AN ACT to establish the public school disaster preparedness fund.

The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:

SECTION 1.  Chapter 115C of the General Statutes is amended by adding a new Article to read:

Article 38D.

Public School Disaster Preparedness.

§ 115C‑546.50.  Fund created; administration.

(a)        There is created the Public School Disaster Preparedness Fund. The Fund shall be administered by the Department of Public Instruction and shall be used to provide funds to schools in areas at high risk of experiencing natural disasters to improve or replace existing school structures in an effort to mitigate the damage to those structures from future weather events.

(b)        This Fund shall be a nonreverting special revenue fund consisting of any monies appropriated to it by the General Assembly.

§ 115C‑546.51.  Fund disbursements; allowable uses.

(a)        The State Board of Education shall adopt rules to determine the disbursement of the Public School Disaster Preparedness Fund. At a minimum, the rules shall include:

(1)        The system that will be relied upon to determine the level of risk in an area.

(2)        A template for local school administrative units to use to develop disaster preparedness plans. As used in this section, a disaster preparedness plan is the plan in which a local school administrative unit identifies the structures that will be improved or replaced, the risk posed to those structures, and the plan to improve or replace the structure.

(3)        The standard of increased preparedness schools are intended to achieve with disaster preparedness funds.

(4)        The system by which the State Board of Education will evaluate a school's disaster preparedness plan.

(b)        The Department of Public Instruction shall develop and publish an application through which local school administrative units may apply to receive a distribution from the Public School Disaster Preparedness Fund. At a minimum, the application shall require local school administrative units to provide a copy of the disaster preparedness plan and an estimate of the cost of the plan.

(c)        The Department shall accept applications on a rolling basis. Once received, the application shall be evaluated by the School Planning Section and the School Planning Section shall present the application with a recommendation on whether the application meets the goals set by the State Board of Education. The State Board of Education shall then vote to approve or reject the application at the next regularly scheduled meeting of the State Board of Education. If the application is approved by unanimous vote of the State Board of Education, then the Department shall disburse the amount of funding approved by the State Board of Education to the approved local school administrative unit.

§ 115C‑546.52.  Reporting requirements.

(a)        No later than December 15 of each year that a local school administrative unit is in receipt of a disbursement from the Public School Disaster Preparedness Fund, the local school administrative unit shall provide the Department of Public Instruction a report on any funds that have been expended or committed, the remaining balance of funds available, and a detailed report of the progress made toward completing the disaster preparedness plan.

(b)        No later than February 15 of each year, the Department of Public Instruction shall report to the Joint Legislative Education Oversight Committee on any disbursements made from the Fund, including the local school administrative unit that received the funds and the amount received, a copy of any disaster preparedness plans currently being funded, a progress report on any disaster preparedness plans being carried out, and an overview of completed disaster preparedness plans.

SECTION 2.  There is appropriated from the General Fund to the Department of Public Instruction the sum of twenty‑five million dollars ($25,000,000) in nonrecurring funds for the 2025‑2026 fiscal year to establish and administer the Public School Disaster Preparedness Fund under Article 38D of Chapter 115C of the General Statutes, as enacted by this act.

SECTION 3.  This act becomes effective July 1, 2025.