Thursday, September 26, 2013

DOE cleans up moldy trailers


From NY1:

Water leaking in through cracked walls. Mold growing in ceilings from vents.

The photo seen above was taken by a teacher at Richmond Hill High School of the ceiling of one of the nearly two dozen trailers where hundreds of students go to class.

"They're kept in deplorable conditions, where they don't clean them properly," said Charles diBenedetto, a teacher at Richmond Hill High School. "The floors sink in because the moisture seeps in through the sheet metal that's outside, seeping in through the walls, causing the floors to bevel and crack. Some of our trailers actually have metal plates where the floors should be, so that way, nobody falls through the floor."

DiBenedetto requested an inspection by the teachers' union's health unit. So did teachers at Cardoza High School. At Francis Lewis High School, teacher Arthur Goldstein called the union after being interviewed by NY1 for a previous report on trailer conditions.

The DOE responded quickly to the health reports, cleaning trailers at Francis Lewis and Cardozo in the days before school started. At Richmond Hill, the DOE said that students have been temporarily removed from the moldy units until they're made safe.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Now let's see, the dept of education just wrapped up a long term reconstruction project at RHHS that did nothing to address the real problem that its freshman spend their first year in trailers? Guess some communities don't count...This "temporary" situation has only been going on for what, over ten years?

Anonymous said...

This sounds crazy!! How could a school allow their students to be in conditions like these? Has the roof been inspected? Sinking floors, moldy ceilings... all signs of a failing roof! For anyone interested in finding the other tell tale signs of a failing roof, here is a great article: http://bit.ly/1aF6NmE

[FULL DISCLOSURE: I don't work for Bloom, but I do help with some of their digital.]