Air study yields "sticker shock"

By NATHAN LAMB | Milton Independent Staff Writer
mireporter@mac.com

The Milton Town School District spent $4.2 million a couple years back to rid the Elementary School of a mold infestation; now a study is indicating that a similar investment may be needed to keep the problem at bay for good.

Penned by Salem Engineering, the study recommends installation of $3,000,000 to $5,000,000 of humidity control equipment at MES, and warns that future mold outbreaks will result if moisture issues are not resolved.

Asked about the report's findings, Superintendent of Schools Martin Waldron acknowledged further out- breaks were a possibility—but added a vote of confidence for preventative measures implemented since the previous crisis.

“I think we could face mold problems again, if the same conditions were present, and those are a neglect of facilities…and not investing money in doing the repairs that you need to do,” he said. “Having been burned by the mold project, I think people are looking for…the degree of comfort that we really need to have to say we've done everything we can to not have a reoccurrence.”

The schools already had one set of recommendations delivered by the architect who oversaw the mold remediation, and the Salem study was a second opinion, said Waldron.

Cost figures within the previous report were substantially lower, though, and that led to School Board Chairman Doug Stout receiving the Salem study with a “high amount of sticker shock” when the topic was raised on April 28.

To investigate that disparity—and get a better idea of the reasoning behind the estimates—the board invited both consultants to its May 12 meeting for further explanation. Given the dollar figures involved, Stout said the board would need to be “150 percent” certain about the details.

“It would become a very major project and it's very clear we'd need to have a lot more discussion on this before we could move forward,” he said.

Central to the issue is the current heating and ventilation system at MES, which draws untreated air—and moisture—directly into classrooms. The system works fine in the winter, but can pile-on humidity in wet weather, explained school grounds director Lyall Smith.

The Salem report recommends a central moisture control system, which would have roof mounted intakes that would pre-condition air through heating or cooling. Also included is at least partial reworking of the school's compartmentalized ventilation system, which is thought to be the result of cost cutting during construction.

Salem also differentiated between moisture treatment and full air conditioning, saying the latter would not be necessary, provided the school could be kept relatively cool and dry.

The previous report—produced by mold remediation architect John Hammilgarn—listed several air conditioning options to alleviate the problem, which ranged from installation of window-mounted units to larger and more centralized equipment. Those costs ran up to $1.6 million, when the recommendations were issued two year ago.

The district is currently using a combination of tight surveillance and portable dehumidifiers to keep things dry, said Waldron. While the ultimate decision rests with the School Board, he clearly had misgivings with using the current set-up as a long term solution.

“It's a risk management kind of decision and (the question is) what's your level of comfort?” he said. “One level of comfort would be to continue as we are right now... That's heavily dependant on people being sensitive, alert, and aware; it could be, if you ran a string of days together that were really humid—that could create some conditions in the school that would really have you nervous.”

For his own part, Smith preferred phased upgrades to the building's Heating Ventilation Air Condition (HVAC) system, which would start by replacing the oldest parts of the system and doing more to centralize it.

Even so, Waldron said it's too early to predict which way things will go, saying the merits of each option have yet to be compared in depth.

“It's an option,” he said, of the Salem report. “There's a pretty high variation in terms of the cost, so I think there are definitely questions to be answered…and would need to be fleshed out in greater detail if that was an option that people were really going to consider,” he said.

“It's a place to start. It gives you a scope to look at, and those are important things for us being able to wrestle this down,” he added.