Carson school faces decision because of mold

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http://www.nevadaappeal.com/

March 3, 2002

Carson school faces decision because of mold

By Pierczynski, Superintendent of schools

The mold issue that the Carson City School District is facing at the

Bordewich/Bray Elementary School is an issue that is surfacing around Nevada

with some state offices and classrooms in other school districts vacated

because of toxic mold.

Most of the modular classrooms at Bordewich/Bray continue to be occupied

because the recent indoor air quality tests show the air in those classrooms

has remained safe. However, four rooms in the modulars are no longer being

used following the remediation work completed during the Christmas break

because elevated spore counts resulted when retesting was done in those

areas. Those programs have been moved to other spaces on the campus.

Although school officials have been able to provide a temporary solution to

the problem, a permanent solution has to be decided upon by the school

district board of trustees.

The board has some options. The first decision reached at the Feb. 26 board

meeting was to vacate all the modulars at the end of the school year. There

was fear by board members that the mold, which is encapsulated within the

walls, could never be totally and permanently removed.

The issue remains how to replace the lost space. Two options are the most

obvious for the board to initially explore. The first is to replace the

modular classrooms with new portable classrooms. The up side of this

solution is that it is the least expensive and will cost the district

approximately $750,000 over a three- or four-year period of time.

Approximately $200,000 would have to be taken out of the district's $500,000

building maintenance budget each year for four years and the portables

phased in.

The down side to this solution is that it will reduce by 40 percent the

amount of money the district will have to spend on required maintenance of

the other nine campuses and 1,000,000 square feet of building space. It also

replaces " temporary " structures with other " temporary " structures which are

more expensive to maintain and operate ($2-$3/square foot) than permanent

buildings ($1.50-$1.75/square foot). Portable classrooms have a " life "

expectancy of about 25 years, depending on how they are utilized. After that

time, they need to be replaced.

The second option is to replace the modulars with a permanent bulding, which

would be an add-on to the current Bordewich building. The down side to this

solution is that it will cost approximately $3,750,000 to build and may

necessitate passage of a bond.

The district anticipates that bonds could be issued without raising its

current tax rate. Although this would not affect your tax bill now, it would

mean that as bonds are retired in the next few years, the portion of your

taxes that is going to the schools would remain the same and not be reduced

as quickly.

The up side of this solution is that the permanent building would be less

expensive to operate (heating and cooling); would enable the district to

resolve the disjointed campus issues at the school, thus providing a safer

environment for first- and second-graders; with relocation of Student

Support Services from Seeliger to Bray, this solution could open space on

the Seeliger campus, which is currently the largest elementary school in the

district and continuing to grow each year.

With either solution, the students are going to have to be temporarily

housed in various spaces, including some space rented by the district, until

the issue is resolved.

The school district would like to hear from the citizens of Carson City.

What would you like to see happen? Please call Pierczynski,

superintendent, or Mike , director of operations, at 283-2100 or fax

them at 283-2090. Their e-mail addresses are mpierczy@... or

mmitchell@....