As grant program ends, state hopes to 'change the conversation' on safety projects

The Garden Valley School District used state grants to build an entryway and controlled vestibule. Visitors enter into a secure waiting area, and can enter the rest of the school only with staff permission. (Photo courtesy State Board of Education)

A $20 million grant program has covered safety upgrades in every school in Idaho.

The grants are a one-shot deal, with no similar plans on the horizon. But a State Board of Education official says a new school facilities law gives Idaho a chance to continue to invest in security.

“I think that really has the opportunity to change the conversation,” said Mike Munger, manager of Idaho’s school safety and security program.

The 2023 Legislature approved the grants. The money has pretty much been spent, Munger said recently.

The Securing Our Future grant program offered something for everyone — and larger grants for districts that needed some extra help.

Phase One: $20,000 per school

The first $13.8 million went out across the board. Every school in the state received a $20,000 grant.

Districts had a little bit of room to maneuver: They could move some of their money around to spend extra in an older school, for example. But they didn’t have a lot of flexibility in terms of projects. The state wanted to make sure the money went into projects with at least a five-year lifespan. Replacing a door might be boring, Munger said, but a new door can keep intruders out and withstand student traffic for 15 years.

“This isn’t an opportunity for experimentation on the state dollar,” he said.

Projects tended to fall into several common categories:

Repairing PA systems, or replacing outdated systems that are costly or impossible to repair.
Security cameras. The West Ada School District spent some of its $1.14 million on additional cameras and surveillance systems, and the Boise School District used some of its $863,000 to expand and upgrade its camera systems.
Replacement doors.
The Twin Falls School District received $319,000, and put about $41,000 into fencing at its 1950s-era Twin Falls High School — closing off the school site, and funneling visitors into the school through a single entrance.
Electronic access controls at school entrances.

Phase Two: More money, more competition

Here’s where the state funded some bigger projects. But not all of them.

The state divvied up $6.1 million for larger, competitive grants. The state received requests totaling $23 million.

“It was definitely clear that there was more need than those Phase Two dollars would cover,” Munger said.

The state winnowed the list down to 73 recipients — again looking for projects with staying power. The state also looked for community buy-in, and schools that had collaborated with local first responders.

But the state also prioritized smaller school districts and charters — with smaller budgets and little room to move money into an area of need.

Consequently, some of the maximum $200,000 awards went to some of Idaho’s most rural districts, like Murtaugh and Camas County.

Murtaugh, in the Magic Valley, put its $200,000 toward updating the electrical and HVAC units in the school gymnasium, and installing air conditioning. The overall project will cost more than $500,000, Superintendent Michele Capps said.

An HVAC project can have an unexpected but direct effect on school security. When a school has faulty air conditioning — or no air conditioning — a staffer or student will sometimes leave a door propped open, giving an intruder an easy passage into a school, Munger said.

In Camas County, $200,000 will go toward replacing a roof at the junior high school addition. It’s the newest school in the district — its grade school and high school wings are both more than a century old — but the junior high school’s flat roof poses a flood risk. When the snow rolls into Camas County, and eventually melts, the frigid runoff causes mold. Waterlogged ceiling tiles can collapse. The electrical systems for the fire alarms and security systems, wired into the building roof, are susceptible as well.

It will cost Camas County $822,000 to repair the roof and the HVAC system that sits on the roof. After voters rejected a $9 million bond issue in May, this project and others were thrown into limbo. The $200,000 grant made the difference in getting the roof and HVAC project done.

“This was just a godsend,” Superintendent Janet Williamson said.

A template for future projects

Camas County will cover the $622,000 balance on this project from another state funding source.

It will use its share from a historic new fund to cover school facilities projects.

The 2024 law will provide $1 billion in bonds for building projects, by far the largest infusion of state dollars into local school facilities.

The $622,000 will essentially zero out Camas County’s share of the facilities money — a worrisome thought, said Williamson, given the age of the district’s buildings.

However, the facilities law gives schools another potential funding source for safety-driven projects, an avenue that didn’t exist when lawmakers funded the $20 million grant program in 2023.

The Legislature didn’t provide safety project grants this year. The State Board didn’t propose grants in its 2025-26 budget proposal to Gov. Brad Little — which means it’s unlikely the state will earmark money for a grants program next year.

The $20 million was never meant to be a cure-all solution to school safety needs. Munger says the facilities law gives the state a chance to build on the grant-funded projects.

“How do we kind of regularize this?” he said.