motion to send the bill to the full Senate.
“The commission can look at all the building codes and look at our state and create something that will work,” he said. “It will create a process and the accountability that has been missing.”
The bill passed with only two “no” votes despite concerns voiced during testimony. The main concern is that the legislation doesn’t specify which codes the commission must follow.
The committee also considered HB 668, which contains a $20million revolving loan fund that districts would be able to access as a last resort if they were unable to pass a bond levy.
The committee voted to hold the bill until Tuesday to consider amendments and alternatives.
“This provides an alternative to levy funds,” said Sen. Laird Noh, R-Kimberly. “But once a (loan) application has been submitted to the treasurer he can accept it or he may impose his own system of detainment, including all these drastic measures.”
Those measures include freezing teachers’ pay and laying off staff to free up money to repay the loan from the state. That’s just one of the sticking points for the bill’s opponents. The other is that the state treasurer would set the interest rate at the market rate, providing the school districts no real relief. Several members of the committee wondered why the state couldn’t offer schools a lower interest rate.
Rep. Lawrence Denney, R-Midvale, one of the bill’s sponsors, said the House would not accept the bill with a lower interest rate because then it would have an impact on the state’s general fund. “These schools need help, not just more loans,” said committee chairman Sen. Gary Schroeder, R-Moscow. “There are some districts that are in such dire straits that they aren’t going to pass a bond, we need to provide some help for them.”
The third bill has already passed through the committee. It would extend the period of time school districts have to pay back facility levies if part of the money is going to fix health and safety hazards. If the bill becomes law, the Bankers Association has agreed to make $50 million in low-interest loans to the schools.