House passes education finance bill with anonymous threat reporting, school mental-health grants and modest safety funding

The Minnesota House on May 16 approved House File 24-33, an education finance package that includes layered school safety measures and modest competitive funding for districts.

Key components described on the floor include $4 million in grant funding to help school districts, charter schools, cooperatives and tribal and nonpublic schools implement anonymous threat reporting systems; $1 million to the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension to staff threat-analysis capacity; $12.5 million in school-linked behavioral health funds (allocated in the health bill), $3.8 million for mobile crisis grants, and $10 million in competitive compensatory aid intended to help districts facing immediate budget pressures.

Representative Rayner Hour, who presented the section, said anonymous reporting systems are evidence-based and support early intervention. "This bill includes $4 million in grant funding and 1 million in staffing for the BCA so that we have the expert staff necessary to receive them, analyze these threats," Rayner Hour said, adding that research from Sandy Hook Promise supports early-warning systems.

Several members praised the multi-layered approach and emphasized that funds apply to all schools, including nonpublic and tribal schools. At the same time, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle criticized the overall scale of school safety funding compared with the security funding directed at the State Capitol elsewhere in the package. Representative Lawrence and others said the state could have done more and pointed to a separate proposal for $100 million in school safety that did not pass.

Floor debate also covered compensatory aid shortfalls facing districts, linked to changes in direct certification and universal school meals; the bill's authors said the $10 million competitive aid is a short-term relief measure ahead of broader task-force recommendations.

The House passed the bill by a roll-call vote of 129 yeas and 31 nays.

Outlook: Sponsors said the grants and programs will be implemented through the School Safety Center at the Department of Public Safety and that progress will be monitored; critics urged larger, longer-term investments in school safety and mental health.