House Education panel hears testimony on bill to create statewide school facilities inventory

The Pennsylvania House Education Committee held an informational hearing in Philadelphia on proposed legislation—House Bill 1701—to create a statewide public school building inventory and condition-assessment program housed at the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE).

Representative Fiedler, the bill sponsor, said the legislation aims to document and prioritize repairs after repeated examples of aging, unsafe school facilities. “The current state of school facilities presents both a crisis of education and a public health crisis for us,” Representative Fiedler said, citing asbestos, lead, warped floors and other hazards that have forced school closures in her district.

Proponents told the committee that the commonwealth lacks uniform, accessible data on building condition and that the absence of such data hamstrings planning and state funding. Jessica Sites, director of the Bureau of Financial Operations at PDE, said the department has no statutory authority to require uniform statewide collection of building-debt and condition information and therefore cannot reliably quantify statewide need. “Over the last two budget cycles, dollars—$250,000,000—have been appropriated and distributed via the public school facilities improvement grant and environmental repair grant programs,” Sites said, adding that current statutory limits prevent mandatory, statewide assessments.

Stakeholders recommended a mix of policies and funding approaches. Tim Schromm, director of research for the Pennsylvania Association of School Business Officials (PASBO), urged predictable, multiyear funding and a sustainable state partnership. “Predictable funding is key,” Schromm said, arguing that districts can plan multi‑year capital work only when they know state and local revenue streams are stable.

Union and public‑health voices said data collection must be paired with funding to correct unsafe conditions. Lashona Coleman, chief of staff of the Philadelphia Federation of Teachers (PFT) Health and Welfare Fund, supported the bill “so long as [districts] receive resources from the state that enable them to comply,” warning that without recurring appropriations the requirement would become an unfunded mandate. Jerry Roseman, PFT’s acting director of environmental science, urged collection of actionable maintenance and indoor‑air data and said modest investments in maintenance and cleaning can yield large immediate benefits.

Private vendors and design professionals testified about available technical capacity and costs. Representatives of SiteLogic, a private facilities‑data vendor, said their cloud application already hosts condition data for roughly one‑fifth of Pennsylvania school districts and that commercial tools can collect, standardize and analyze data faster and less expensively than a paper process. Rick Evans and Garrett Lewis of SiteLogic warned that the draft bill’s itemized, highly granular data requests (for example, detailed system inventories for every room) would be costly if carried out by every district at the level written in the draft; they recommended PDE set high‑level data requirements and let vendors or districts supply more detailed, electronically structured data.

Architects and building professionals backed a statewide advisory structure. Jeremiah Woodring, a licensed architect and chair of AIA Pennsylvania’s Government Affairs Committee, endorsed a public school facility advisory committee to guide districts on safety, accessibility, sustainability and compliance with modern codes.

Committee members pressed witnesses on implementation details: who pays for assessments, how to avoid duplicative work, and how to protect security‑sensitive information (egress plans, door counts). Several witnesses recommended a tiered approach—high‑level, statewide data to prioritize funding and lower‑cost, locally performed assessments or vendor‑assisted, more detailed assessments as needed.

The panel did not take formal action on the bill at the hearing. Committee leaders repeatedly said they intend to continue work on the measure; committee staff and members signaled plans to consider the bill during upcoming committee meetings. Chairman Pete Schwier said the hearing’s purpose was to create momentum and gather input before the committee votes on a next step.

Why it matters: lawmakers and stakeholders said existing funding programs—cited examples include the now‑defunct PlanCon reimbursement program, Act 70 provisions enacted in 2019 and recent public school facilities improvement and environmental repair grants—have not produced a single, reliable statewide picture of building health. Witnesses said a uniform inventory and condition assessment would help prioritize limited state dollars, improve transparency for taxpayers and guide districts toward targeted, cost‑effective maintenance and capital investments.

Next steps: committee members asked PDE and stakeholders to provide implementation estimates, options for tiered assessment requirements and examples from other states (witnesses pointed to Minnesota’s approach and to tools developed by the National Center for School Infrastructure). Several witnesses offered to provide additional cost and timeline estimates to committee staff for incorporation into bill language. The hearing closed with no votes taken.