So much to tackle, but so little headway.
That, in a nutshell, summarizes the difficult situation stymieing progress on public school facilities, due to conflicts between the bureaucratic state Department of Education (DOE) and the School Facilities Authority (SFA), an entity the state Legislature created in 2020 to try to cut through the slog. Instead of coordination and unfettered progress, blurry jurisdictions have enabled turf battles that are certainly not in the best interests of students and teachers. That must change.
To its credit, SFA seems to be trying to produce results, thanks to an infusion of funds in the past couple years for one of its missions: to produce public preschool classrooms. That effort has been greatly buoyed by political favor led by Lt. Gov. Sylvia Luke, who has staked out the “Ready Keiki” initiative as a priority project. So even as SFA was fending off attempts for its repeal in the 2024 Legislature — attempts that failed — the agency was able to add new preschool space for 849 children, on top of 213 seats the previous year. And next school year, with more funding, the eight-staffer SFA expects to add preschool space for another 497 keiki, toward the state’s laudable goal for universal preschool by 2032.
But ongoing clashes between SFA and DOE — mix in various legislators, too — hamper progress that should be made on new teacher housing projects and new school development. Just one example: SFA was tasked by the Legislature to build a new Central Maui elementary/middle school — a need backed by DOE data, SFA Executive Director Riki Fujitani noted — but funding has come in dribs and drabs; meanwhile, DOE has its own list for 16 new schools.
“There’s a big disconnect between what’s going on in the operations of DOE vs. SFA,” state Sen. Donovan Dela Cruz said to Fujitani in a January hearing, questioning who determines new school priorities. “Your board has no idea what’s going on with board business at DOE. That’s awkward. Some of that got to get cleaned up.”
“Awkward” is an understatement — but yes, this situation must get resolved. House Bill 329, now before the governor, seeks to refine SFA’s mission to mainly developing preschool and child care facilities, workforce housing and new school development assigned only by the Legislature, the governor or the Board of Education.
Today’s dysfunction could be foreseen five years ago when legislators, frustrated by DOE’s facilities backlog, created SFA as an autonomous agency to get around bureaucracy and oversee schools’ capital improvement projects. That frustration came to a head in 2023, when DOE said $465 million in unspent money allocated for school repairs would lapse.
Never clarified, though, was how to disentangle the overlap between SFA and the still-existent DOE facilities office, staffed by about 140 employees. Enter new silos.
Since its inception, SFA has been pushed and pulled — created to be nimble and do projects quicker than the DOE, but underfunded and understaffed, with too many masters to please but scant data resources of its own.
As for the worthwhile pursuit of affordable teacher housing: the Legislature in 2023 assigned seven such projects to SFA, but a $170 million allocation was cut to $5 million by the governor, amid Maui wildfire emergency needs.
Further, SFA has been unable to obtain other DOE sites for teacher housing despite identifying some 25 prospects and having the statutory power to acquire such land with the governor’s approval.
Fujitani, who formerly directed the DOE facilities office’s auxiliary service branch so knows whereof he speaks, called out the bureaucratic “inertia”; a DOE spokeswoman, meanwhile, cited the need for “careful consideration” and “due diligence” on the proffered sites.
The latest political winds seem to be favoring SFA and its assorted missions. HB 422 would repeal the School Impact Fee law and transfer to SFA the unencumbered $19.9 million collected. If so, the agency needs to have a clear field, and plan, to put the funds to good use.
There’s enough work here for everyone. Let SFA be that special-projects spear, cutting through red tape for preschools, teacher housing and targeted new schools. Improve coordination with DOE leadership, which certainly needs to produce its own successes. By making it a race to the top, everyone comes out ahead — the bureaucrats, yes, but most importantly, the students and teachers who will have better classrooms, facilities and affordable housing.
