District seeks to calm parents' concern about roof safety

A School District administrator said yesterday that several parents called or visited the district office yesterday with concerns about the safety of school buildings, especially after Superintendent Bob Champlin asked the School Board on Tuesday to hire a crew of workers to clear snow from the most concerning areas of the roofs of the district's five schools.

Ed Emond, business administrator for the district, said the parents are acting out of concern for their children's safety, and he wants them to know that the district has the utmost confidence in the safety of the roofs over their child's head. "There is no concern that we have students in the building," he said. "We're doing preventative stuff now, not because they [the roofs] are overloaded, but because we don't want them to get overloaded."

At the Tuesday board meeting, the superintendent said the district's roofs are engineered to handle 40 lbs. of load per square foot of roof. He also said the analysis of current load showed a range of 32 to 35 lbs per square foot.

The board approved the request to spend $4,000 per day for at least three days to hire a private 10-person crew to address the parts of the roofs seen as

Emond elaborated on this point on Wednesday, clarifying that only the deepest drifts were measured for the load analysis, and that the 40 lb. threshold only represents the weakest roofs in the district. Woodland Heights Elementary, for example, was built to handle 60 lbs. of weight per square foot.

Additionally, the measurement of current load was taken prior to the mild weather experienced on Tuesday and Wednesday. Much of the snow melted and ran off the roofs during those periods, he said.

Melting or not, snow removal began Wednesday morning at Pleasant Street School, which Emond said was the school where the heaviest points were closest to roof load capacity. After that, the crew was moved down the line, with roofs prioritized in descending load to capacity ratio.

Memorial Middle School was expected to be shoveled Wednesday afternoon, and Emond said he would direct the crew next to Elm Street School, then the high school, and finally Woodland Heights.

In his eleven years at the district, the business administrator said this is the first time he's had to develop a district-wide roof shoveling plan.

Fire Chief Ken Erickson said several parents called or stopped by the department Wednesday morning, asking the department to look into the situation. The chief said he's concerned about schools as he is concerned about every flat-roofed building in the city, and especially so for the schools because they're filled with children. However, Erickson said he's been in contact with the school district and said "there's no indication of serious problems…no warning signs present."

On Wednesday, students in Alton Central School were evacuated from one part of the building after a roof bowed inward.