GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF NORTH CAROLINA
1993 SESSION
CHAPTER 416
The General Assembly of North Carolina enacts:
Section 1. G.S. 115C-521 reads as rewritten:
"§ 115C-521. Erection of school buildings.
(a) It shall be the duty of local boards of education to provide classroom facilities adequate to meet the requirements of G.S. 115C-47(10) and 115C-301. Local boards of education shall submit their long-range plans for meeting school facility needs to the State Board of Education by January 1, 1988, and every five years thereafter. In developing these plans, local boards of education shall consider the costs and feasibility of renovating old school buildings instead of replacing them.
(b) It shall be the duty
of the boards of education of the several local school administrative school
units of the State to make provisions for the public school term by providing
adequate school buildings equipped with suitable school furniture and
apparatus. The needs and the cost of such those buildings,
equipment, and apparatus, shall be presented each year when the school budget
is submitted to the respective tax-levying authorities. The boards of
commissioners shall be given a reasonable time to provide the funds which they,
upon investigation, shall find to be necessary for providing their respective
units with buildings suitably equipped, and it shall be the duty of the several
boards of county commissioners to provide funds for the same.
Upon determination by a local board of education that the
existing permanent school building does not have sufficient classrooms to house
the pupil enrollment anticipated for such the school, then
such the local board of education is authorized to may acquire
and utilize use as temporary classrooms for the operation of such
the school, relocatable or mobile classroom units, whether built on
the lot or not, which units and method of use shall meet the approval of the
School Planning Division of the State Board of Education, and which units shall
comply with all applicable requirements of the North Carolina State Building
Code and of the local building and electrical codes applicable to the area in
which such the school is located. These units shall also be
anchored in a manner required to assure their structural safety in severe
weather. The acquisition and installation of such these units
shall be subject in all respects to the provisions of Chapter 143 of the
General Statutes. The provisions of Chapter 87, Article 1, of the General
Statutes, shall not apply to persons, firms or corporations engaged in the sale
or furnishing to local boards of education and the delivery and installation
upon school sites of classroom trailers as a single building unit or of
relocatable or mobile classrooms delivered in less than four units or sections.
(c) The building of all
new schoolhouses school buildings and the repairing of all old schoolhouses
school buildings shall be under the control and direction of, and by
contract with, the board of education in for which such the
building and repairing is done. If a board of education is
considering building a new school building to replace an existing school
building, the board shall not invest any construction money in the new building
unless it submits to the State Superintendent an analysis that compares the
costs and feasibility of building the new building and of renovating the
existing building and that clearly indicates the desirability of building the
new building. Boards of education shall also not invest any
money in any new building that is not built in accordance with plans approved
by the State Superintendent to structural and functional soundness, safety and
sanitation, nor contract for more money than is made available for its
erection. However, this subsection shall not be construed so as to
prevent boards of education from investing any money in buildings that are
being constructed pursuant to a continuing contract of construction as provided
for in G.S. 115C-441 (c1). All contracts for buildings shall be in writing and
all buildings shall be inspected, received, and approved by the local
superintendent and the architect before full payment is made therefor:
Provided, that this subsection shall not prohibit boards of education from
repairing and altering buildings with the help of janitors and other regular
employees of said the board.
In the design and construction of new school facilities and in the repair and renovation of existing school facilities, the local board of education shall consider the placement of windows to use the climate of North Carolina for both light and ventilation in case of power shortages. A local board shall also consider the installation of solar energy systems in the school facilities whenever practicable.
In the case of any school buildings erected, repaired, or
equipped with any money loaned or granted by the State to any local school
administrative unit, the State Board of Education, under such any rules
as it may deem advisable, may retain any amount not to exceed fifteen percent
(15%) of said the loan or grant, until such the completed
buildings, erected or repaired, in whole or in part, from such the loan
or grant funds, shall have been approved by a designated agent of the State
Board of Education.
Upon such Education. Upon approval by the State
Board of Education, the State Treasurer is authorized to may pay
the balance of the loan or grant to the treasurer of the local school
administrative unit for which said the loan or grant was made.
(d) Local boards of
education shall make no contract for the erection or repair of any school
building unless the site upon which it is located is owned in fee simple by the
said board: Provided, that the board of education of a local
school administrative unit, with the approval of the board of county commissioners
is authorized to commissioners, may appropriate funds to aid in the
establishment of a school facility and the operation thereof in an adjoining
local school administrative unit when a written agreement between the boards of
education of the administrative units involved has been reached and the same
recorded in the minutes of said the boards, whereby children from
the administrative unit making such the appropriations shall be
entitled to attend the school so established.
In all cases where title to property has been vested in the
trustees of a special charter district which has been abolished and has not
been reorganized, title to such the property shall be vested in
the local board of education of the county embracing such the former
special charter district."
Sec. 2. This act becomes effective July 1, 1993, and applies to all plans for meeting school facility needs developed after July 1, 1993, and all plans for building school buildings submitted to the State Superintendent of Public Instruction after July 1, 1993.
In the General Assembly read three times and ratified this the 20th day of July, 1993.
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Dennis A. Wicker
President of the Senate
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Daniel Blue, Jr.
Speaker of the House of Representatives