Governor signs historic billion dollar school bill

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COMMERCE CITY - All across Colorado, especially in smaller districts, school buildings sit in disrepair. Many of these communities are so small there's not a tax base big enough to replace old buildings. State leaders fought to change that.

"It's the most substantial commitment to rebuild and repair K-12 schools in the history of the state of Colorado and with no new taxes and impact on the general fund," said Governor Ritter during the ceremony to sign the BEST act – standing for Building Excellent Schools Today. He signed it at Monaco Elementary School in Commerce City.

Monaco Elementary was built in 1956. It was originally intended as a bomb shelter. Now, Principal Jennifer Ikenouye says it's a school that's been falling apart for years. This summer, the Adams 14 School District was able to pump in $2 million for some repairs. Ikenouye says the building needs to be replaced, but there's currently no money to do it.

"There are times that we feel our hands are tied in being able to educate these students and give the same opportunities and advancements that other students have," said Ikenouye.

Adams 14 Superintendent John Lange said the district had to ask voters to pass a tax levy for the first time in 40 years to fund repairs at Monaco and other major projects around the district including a new high school.

"We still have about another $150 million worth of facility needs here in the district," said Lange. "But, we have borrowed all the money we can to build these buildings."

The BEST act was created by House Speaker Andrew Romanoff, Senate President Peter Groff and State Treasurer Cary Kennedy with help from a non-partisan, grass roots organization called Great Education Colorado. The law will generate up to a billion dollars over the next six years to repair and build schools around the state.

The main focus will be to help smaller districts, especially rural ones. In these areas, many of the buildings are old, reaching upwards of 100 years. And, there's not a tax base for residents to support construction projects without help.

"We cannot ask local taxpayers to shoulder the burden alone to modernize our aging educational infrastructure," said Kennedy (D) State Treasurer.

Senator Groff says Colorado cannot use 20th century buildings to foster a 21st century school system.

"All of that doesn't matter if the school is falling down around the students' ears and the teachers aren't safe in these facilities," said Groff (D) Denver.

The money will come from land trusts given to Colorado more than 100 years ago by the federal government. These lands are used for farming, mining, oil extraction and other developments generating about $35 million each year. The state had been using the interest from that money to help pay for district operating budgets around Colorado.

The BEST act changes how the money will be used. Instead of taking the interest, the state will use the principal of $35 million each year and invest it. Over a six year period, the returns on those investments could generate the billion dollars which will be used for school construction.

"Enough to build a hundred new school buildings across the state and to repair many others," said Speaker Romanoff (D) Denver. "That's not enough."

Speaker Romanoff says the billion dollar investment would only fix about a third of the problem buildings around the state.

"Students should be able to focus their time on reading and writing and arithmetic, not on broken boilers or septic tanks," said Romanoff.

Ikenouye says at this point anything helps.

"It is a very long time coming," said Ikenouye.