School facilities funding: high performance schools.

Existing law, the Leroy F. Greene School Facilities Act of 1998 (the Greene Act) , requires the State Allocation Board to allocate to applicant school districts prescribed per-unhoused-pupil state funding for construction and modernization of school facilities, including hardship funding and supplemental funding for site development and acquisition and requires the board to adopt rules and regulations for the administration of the Greene Act. The Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Act of 2006 (2006 bond act) sets aside $100,000,000 of the proceeds of the bonds sold under that act for incentive grants under the Greene Act to promote the use of design and materials in new construction and modernization projects that include the attributes of high performance schools. Existing law authorizes a grant for new construction to be used for the costs of design and materials that promote the efficient use of energy and water, the maximum use of natural lighting and indoor air quality, the use of recycled materials and materials that emit a minimum of toxic substances, the use of acoustics conducive to teaching and learning, and other characteristics of high performance schools. A school district is required to certify, as part of its application for funding under the Greene Act, that it has considered the feasibility of using these characteristics of high performance schools. This bill would increase the amount of a modernization grant by $250,000 per schoolsite and the amount of a new construction grant by $150,000 per schoolsite if a school district incorporates the use of high performance design and materials, and if the project is able to achieve one of 2 specified objectives. This increase would be provided from the $100,000,000 set aside for this purpose in the 2006 bond act. The bill would require the State Allocation Board to adopt, and the Office of Administrative Law to process, emergency regulations to implement these provisions. This bill would declare that it is to take effect immediately as an urgency statute.