• Donate
  • Subscribe to Newsletter
  • Home
  • About
    • Awards & Recognition
    • Our Mission
    • Our Board
    • Be Our Sponsor!
    • Donors & Supporters
    • Editorial Policy & Terms of Use
    • Comments Policy
    • Our Team
  • Contact
  • Topics
    • Aging
    • Children’s Health
    • Environmental Health
    • Gender health
    • Health Inequities
    • Medicaid
    • Mental Health
    • Oral Health
    • Prison Health
    • Public Health
    • State Health Policy
    • Rural Health
  • Series
    • Voices from the pandemic
    • COVID-19 updates: What’s happening in North Carolina?
    • When kids’ cries for help become crimes
    • Youth Climate Stories
    • Youth climate stories: Outer Banks edition
    • Seeking Help and Getting Handcuffed
    • Unequal Treatment: Mental health parity in North Carolina
    • Storm stories – NC Health News works with teens from SE North Carolina to tell their hurricane experiences
    • Lessons from Abroad: How Europeans have tackled opioid addiction and what the U.S. could learn from them.
  • Health Care Half Hour
  • Health Care Job Listings
  • Coronavirus
  • En Español
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • RSS
Skip to content
North Carolina Health News

North Carolina Health News

News. Policy. Trends. North Carolina.

Donate

Read our articles published in partnership with The Charlotte Ledger

Posted inChildren's Health

Headline: Republican Lawmakers Budget $35 Million for School Safety

Republican’s school safety plan makes some temporary changes, while giving lawmakers time to assess what else might be needed.
by Education NC June 5, 2018June 7, 2018

By Alex Granados

EducationNC

Republican lawmakers announced at a press conference last month $35 million in school safety grants that made their way into the revised 2018-19 budget.

The one-time money is meant to temporarily address school safety needs while the state gathers more information on what districts and schools require to protect students.

“A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step,” said Rep. David Lewis (R-Dunn). “I think this is an ongoing process.”

Image courtesy: NCGA Republicans

The school safety plan stems from work performed by a committee on school safety that came into existence following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida and met regularly prior to the short session.

Governor Roy Cooper has his own school safety plan in his budget proposal. It amounts to a total of $130 million, including $65 million for making buildings safer and $40 million for additional personnel. Legislative Democrats also floated a similar plan yesterday.

But Republican lawmakers say it is too soon to know exactly how much money is needed. Part of the ongoing process going forward will be getting reports from districts sent to the state Department of Public Instruction so that legislators can understand what schools require. Rep. Linda Johnson (R-Kannapolis) said additional recurring money needs to be added to the budget in the future.

“Because the issue came up at the time that it came up, and the amount of effort that had to go into it, this is not the end, this is just the beginning,” she said.

The Republicans’ plan also includes between $30 and $90 million in new federal funding for student health, but that will not come until the second year because North Carolina needs a Medicaid State Plan Amendment before it can start collecting the funds. Essentially, the money will come from reimbursements from Medicaid for services the state is already providing.

Sen. Jerry Tillman (R-Archdale) said lawmakers must act so that parents do not have to worry when their kids leave for school every day.

“I walked the halls of schools for about 40 years…and my prayer every day was ‘give us a good, safe day for these kids.’”

[sponsor]

In an e-mailed statement, Cooper criticized the Republicans’ plan.

“Legislative Republicans’ misguided priorities are perfectly captured by their plan to fund tax giveaways for the wealthy and corporations while shortchanging youth mental health and school safety,” he said. “These programs are important and the legislature’s investment is simply not enough to protect our students.”

Along with the money for school safety, Republicans also filed several bills this session that deal with policy changes to address school safety.

H.B. 933 Reciprocity/School Psychologist Licensure
H.B. 934 Threat Assessment Teams/Peer to Peer Counsels
H.B. 937 SROs Defined/Training Standards
H.B. 938 Expand Use/School Risk Management Plans
H.B. 939 School Building Vulnerability Assessments
H.B. 940 SRO Report by LBEs to Center for Safer Schools

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.

Close window X

Republish this article

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

You are free to use NC Health News content under the following conditions:
  • You can copy and paste this html tracking code into articles of ours that you use, this little snippet of code allows us to track how many people read our story.
  • Please do not reprint our stories without our bylines, and please include a live link to NC Health News under the byline, like this:By Jane DoeNorth Carolina Health News
  • Finally, at the bottom of the story (whether web or print), please include the text:North Carolina Health News is an independent, non-partisan, not-for-profit, statewide news organization dedicated to covering all things health care in North Carolina. Visit NCHN at northcarolinahealthnews.org. (on the web, this can be hyperlinked)

Headline: Republican Lawmakers Budget $35 Million for School Safety

by Education NC, North Carolina Health News
June 5, 2018

1
Tagged: Education NC, Gov. Roy Cooper, NC Department of Public Instruction, Rep. David Lewis, school counselors, school nurses, school safety, school social workers

Education NC

This story was reported by EducationNC, (www.ednc.org) a North Carolina-based nonprofit news source focusing on the state's educational system. More by Education NC

Post navigation

Previous Rural Broadband Highlighted in the State Budget
Next Across NC, Professionals Treat Hoarding as a Distinct, Potentially Deadly Disorder

Subscribe to our Newsletter

This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

Latest News

Health providers sometimes ignore mental health patients’ documented wishes during treatment

Health providers sometimes ignore mental health patients’ documented wishes during treatment

February 7, 2023February 6, 2023
Providers say legislature’s proposed ‘transgender’ bills will hurt LBGTQ youth, disrupt care

Providers say legislature’s proposed ‘transgender’ bills will hurt LBGTQ youth, disrupt care

February 6, 2023February 6, 2023
As pandemic-era Medicaid provisions lapse, millions approach a coverage cliff

As pandemic-era Medicaid provisions lapse, millions approach a coverage cliff

February 3, 2023February 3, 2023

Republish our stories for free!

Republish our articles for free, online or in print, under a Creative Commons license.

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • RSS
© 2023 News. Policy. Trends. North Carolina.. Proudly powered by Newspack by Automattic