By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews.com
WALDPORT – Officials cancelled classes Wednesday at Waldport’s only public elementary school after a series of air quality issues sent at least 14 students to the hospital for tests Tuesday.
Classes are scheduled to resume Thursday, said Libba Sager, principal of Crestview Heights School. Students from eight classrooms in Hallway B will have class in other locations the rest of the week.
Kristin Bigler, spokeswoman for the Lincoln County School District, said Wednesday night that students and staff using Hallway B seems to report more noxious odors than all the other places in the school. “For extra precaution we wanted to make sure to have them, for the next two days only, be out of that hallway,” Bigler said.
Classes at Waldport middle and high school, which are adjacent to the elementary school, were not affected Wednesday. Elementary school aged children in Yachats attend Crestview, which has 356 students.
The district said Tuesday it will turn off diesel-fired boilers – which are suspected of causing the issue – in both the elementary and middle/high school buildings for two to four weeks.
“They will remain off as part of our process of elimination as to what is going on here,” Superintendent Karen Gray said in a letter to parents and posted on the district’s website. “They will remain off between two and four weeks in order to give us the right amount of time to know if there is indeed anything wrong with our boilers. At this time we believe they are working well.”
The issue has roiled much of the Waldport school community, fueled by Facebook postings showing kids in hospital emergency rooms to threats of lawsuits and pulling children out of school.
The air quality issues started Jan. 26 when a boiler at Crestview misfired and sent diesel fumes into the elementary school. The school was evacuated and classes cancelled.
The school then had similar reports of noxious smells of gas or diesel on April 2, April 10 and then again Tuesday. In each case, staff moved children – some complaining of headaches and dizziness — to other parts of the school complex or outside. In each case, firefighters were called to check the building, tested them for concentrations of carbon monoxide and told staff the building was safe.
A half-hour after the all-clear was given Tuesday, however, four classrooms smelled something again and they returned to the cafeteria, school officials said.
After the January boiler misfire the district installed 97 carbon monoxide monitors around the school complex and in every classroom; none of those went off Tuesday. Gray said in an email to staff Wednesday that a records from one monitor showed it recorded an “11” in the past month and that room will not be used until it is rechecked for safe use. The monitors are designed to go off when their readings hit 30, Gray said.
Fire district officials attributed the April 10 evacuation to the boiler at the middle/high school turning on and the exhaust from that drifting into the elementary school through a door left open for recess.
Despite previously saying the boilers at the two schools were in good working condition, Gray announced Tuesday they would be shut down as part of the test to determine the source of the noxious smells.
Medical authorities offer information, urge calm
On Wednesday, Seashore Family Literacy in Waldport opened its doors to Crestview parents and students needing childcare for the day. Center director Sentila McKinley said 20 children showed up and at least seven Crestview staff members turned out to help.
One parent, who asked not to be identified, said she had her third-grade son tested for carbon monoxide levels in his blood Tuesday at Samaritan Pacific Communities Hospital because he had been complaining for weeks of headaches. While she said it could also be low-grade flu or allergies — both of which the school has notices about at its entrance — she was worried about possible longterm effects of any unhealthy air at the school.
“I’m still exploring, trying to gather information,” she said. “I’ve seen all the Facebook posts. I’m not trying to over react. I’m concerned, but I also think the school is trying to do its best.”
Samaritan Pacific has seen 40 Crestview students in its emergency room this month, hospital chief executive officer Dr. Lesley Ogden told YachatsNews.com. The children and their parents described a “variety of symptoms,” she said, but nothing that appeared dangerous. Most youngsters received blood tests to determine the level of carbon monoxide in their system.
Dr. Lauren Murphy of the Poison Control Center at Oregon Health & Science University said having a carbon monoxide level in your blood of 2 percent to 5 percent is normal; a smoker would have 6 percent to 10 percent. When a person’s carbon monoxide level reaches more than 20 percent, Murphy said, that’s when doctors “start considering treatment.” Because children have a higher respiratory rate, she said, they also tend to have higher levels of carbon monoxide in their system.
“Anything less than 5 percent we don’t bat an eye,” Murphy said.
Ogden said while the smell of noxious fumes is upsetting, there does not appear to be a short-term health risk with carbon monoxide at Crestview.
“We are not worried about this level … but only if there is some sort of unexpected, long-term exposure,” she said.
Both Odgen and Murphy urged Crestview parents concerned about exposures to contact the poison control center at OHSU, which is open around the clock and staffed by medical personnel who can offer advice, information, and monitor symptoms from Portland. Murphy said there has been an increase in calls from the Waldport area, but none that have required emergency response.
The poison control center number is 1-800-222-1222.
On Wednesday, Lincoln County Public Health announced it was opening an investigation into the Crestview situation after the Newport hospital reported the 14 visits to its emergency room. The agency said in a news release that it would work with officials from the Oregon Health Authority, OHSU’s Poison Control, Oregon Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality and the U.S, Environmental Protection Agency.
In long letters to Crestview parents Monday and Tuesday, Gray tried to address concerns by some parents that the district wasn’t working hard enough to find a solution, that they didn’t care or there was some kind of cover up.
“We all want this issue to be resolved so that parents and families can feel assured that it is safe to bring their children to our schools and feel at peace,” she wrote Monday. “We know that is not where we are with many of our parents right now, and we want and need that to change.
“… I really want all of our parents, students, staff, and community to know that we take student and staff health and safety very seriously. We will continue to try different options, protocols, procedures, and investigations to try to determine where these smells are coming from and how to stop them,” Gray wrote. “The facts are that your children have not been exposed to carbon monoxide on a daily basis, we are not poisoning your children and the district is not involved in a cover up. That is unfounded. Everything we have done so far, including the reports we have received, are listed here and the report results are on our website. Transparency means a lot to us, too.”
Gray said Tuesday the district is exploring the possibility of changing to electric heat at the Waldport schools. On Monday she outlined all the steps the district has taken – from hiring an environmental testing company to testing for mold to changing how and when doors are opened and when diesel trucks use the parking lot – to help solve the problem. The district will also pay for another environmental study of the school complex from a list of companies provided by the Oregon Department of Education, Gray said. A parent committee will pick the company and oversee its work, she said.
Gray said Wednesday the district is working with the county health department to schedule a facilitated meeting with parents as soon as practical to discuss Crestview “concerns and ideas.”
OHSU Poison Control Center:
https://www.ohsu.edu/oregon-poison-center
April 10 letter to parents:
April 10, 2019 – Evacuation Update from LCSD Safety Coordinator, Sue Graves
April 15 letter to parents:
Letter to All Crestview Heights Families from Dr. Karen Gray, Superintendent. April 15, 2019
April 16 letter to parents:
Update on 4.16.19 Crestview Heights Elementary Event from Dr. Karen Gray
Thank you YachatsNews.com for a well written, informative article. Appreciated.
After the incident in January, correct me if i’m wrong, it was discovered that the exhaust pipe on roof and an air circulation intake were put too close together? Was that ever fixed? And in more recent case another person was quoted saying the cause could be an open door that sucked in the “bad air”. We live on the Oregon coast. Winds change constantly. Doors need to open and close. It seems there is a problem with the design of this building and its heating system? Are they, the designers, being held accountable? I don’t have children in the school but i do pay Lincoln County taxes. I don’t think shutting down the boiler for a month is a real solution. Alternatives to the diesel boiler should be found and implemented; ductless heat pump. Thank you, for reporting on this issue.