After weeks of not getting answers to questions about the June 7 fire at New Rochelle High School, I compiled them into one set of questions and sent them to the entire board last week so they could respond to my questions at the meeting.
I then read from prepared remarks, printed below as written beforehand. I strayed a bit from the text in the actual speech, the video will be published here once available.
Schools Superintendent Richard Organisciak responded to my request for information on the fire at New Rochelle High School on June 7th by stating that there had been some internal meetings to review what took place and come up with a set of “lessons learned”.
After giving a brief set of remarks on the need for greater transparency and openness by the board, newly sworn in Board President David Lacher responded by characterizing my request for information about the fire as a “formal interrogatory “. He said there were 16 questions, that they were multipart questions and of the kind asked in a lawsuit and therefore the board would not respond to the questions I asked.
Here is my speech and the questions:
Ever since Sandy Hook, there have been many assurances given by administrators and board members about school safety.
Since then we have had serious safety incidents involving school intruders and fires.
In January two wheel-chair bound students were not evacuated during a fire incident. That incident involved smoldering electrical cables in an electrical vault in the ground, in front of the main entrance on Clove Road.
The U.S. Department of Justice initiated an inquiry; that inquiry has since been expanded to cover all students who were mobility impaired, permanently or temporarily, for this current school year and the 2011-12 school year.
At that point, the administration and board was aware that there were electrical problems in this area, that the emergency plan for the school was not in compliance with the SAVE Law and that whatever plans did exist had not been tested through evacuation drills.
On June 7th, there was another fire at the same location, in an adjacent electrical vault in front of the high school.
The fire department found CO levels in the school as high as 1,500 parts-per-million, far beyond acceptable levels.
Despite a fully engaged electrical fire, at about 11 am students were brought back into the building, including the Whitney Auditorium, a location not far from the fire.
There is a planned location for evacuations and sheltering, off school grounds but this plan was not activated.
A few minutes later there was an explosion in the vault which sent a massive jet of flame — about 30 feet high — through the manhole opening. I was standing 50 feet at the time and I can tell you it was frightening.
Con Edison said the fire was the result of the failure of the district’s electrical equipment.The Fire Department said the explosion destroyed the feeder cables that supply power to the school. There has been no information as to the cause of the explosion.
My son and his friends were in the Whitney Auditorium. They told me that the entire auditorium was plunged into complete darkness. No emergency lights came on. The students self-evacuated using the lights on their smartphones.
Within 4 minutes of the explosion dozens of students were allowed to walk down Clove Road through heavy smoke, into the middle of an active fire scene, within 10-15 feet of the open manhole, as smoke poured out.
Members of the board and administration have each said a great deal about what they are going to do regarding school safety but the recent fire incident once again demonstrates that your words do not match your deeds.
Once again, we are not given a prompt, meaningful, and accurate account of a serious safety incident.
Once again we get lip-service to safety and meaningless, self-serving platitudes intended to provide false assurances to those placed in danger due to the incompetence of those charged by the State of New York with providing for safety and security in our schools.
I am not aware of any public discussion by the board of the fire event of June 7, 2013 or the issuance of any sort of statement or report.
There is no law that prohibits board members from publicly disclosing discussions that occur in executive session that are not confidential by statute and certainly none that prohibit board members from stating the topics discussed on the same basis. In fact, the law requires that the board cite the exception under the Open Meeting Law as to why a topic will be discussed in executive session and further requires that the board then only confine themselves to discussing items covered under the exception.
The only executive session meeting the board has had since the June 7 fire was Tuesday June 25. The stated purpose was “the employment history of a particular individual” – in this case, a legal euphemism for the board interviewing job candidates. So, it is safe to say that the board could not legally discuss the June 7 fire incident in that executive session.
From this I take it that the board has not discussed the June 7 fire incident in public or executive session and there has been no public accounting for what took place at New Rochelle High School that day.
Therefore, I have several questions which I emailed to the board and administration on Friday in the hope that, based on your stated policy, board members or administrators could answer tonight so that the public might better understand the events of June 7. If any of these questions require further investigation before responding, I would ask that the board indicate which questions require further investigation and when I can expect to have an answer, in writing, per your policy. If the district intends to invoke some claim of confidentiality or an exception under the Open Meeting Law in responding to a particular question I would like a citation of the specific statute or exception pertaining to a particular question. I would then like to revisit this issue at the next board meeting.
1. Con Edison has stated that the cause of the June 7 fire incident was faulty electrical equipment owned by the school district, does the district dispute Con Ed’s statement?
2. If the district is not disputing that the district’s equipment failed, given the similar electrical issues in January, was the electrical vault that caught fire in June inspected after the January incident?
3. What is the district spending each day, on average, to have an electrical generator installed at NRHS, including the costs related to installing and maintaining the equipment, fuel to run the generator and any related costs?
4. What is your current estimate of when you will no longer need the generator?
5. What electrical equipment, if any, is designated to be kept off or used on a limited basis to reduce demand on the generator?
6. Has the district been informed or otherwise determined the specific cause of the explosion at the high school on June 7?
7. In the past 5 years, there have been no major fire incidents at any schools in the district except New Rochelle High School where there have been 4, this at a school that many years ago burned to the ground. The four fires have a common element. There were two incidents of lightening strikes on improperly ground lightening rods that caused major structural damage. There were two incidents of electrical feeder cables in electrical vaults. Beyond the annual fire inspection, have any additional steps been taken to evaluate the electrical system in the building, to evaluate personnel or contractors responsible for performing electrical work in the building or anything else?
8. New Rochelle Fire Chief Lou DiMeglio told reporters on scene that the fire department was notified of smoke coming from the manhole by a phone call from a civilian. Upon arriving, the Fire Department took CO readings of 1,500 ppm, the maximum safe level is 70 ppm. Does the building have CO detectors and, if so, why did they not trigger an alarm to the fire department?
9. Students were evacuated around 10 am then around 11 am were brought back into the building with an active fire scene, on what basis was this decision made, who made it and why?
10. About 15 minutes later, there was an explosion and a massive jet of fire shot up through the manhole above the electrical vault. Knowing this now, is the decision to bring the students back into the building being re-evaluated?
11. The building level emergency safety plan contains an off-site evacuation/sheltering plan. Why was this plan not activated on June 7? Given the explosion that took place shortly after bringing students back into the building, should the evacuation/sheltering plan been activated?
12. Given the legal requirement to hold evacuation/sheltering drills, was the failure to activate the plan a missed opportunity to test and evaluate your plan?
13. Why was there no emergency lighting in the Whitney auditorium after the explosion and loss of power to the building?
14. Four minutes after the explosion, about 2 dozens students were able to walk through an active fire scene to within 10-15 feet of the electrical vault and open manhole. Do you consider this to be a concern? How did this happen? What changed are you considering to address this issue?
15. Has the board request or has the administration provided any sort of after-action report including “lessons learned” and “proposed changes” to the safety plan?
16. In the context of the Department of Justice Inquiry into potential ADA violations in New Rochelle schools, how many students were identified as mobility impaired, permanently or temporarily, during the 2011-12 and 2012-13?