JOPLIN, Mo. — Nearly a million dollars has been given to the Joplin school district following the May 22 tornado — everything from large grants of $250,000 provided by business leaders to $360 collected from Zevin George, 9, of Nevada, who held a car wash recently.

Although the Joplin schools destroyed or damaged in the tornado were fully insured, and the district has $13 million in reserves, school officials said there are many gaps the donations will plug, and plenty of unknowns a month after the storm.

Joplin School Superintendent C.J. Huff and Board President Ashley Micklethwaite recently outlined how all of it could work together as the district rebuilds.

Insurance

Huff has said losses from the May 22 tornado will total an estimated $151 million. The district’s insurance carrier, Travelers Insurance, has so far determined that Joplin High School, Irving Elementary School and Franklin Technology Center are total losses. As of Friday, the insurance company was continuing to investigate Emerson Elementary School, East Middle School and the old South Middle School to determine if they can be repaired or will need to be replaced.

Cecil Floyd Elementary School and the Roi S. Wood Administration Building sustained major damage, while Kelsey Norman and Duquesne elementary schools had minor damage.

Paul Barr, the district’s chief financial officer, said school officials hope the insurance coverage pays all of the $151 million in damages.

“There are still some open issues” with the insurance company, Barr said last week, but noted that the company has been cooperative.

Barr said even if East Middle School is not a total loss, repairing the building could approach the $17 million cost of initial construction.

Huff said the district has “blanket” coverage with a total $5,000 deductible, and that insurance money already has been coming in as the district arranges temporary classrooms.

Ashley Maagero, a spokeswoman for Travelers Insurance, didn’t return calls.

Micklethwaite pointed out that while much of the school’s property is covered, personal property is not. Band instruments that the district owned, for example, are covered; band instruments owned by students are not, even if they were in the schools at the time of the storm.

That is one example of the gap donations may fill.

Donations

One of the fundraisers for the district, a two-day rummage sale Friday and Saturday by the Webb City Cardinal Pride Band, raised money to replace instruments band members lost.

Personal possessions of teachers, including their own reading libraries and other materials, also are not covered by district insurance, Micklethwaite said.

Large donations are going to the Joplin R-8 Foundation; smaller donations — the dollar bills sent in by students elsewhere and the bags of loose change, for example — will go into a district fund. Both will be audited by the district’s auditors, both will be used only for tornado relief and only for their designated purposes, and neither will be mingled with district operating funds, Micklethwaite said.

Huff said another gap will be the district’s buildings going forward.

Although insured, the insurance company is responsible to pay to rebuild the buildings as they were. But the district isn’t going to do just that; rather it will try to make improvements. Huff used Joplin High School with its narrow hallways and general lack of space as an example.

“We’re not going to rebuild that building back as it was,” Huff said. “They will pay us based on that, but we’re going to build a 21st century high school and it’s going to look different. I think if we were to rebuild that building back just like it was, I think that’s a step backward.”

Storm shelters

The district also plans to put in Federal Emergency Management Agency-approved storm shelters in every school, but only part of that cost will be covered by the federal agency.

Huff said FEMA would pay for 75 percent of shelter costs, while 25 percent must be covered by the school district.

Huff said some of the donations may go toward that match, but the district also is tracking the hours of volunteers because in-kind contributions also can be counted.

He said costs associated with retrofitting space for temporary school locations at Northpark Mall and elsewhere can be reimbursed by FEMA.

“We’re trying to be very frugal and creative in how we address that 25 percent, but I don’t see how there’s going to be any way possible we won’t be hit a little bit with that,” he said.

He also said he continues to hope for some state assistance with the local match.

Huff said some donors have wanted the money to go toward a specific program or item — the band, for example, or libraries — but most have donated money without designating how it should be spent.

“What we’re doing is being very diligent, because I think it’s important that we honor the requests of our donors with regard to how they want their funds spent,” Huff said.

People needs

Micklethwaite said some of the donations also may be used to help students and staff who suffered in the storm and have gaps of their own as they try to get back on their feet. The district is conducting a survey and doing, she said, “due diligence” to determine what the needs are.

“We want to know how many have insurance,” she said.

Many of the students, she said, were from families with limited incomes, and she added that more than half the students in the district are eligible for free- and reduced-price lunches.

“These were challenged prior to 5/22. Now those challenges have just exploded.”

The district has started an Adopt-a-Classroom program and will announce soon an Adopt-an-Eagle initiative, to connect tornado victims with willing donors.

Reserves

The district also has $13 million in reserves, but Micklethwaite said it will have to be prudent about that. It’s important that the district keep something in reserve, she said, for future emergencies, especially if it is unsure about its funding base after the storm.

She said state and federal legislators are working on bills that could help Joplin make up any losses, but it’s too soon to know how that will play out.

“There’s a very strong possibility our operating expenditures are going up,” Huff said. “Potentially our revenue is going down because of the loss of assessed valuation, possibly a loss in student enrollment that drives our state funding formula. So we are going to need some of those funds, without question, to help offset some of the costs associated with this disaster.”

Other donations may be used to establish activities and programs, including after-school programs for the district’s pupils when the school year begins.

“We’ve got 7,747 kids I believe are the walking wounded,” Huff said.

Huff said he envisions an improved future for Joplin schools, students and residents as the district rebuilds.

“We want Joplin schools and this whole community to rebound from this thing and be better than we were before. I think we owe that to the legacy of the lives that were lost in the storm. We owe it to the folks and the volunteers who helped us get back on our feet to show them what we can do and that nothing’s going to hold us back.”