NJ awards $75 million in grants for school facilities statewide – New Jersey 101.5 FM

GARFIELD – School districts across New Jersey are receiving a combined $75 million from the state to help defray the costs of their buildings’ emergent, capital maintenance and pandemic-mitigation needs, Gov. Phil Murphy and other officials said Friday.

“We share a commitment to not only maintaining our state’s place as home of the top-ranked system of public education in the country but ensuring that every child and every community has a place under that banner,” Murphy said. “And that includes safe and modern schools. And we share a commitment to keeping our communities affordable for working families and seniors.”

What about my town? Here’s the full list of grants, district by district.

Murphy made the announcement at a news conference at Christopher Columbus School in Garfield. The Bergen County school district is receiving $853,224 through the allocation, as it is one of the 31 systems in the state included in the series of Abbott v. Burke school funding litigation.

The funding awarded by the state includes $50 million for those 31 systems, called Schools Development Authority districts. Those grants range from $202,239 for Salem to $6,455,930 for Newark.

All other districts are sharing the other $25 million, with at least a small amount for each district – as low as $110 for the Hunterdon County Educational Services Commission to as much as $393,418 for Edison.

“Every dollar is going to be put to work on projects large and small to ensure our school buildings can meet the needs of the future,” Murphy said. “But what’s more is that every single dollar of these funds is a dollar of property tax relief. Every single dollar being distributed is a dollar that school boards do not have to ask from local property tax payers.”

Funding for the grants comes from the state budget, not from borrowing. The state Department of Education and Schools Development Authority have been developing a formula for distributing the funds since June.

Michael Symons is State House bureau chief for New Jersey 101.5. Contact him at michael.symons@townsquaremedia.com.