District Gets Grant Money For Two Projects

The Paramus school district will receive $400,000 in state grant money for a pair of construction projects at .

The New Jersey Schools Development Authority executed two grants totaling $398,654 for upgrades to the roof and construction of a new special education classroom at the high school, as well as the installation of solar panels.

The grants pay for 40% of the estimated $996,636 projects.

The work on the roof, solar panels and classroom has been completed, Steven Cea, business administrator, said. The school still has to receive approval from PSE&G to hook up the solar panels, but they are functional, Cea said.

The panels themselves, which cost about $900,000 by themselves, weren't part of the grant, but the electric work involved in installing them was.

The Life Skills classroom is part of a district effort to educate special needs children in local schools rather than busing them to out-of-district placements. The classroom, at $125,000, came in under the $200,000 budgeted for the project.

All the projects were paid for through the district's capital reserve account, a special fund available for capital projects.

While the state only announced the grants this month, the district learned it was eligible for the grants about a year and a half ago, when it budgeted for the projects. 

"There's a lot of lead time that's necessary in order to make these projects go forward," Cea said.