School District Receives Increase in Safety Grant Money

Manchester's school district has been awarded a $26,000 safety grant for the upcoming school year, an increase of about $18,000 from this year's offering.

The district will receive the funds from the New Jersey School Board Association Insurance Group, said district business administrator Craig Lorentzen at the Manchester regular March meeting on Wednesday. The money must be used to purchase safety equipment for the 2012-13 school year. 

Lorentzen said that the district has received this grant for the last two years at about $8,200 each time.

"With that funding we installed cameras on our buses," he said. All 54-passenger buses will have cameras by the end of this year, Lorentzen said at last month. Smaller buses will be "gradually" outfitted in the next 2 to 3 years, he said.

Though some of the grant money may be used for additional bus cameras, the increase in grant money means that administrators will consider other safety improvements. 

"With this grant being much more money, we're going to be looking at other safety needs in the district and we'll try to find other areas to apply these funds," Lorentzen said. 

Lorentzen said that one possible use for the funding may be security cameras in the schools. 

"We have a bit of time between now and April 15 — when the application is due — to figure out how we want to allocate this funding," Lorentzen said. "But it will be for safety purposes."