Repairs begin in aftermath of arson incidents

Repairs have begun in two of the bathrooms in which an arsonist set trash-can fires last month, but the bathrooms remain unusable. Administrators are also dealing with problems in Blair's emergency evacuation protocol that the arson incidents revealed.

MCPS hired two contractors, Purofirst and Insurance Repair Specialists, to restore the girls' bathrooms in the 250s and 350s hallways, according to Kenny Hoyle, manager of the Randolph Maintenance Depot of MCPS. Purofirst cleaned the smoke damage on Jan. 13 and 14, but Insurance Repair Specialists has not specified when it will begin its work, Hoyle said. The bathrooms will stay closed until they are fully repaired, said Business Manager James Funk.

The arsonist set fires in three bathrooms on Dec. 7 and 8, prompting two schoolwide evacuations.

Several factors have delayed the repair process, according to Hoyle. Although MCPS received notification of the damage a day after the arsons occurred, it waited to take charge of the repair job because of the transition between former Business Manager Laurie Checco, who was leaving Blair, and Funk, her replacement. In addition, Insurance Repair Specialists did not provide an initial cost estimate until Jan. 3, nearly four weeks after the arsons.

Insurance Repair Specialists, which will replace damaged ceiling tiles, lights, toilet paper dispensers and a melted partition between stalls, will charge $7,052 for one bathroom and $5,323 for the other, Hoyle said. Purofirst, which inspected the bathrooms on Dec. 20, charged $2,393. MCPS insurance will cover all the costs; Blair will not pay anything, Hoyle said.

Shortly after the arson incidents, building services workers Marianne Christopher and John Colandreo worked in the bathroom in the 250s hallway to remove water released by sprinklers and prevent leakage. They spent an hour mopping and vacuuming the water, which was at least an inch high, Christopher said.

Aside from burdening building services workers, the arson incidents revealed flaws in Blair's fire evacuation procedure. At the start of the first evacuation, the doors to the stadium were locked because building services workers on the day shift, who were responsible for opening the stadium, had left Blair shortly before the evacuation, said Principal Phillip Gainous.

Neither incoming building services workers on the night shift nor administrators had keys to the stadium gates. Security guard Jeff Seals eventually opened the stadium. Afterward, to remedy the problem, all administrators were given keys to the stadium.

Gainous said he was mainly concerned with the number of teachers who abandoned their duties during the first evacuation. Some teachers entered their cars in the staff parking lot instead of monitoring their homeroom students in the stadium, he explained. "That disappointed me most," he said. "The conditions were unbearable, I recognize that, but everybody's safety at that point is the most important."

An administrative team meeting on Dec. 12 discussed the issue of teachers leaving their designated areas, according to Assistant Principal Patricia Hurley. Because it is unclear which teachers left the stadium, they will face no consequences, Hurley said.

The first evacuation ran into further difficulty because it occurred at the end of the school day for most students - the "worst time of the day" for an evacuation, according to Assistant Principal Linda Wanner. Several buses had already arrived, and the students who boarded them or walked home instead of entering the stadium were unaccounted for. Still, Wanner noted, buses operate on a fixed schedule, and though students who stayed at Blair followed the rules, they could have missed their buses.

Assistant Principal James Short commended students and staff for keeping composure in the cold. "When you're in that kind of weather, people get uneasy, especially if they don't have proper clothing on," he said.

The arsonist was able to cause a second evacuation because she had not been identified on the day of the first evacuation, according to Wanner.

Gainous said Blair is treating the arsons as a learning experience that "showed us the chinks" in the evacuation plan.