Barnett pushing for first GDOE maintenance budget in decades; 24 schools to open Thursday; Remainder to go back to school next Thursday


Chris Barnett

Chris Barnett wants senators to set aside at least $10 million every year for the Guam Department of Education to use exclusively for deferred and preventative maintenance of the schools. An elated and nearly-relieved Erik Swanson, the education superintendent, said he would prefer to use a bulk of that money to hire maintenance staff and move away from contractual maintenance work.

“That would be a huge help,” Mr. Swanson said. “Because historically we have had no maintenance budget. A better way to do that (provide for maintenance) is to have custodial staff on site who will have (a stake in) ownership of the school, because they can be doing maintenance all the time.”

The superintendent said that ideally the maintenance staff would work in shifts, with nighttime staff serving a campus security function as well.

“I remember back in the day, we had janitors in our schools,” Guam Education Board vice chairman Angel Sablan said at he and Swanson’s second day-in-a-row news conference on school readiness. Mr. Sablan said he agrees with Mr. Swanson, recalling a time when GDOE had far more maintenance staff.

The last time the legislature appropriated a multi-million dollar sum of revenue exclusively for GDOE maintenance was during the Gutierrez administration nearly three decades ago. Since then the schools aged considerably, with a 2011 report by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers revealing that by that time there was $100 million worth of deferred maintenance. According to a recent procurement for school repairs, that sum as of last year was more than $280 million; most of it the result of legislatures and governors failing thus far to provide GDOE with maintenance funding year after year.

Mr. Barnett will be moving an amendment in the Fiscal Year 2025 budget to appropriate $10 million from excess revenue projected for the current fiscal year to GDOE for maintenance. The legislature goes into session Wednesday to debate and potentially pass the FY 2025 budget by the August 31 statutory deadline.

It is unclear whether there remains $10 million in excess, unreserved revenue from the current fiscal year. Joe San Agustin, the budget chairman, has not replied to Kandit’s request for verification of the availability of funds.

The failure by several legislatures and four governors to provide this funding to GDOE, on top of the previous superintendent’s failure to use federal funds during the pandemic to start fixing schools sooner led to today’s crisis.

 

24 schools to open Thursday, August 15, 2024

Mr. Sablan confirmed that the Astumbo Middle School community is being informed today that the school passed public health inspection and will be open this Thursday. This is on top of the following 23 schools that already have their sanitary permits:

  • Adacao Elementary School
  • Agana Heights Elementary School
  • Astumbo Elementary School
  • B.P. Carbullido Elementary School
  • C.L. Taitano Elementary School
  • H.S Truman Elementary School
  • Inalahan Elementary School
  • LBJ Elementary School
  • Liguan Elementary School
  • M.A. Sablan Elementary School
  • Maria Ulloa Elementary School
  • Merizo Martyrs Elementary School
  • M.U. Lujan Elementary School
  • Talofofo Elementary School
  • Tamuning Elementary School
  • Wettengel Elementary School
  • Agueda Johnston Middle School
  • L.P. Untalan Middle School
  • Oceanview Middle School
  • JFK High School along with Simon Sanchez High School in a double session at JFKHS
  • Tiyan High School
  • J.P. Torres Success Academy

The students of the remaining 17 schools will be able to return to classes no later than Thursday, August 22, 2024. Depending on whether more schools pass public health inspection, the remaining students will return to school under one of two protocols:

  • Face-to-face instruction at a permitted campus they will share through an alternating-days schedule; or
  • Online learning.

The only schools that will be on a double session schedule will be JFKHS and SSHS at JFKHS, and Okkodo High and FBLG Middle at Okkodo High, according to the superintendent.

The full contingency plan, which will include two separate school calendars (one for the schools that will start August 15, and the other for the schools that will start August 22), where or how each school community without a permitted campus will return to school, and a bell schedule, will be discussed and approved by the education board at its emergency meeting Wednesday.

 

School repairs

Mr. Sablan said that the crisis has led to island leaders and businesses stepping up to help at several public schools. That includes a government-wide Adopt-a-School program led by the governor’s School Opening Readiness Team (SORT). According to the board vice chairman, the governor’s office was calling in every agency throughout today to confirm agency pair ups with schools. GDOE will provide the roster of the pair ups Wednesday morning.

According to Mr. Swanson, emergency procurement paperwork is awaiting signatures at the governor’s office. Those signatures will allow purchase orders for the purchase of materials and supplies needed by schools so that volunteers and contractors can make the repairs.

The list of materials and supplies for each school is based on what each school was best able to anticipate. Mr. Sablan ballparks the figure at around $1 million per school, though there are 43 schools and a budget of only $20 million for the materials and supplies. He said that some schools need far less than $1 million, and other schools need a little more than that ballpark amount.

Neither were able to answer how much in repairs were needed at each of the remaining 17 campuses awaiting inspection, though yesterday and today they emphasized that some campuses will not be ready for inspection for longer than a period of weeks.

 

You may watch the full news conference, which contains much more information than what is summarized here.


Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Advertisement