BY KATHY BARATTA
Staff Writer
KATHY BARATTA Bill Lenahan addresses a comment to the Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education during a meeting held on Sept. 11 at the Wemrock Brook School, Manalapan. Parents were upset that the Manalapan-Englishtown Middle School did not open as expected that day and that their middle school children are being bused to elementary schools for half-day sessions. MANALAPAN – When the Manal-apan-Englishtown Middle School (MEMS), Millhurst Road, did not open as scheduled on Sept. 11, school officials had to deal with about 1,000 angry parents who attended a series of meetings last week.
As school resumed this week, MEMS remained closed and 1,400 seventh- and eighth-grade MEMS pupils were still receiving educational instruction dispersed among the Manalapan-English-town Regional School District’s six elementary schools.
A $17 million construction project at MEMS began in March 2005 and was paid for out of a $49 million school bond referendum that was approved by voters in 2003.
The end result of the construction at MEMS will include the addition of 73,000 square feet to the existing middle school and 30 new classrooms. There will be a new science room, two new computer labs and the addition of a new gymnasium, health center and nurse’s office, as well as renovated art rooms and a music instruction room.
Maureen Lally MEMS did not open on time because many items associated with the construction project failed inspection, apparently in the days before school was scheduled to begin, and municipal code enforcement officials would not issue the school a Temporary Certificate of Occupancy (TCO).
By the end of last week school administrators were targeting Sept. 25 as the opening date for MEMS.
According to Board of Education members and municipal officials, the school could not have legally opened to staff members and students without a TCO.
Manalapan construction code official and fire official Richard Hogan said the construction project had initially failed 102 of 283 inspection items in all disciplines – electrical, plumbing, building and fire.
Also discovered during the inspections by township officials was wiring for computers that had been installed in the existing MEMS building without a permit. Therefore, municipal inspectors had not been previously aware the work had been done.
Subcode official John Marini told the News Transcript that the wiring work compromised the school’s fire walls.
When asked if the compromised fire walls represented a risk to safety of the school, Marini said, “A fire wall is designed, and that integrity has to be kept. Once you put a hole in it, the integrity of that wall of course is diminished.”
Hogan and Marini noted that in addition to serving as places of learning, the school buildings would be used as public shelters during an emergency.
“We’re talking about safety issues here, and you don’t compromise on safety; at least we (township inspectors) don’t,” Marini said.
At three evening meetings last week (Sept. 11, 12, 14), school board members and district officials angered parents even further when construction manager Allen Van Hook was not made available to discuss what had happened at MEMS.
Angry parents shouting from the audience wanted answers to questions about such things as why a water fountain, as dictated by code and indicated in blueprints, had not been installed on the second floor of the MEMS addition.
District officials said about $11,000 was spent to correct that mistake and said damages would be sought from the contractor, Ernest Bock and Sons, of Phila-delphia.
According to terms of the contract between the school district and Bock, the contractor had agreed to a rate of $1,500 per day compensation to the district for every day past the agreed upon Sept. 1 completion date.
Anthony Manisero, president of the Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education, and Super-intendent of Schools Maureen Lally both said they did not believe that having Van Hook available to answer residents’ questions would serve any good purpose. They said the possibility that the matter will end up in litigation was a reason not to have Van Hook answer questions from the public.
Lally and Manisero said they had no complaints with how Van Hook performed his duties as construction manager or with how he performed his duties as Lally’s liaison to the project.
Van Hook is an employee of the project architect, DRG, of Raritan.
School district officials did not respond to a request from the News Transcript asking what Van Hook is being paid by the district, his construction credentials, and the agreement of his job description and duties regarding the MEMS project.
Beyond acknowledging that construction deficiencies were preventing MEMS from receiving a TCO, no one from the school district would discuss the nature of the deficiencies inspectors found, nor would they say if they believe there is one person who should be held accountable for those deficiencies.
The mood of the crowd at the Sept. 11 meeting – the day students were supposed to start the new year at MEMS – was one of controlled fury and parents were not mollified by comments from Lally, Manisero or school board Vice President Ryan Green.
Resident Beth Galloway wanted to know who was going to supervise the 1,400 MEMS students who would be dismissed after a half-day of instruction. She said some working parents had neither the time nor possibly the resources to arrange for child care.
Galloway’s comment to the board was met with thunderous applause when she asked, “Should I quit my job because you didn’t do yours?”
Green answered Galloway’s remark saying, “Maybe you should.”
Responding to questions about what police would do in order to see that supervision for the MEMS students would be provided, Manalapan Police Chief Stuart Brown said that as a working parent himself he fully appreciated the concerns of the parents. The chief said although it is “not our job to provide day care,” he and his officers would always be available to help when their help was requested and needed.
Parents were asked not drive MEMS students directly to the elementary school to which they are assigned. MEMS pupils are taking their regular bus to MEMS and then boarding a bus bound for one of the six elementary schools. They are bused back to MEMS in the early afternoon and then take their regular bus home.
When the school board met for its regularly scheduled meeting on Sept. 12, hundreds of parents were shut out of the district offices on Main Street, Englishtown, because there was not enough room to accommodate everyone who wanted to attend. The meeting room holds 95 people.
School district business administrator Joseph Passiment said administrators are dealing with the ongoing situation as “efficiently and effectively” as possible. He said it was not feasible to rent temporary trailer classrooms, as some people have suggested. He said those units are only available for lease or purchase.
By Sept. 15, district officials were saying that although they were shooting for Sept. 25 as the opening date for MEMS, they were going to explore the possibility of accepting an offer from St. Thomas More Church, Gordons Corner Road, to use 12 classrooms in case that date could not be met.
Lally confirmed that several of the elementary schools whose cafeterias and gymnasiums are serving as classrooms for the MEMS students were, by the end of last week, still functioning without partitions between the different classes being held in the gyms and cafeterias.
On Sept. 11 at the first public meeting, parents were told it would be at least three to four weeks before students and staff members would be able to return to the classrooms at MEMS.
MEMS educates 1,400 seventh- and eighth-graders who, starting Sept. 12, were dispersed throughout the district and began attending half-day sessions in the elementary schools.
The district’s K-6 pupils began school as scheduled on Sept. 11 and are attending full-day sessions.
Marini said he and the rest of the code enforcement officials, including Hogan, all have children who are MEMS students. He said the inspectors are committed to seeing MEMS open as soon as possible.
Marini said he thought it was necessary for him to state that fact since Lally had sent a letter to parents that municipal officials believed had attempted to place blame for the delayed opening on overzealous township inspectors.
Manalapan Mayor Drew Shapiro has a daughter who is a pupil at MEMS. He said at the Sept. 11 meeting that he did not appreciate Lally’s letter and called for school board members to demand Lally’s immediate resignation as superintendent.
Lally has already informed the board she will be leaving the district at the end of June 2007.
The state Department of Community Affairs intervened in the matter last week.
DCA spokesman Chris Donnelly said department officials visited Manalapan to review the matter and make their expertise available to school and municipal officials.
Regarding the 100-plus code deficiencies cited by inspectors, Donnelly said, “All of the deficiencies cited by township officials were found to be items of concern.”
As of press time Monday, MEMS students were continuing to receive instruction in half-day sessions that will end at 12:05 p.m.
Manisero has said that since Lally was in charge of the construction project she should have been aware of any problems and should have related them to the board as a whole.
Lally has said she was not aware of any inspection problems at MEMS until Sept. 6. Action was taken thereafter to inform parents of the pending changes in student schedules.
School board member Dorothy Porcaro attended the Sept. 13 meeting among the DCA representatives, principals from Ernest Bock and Sons, school administrators and municipal officials.
Manisero and Porcaro said they will call for an investigation to be conducted in order to determine “what went wrong.”