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A coalition of more than 100 organizations representing public school advocates, parents, teachers, and community members are calling on Gov. Phil Murphy and the state legislature to invest $500 million annually to fund New Jersey’s school construction program, starting with the upcoming budget.
Dozens of speakers gathered at a virtual town hall described the experiences of students and staff forced to learn and work in old and crumbling buildings to underscore what they say is an “urgent need” for more funding for school construction projects. A Newark Public Schools teacher said numerous students at Bard High School had to be displaced because classrooms were too cold while teachers from Jersey City and Paterson explained how schools in their districts were dealing with rodents and leaky roofs.
Healthy Schools Now, a coalition of 135 organizations across New Jersey, said it hosted the virtual town hall last week to highlight how years of inadequate funding for the New Jersey Schools Development Authority has left dozens of schools across the state in dire need of repair and replacement. The SDA is responsible for fully funding school construction projects in Newark and 30 other high-poverty districts in the state. It also provides grants and undertakes construction projects in regular operating districts under a cost-sharing arrangement.
Murphy will deliver his fiscal year 2026 budget address on Feb. 25 and the coalition hopes his final budget proposal will include an increase to school construction funding.
Over the last three fiscal years, New Jersey has allocated nearly $2 billion for school construction projects but those funds have already been committed to emergency projects, leaving no money for new projects, according to state Sen. Vin Gopal (D-Monmouth), who also chairs the Senate Education Committee.
“What happens outside the classroom impacts inside the classroom,” said Gopal during the town hall. “We have to make sure all of our school districts, especially our urban school districts, are up to date on everything related to HVAC, plumbing, and heating.”
There is an immediate need for an additional 8,000 seats to address overcrowding in schools across the state and more than 50 buildings need to be renovated or replaced due to age and condition just in the 31 high-poverty school districts, according to the SDA’s statewide strategic plan.
The state agency has estimated it will cost, at minimum, an additional $7 billion to address capital projects, such as school building renovations and upgrades, but that amount does not include urgently needed projects in regular operating districts. Last year’s state budget included only $50 million to fund capital maintenance projects across the state.
Some New Jersey students learn in cold classrooms, old schools
During last week’s virtual town hall, state Sen. Raj Mukherji (D-Hudson) said more funding is needed to identify and launch new school construction projects as the need to fix old schools continues to grow.
“It’s just unfair to the children who are going to be tomorrow’s leaders in our state to be educated in these types of environments and in outdated school buildings where the HVAC may not even be comfortable to learn in, let alone the state of disrepair to facilities,” Mukherji added.
Silvia Pereira, an executive vice president for the American Federation of Teachers New Jersey and an English as second language teacher at South Street School, said during the virtual meeting that a substantial investment is needed “to ensure a safe and healthy and modern learning environment for all students, their teachers, and their support staff.”
The state legislature provides funding to the SDA on a “pay-as-you-go basis” with no long-term funding to support school construction work in Newark and the 30 other high-poverty school districts.
At Bard High School, Pereira said, numerous students were relocated because classrooms had no heat and indoor temperatures were dropping to 57 degrees. The heat at Abington Avenue School is also inconsistent, Pereira said, often forcing staff and students to wear their jackets during class. Pereira also described how a teacher at Wilson Avenue School was forced to pump breast milk in her classroom bathroom with no locks on the door because there was no space available.
“While significant strides have been made in funding the school construction program, the ongoing needs in SDA districts necessitate continued and increased investment,” said Pereira during the virtual town hall.
Over the past three fiscal years, the SDA has provided roughly $18 million in funding to Newark Public Schools to address urgent repairs such as HVAC repairs or replacement, masonry, and roofing repairs, among other work. The district can direct the funds to facility improvement projects they deem most needed but ultimately, the SDA is the only one that can build new schools.
Superintendent Roger León estimated that it would take more than $2 billion to fully repair and update all of the district’s schools. Last summer, the SDA agreed to replace 13 of Newark’s oldest school buildings but the deal leaves out 20 schools that need replacement. The agency also committed to spending nearly $153 million to build a new University High School but the plan is in the early stages and needs more funding.
District officials have said that a construction bond referendum would allow them to pay for all their facilities' needs that can’t be funded through its yearly budget. But during January’s school board meeting, León said the district would not present Newark voters with a $1.2 billion bond question in April’s school board election after a poll of district stakeholders showed they would overwhelmingly vote against it, according to León last month. Instead, they would seek other options to fully repair schools but León has not shared what those options would be.
Since 2006, only eight new schools have been built in the district and one other property, which later became the Nelson Mandela Elementary School, was given to the district. Murphy’s budget address will be livestreamed on the governor’s Facebook, X, and YouTube pages.
Jessie Gómez is a reporter for Chalkbeat Newark, covering public education in the city. Contact Jessie at jgomez@chalkbeat.org.
