On Tuesday, February 6, Governor Josh Shapiro gave his annual budget address—and in it, he told a surprising story.
“A couple months ago, I had a meeting with [State] Representative Fiedler in my office,” the Governor recalled. “I was a little surprised when she showed up with her two kids, who were in tow that day because their school was closed after asbestos was detected.
“I was happy to see Rep. Fiedler’s kids and I’m sure they enjoyed their time in the Capitol. But there are a lot of other families out there who would have had to miss part of a paycheck – miss a day’s work – because we didn’t do our part to make our schools safer.”
After sharing this story of his colleague’s encounter with an unsafe school facility, Governor Shapiro went on to acknowledge the crumbling reality of school facilities in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania. To quote from his speech once again:
The Scranton School District alone has identified more than 300 million dollars in necessary repairs – everything from installing a new fire sprinkler to removing lead paint.
The Sto-Rox School District in McKees Rocks has at least 14 million dollars’ worth of work that’s needed.
All three of their school buildings need urgent roof repairs to prevent leaks when it rains.
And the Panther Valley School District in Schuylkill and Carbon counties told the Basic Education Funding Commission that kindergarteners are forced to learn in rooms without air conditioning because they can’t afford the upgrades.
Look, I could go on and on.
My point is, we need to invest a lot more to help these districts maintain safe and healthy learning environments for students.
We commend the Governor for laying out in no uncertain terms what is going on within the walls of too many of Pennsylvania’s schools: toxins like lead paint. Untenable conditions like dripping roofs and no fire safety system. Children as young as five years old learning in sweltering, un-air-conditioned classrooms. And parents scrambling to find alternative arrangements—or struggling to forgo a paycheck—when their children have no safe school facility to learn in during the day.
And, sadly, these issues do go “on and on.” Which is why it was heartening to hear that Governor Shapiro’s budget has allocated “one-and-a-half billion dollars – including 300 million this year alone” to fixing these inadequate and unsafe school facilities.
Of course, a budget earmark is only the beginning. It will take a concentrated effort, genuine accountability and no small amount of political and grassroots pressure to ensure that these dollars go toward fixing these issues in Pennsylvania’s schools. But an admission from Harrisburg that too many of PA’s school facilities are failing is a step in the right direction—and a hopeful sign that soon, all of the schools in the commonwealth will meet the adequate building conditions (ABCs) that we advocate for.