AI Frontier Institute

School safety video analytics grant program establishment and appropriation

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S.F. No. 4906 has not been enacted. It was introduced March 26, 2026 and referred to the Senate Education Finance committee. If enacted, it would add Minnesota Statutes section 123B.573, which sets up a voluntary School Safety Video Analytics Grant Program run by the commissioner. The grants would help school districts, charter schools, and nonpublic schools put video analytics software on their existing camera systems (subd. 1). Grant money could pay for buying, licensing, setting up, training on, and maintaining software for early threat detection, monitoring of unauthorized access or restricted areas, real-time alerts to school officials and first responders, and reducing manual monitoring. It could not pay for new cameras, except where needed to integrate with existing systems (subd. 2). Participation would be voluntary, and schools would keep local control over how the software is set up and used (subd. 3). Privacy safeguards (subd. 4): schools must follow state and federal data privacy laws, including chapter 13 and FERPA. Systems must use privacy-protective features such as facial image masking by default. Any facial recognition must be limited to narrowly defined, high-risk watch lists under written local policy. Data could be used only for school safety and operations, not general surveillance or unrelated student discipline. In awarding grants (subd. 5), the commissioner must give priority to applicants that use existing cameras, show a documented safety need, have staff training and incident response plans, and evaluate outcomes, including how well AI-based video analytics work. The commissioner must award at least three grants each to public and nonpublic schools inside the seven-county metro area, and at least three each outside it. The commissioner must report annually starting January 15, 2027, to the legislative committees with jurisdiction over K-12 education finance and policy (subd. 6). The program would take effect July 1, 2026. Section 2 appropriates general fund money to the Department of Education for the grants, with the dollar amounts left blank. It provides for proration if applications exceed funds and for a grant administration set-aside.

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