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COLUMBUS -- Area schools continue to get safer as Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine awarded more than $42 million to support physical safety and security upgrades at hundreds of Ohio schools on Tuesday. Thirty-three of those schools are in Columbiana County.
A total of 624 schools will receive funding as part of the fifth round of Ohio's K-12 School Safety Grant Program. This new round of funding brings the total number of schools served by this program to 2,789 and the total amount of funding awarded to more than $215 million.
East Liverpool, Lisbon Exempted Village and Salem City Schools received $1,245,482 as part of the fifth round. East Liverpool High School, Junior High, Westgate Middle School, LaCroft and Elementary Schools and the preschool at Westgate each received $100,000. Lisbon was awarded $145,882 - the senior/junior high received 91,619 while McKinley Middle received $53,863. Salem was awarded $500,000. Buckeye, Reilly, and Southeast Elementary Schools received $100,000 apiece, as did the high school and junior high.
"Our educators care deeply about the safety of Ohio students, as evidenced by the thousands of schools that came forward with solid security improvement plans that they intend to carry out with this funding," said DeWine. "There is nothing more important than the safety of our kids, and with today's announcement, every qualifying school that applied for a grant has now received at least one award, including schools in all 88 counties."
All together Columbiana County received $2,607,982 from the grant program. Wellsville Local Schools received $200,000 in the first round. Second-round grants were awarded to Columbiana Exempted Schools ($150,000), Crestview Local Schools ($126,223) and the Columbiana County Educational Service Center ($40,246). Third-round grants were awarded to East Palestine City Schools ($176,069), Southern Local Schools ($200,000) and the Utica Shale Academy ($98,830). Crestview was also awarded $173,775 in the third round.
DeWine partnered with the Ohio General Assembly to launch the K-12 School Safety Grant Program in 2021. The program was created to help schools pay for physical security expenses such as new security cameras, public address systems, automatic door locks, visitor badging systems, and exterior lighting.
The Ohio Facilities Construction Commission administered the program in partnership with the Ohio School Safety Center. The program was funded through Ohio's operating budget and with allocations from the American Rescue Plan Act.