Colorado has a big problem: Our schools are literally crumbling. Nearly 90 percent of our state’s school districts report that at least one of their buildings does not meet health or safety standards. Some of these buildings are more than 100 years old.
The evidence is startling:
• In Yuma County, part of a roof collapsed in an elementary school.
• In Conejos County, students have had to dodge tiles falling from a sagging roof.
• In eastern El Paso County, part of a student’s desk — with the student sitting in it — fell through the rotted floor of a classroom trailer.
Across the state, students and teachers are forced to contend with failing roofs, broken boilers, asbestos contamination, inadequate fire safety, insufficient water treatment, faulty electric systems, and pest infestation. Some districts put nearly half of their students in trailers.
The good news: Help is at hand.
The Building Excellent Schools Today (BEST) Act will provide tens of thousands of children in Colorado with schools that are safe, healthy and educationally enriching. BEST marks the most significant investment in Colorado school construction since statehood.
The BEST Act, or House Bill 1335, was sponsored by Speaker Andrew Romanoff, Senate President Peter Groff and Sen. Gail Schwartz. State Treasurer Cary Kennedy and a host of public-school advocates — including Great Education Colorado, the Colorado School Finance Project, and Children’s Voices Executive Director Kathy Gebhardt — helped craft the measure.
HB 1335 passed the legislature with broad bipartisan support: 63-1 in the House and 29-5 in the Senate. Gov. Bill Ritter signed BEST into law on Thursday.
BEST leverages income from the School Trust Lands, property the federal government granted to Colorado in 1876, for the benefit of our schoolchildren. The plan will direct as much as $1 billion toward school repair and, when needed, new construction. That’s enough to build as many as 100 new schools or to repair hundreds of others.
The first step will be a statewide assessment of the safety needs of our schools. A Public School Capital Construction Assistance Board — made up of experts in facility planning, engineering, architecture, technology, classroom instruction, and public finance — will then use the assessment to identify the schools in greatest need.
BEST puts a top priority on health and safety projects. The law also emphasizes “green building” and energy-efficiency standards.
The 21st century poses new challenges for Colorado’s students and their counterparts around the world. The demand to train and educate our workforce will gain increasing importance in a globally competitive economy.
But it’s difficult to prepare our children for a new century when our schools are stuck in the last one.
One last example illustrates the urgency of this endeavor:
Mesa County’s Gateway School was built in 1914. The building’s heating system is so inadequate that students have worn down the floorboards near the heater, where they huddle in the winter.
Students should be able to spend their time learning to read and write, not just trying to stay warm. Repairing and rebuilding our crumbling schools will allow teachers and students to do what they do best: teach and learn.
Andrew Romanoff (romanoff@coloradohouse.org) is a Denver Democrat and speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives.
