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The Dallas County Schools Board of Education approved two emergency measures that were needed to be able to open school on time.

The first was an upgrade of the fire systems at all campuses except for Martin Middle School. The board approved a $256,469.95 bid with Selcom to bring those fire detection systems up to the current code.

Superintendent Anthony Sampson said this was first noted when they were upgrading the systems at Martin Middle School. He said the fire systems weren’t neglected, but they were forced to upgrade the systems since the new building codes required an up-to-date system.

“I don’t want to say it was neglected, but when the state building inspector came through to do the code inspection, we actually had to go back and have Martin Middle wired in the same way that we are needing to do for the other schools,” Sampson said. “When that was brought up to code, we had to go through and do it for the other schools.

“That same thing that happened with Martin middle now manifests itself to all of the other facilities.”

Sampson said those fire systems had to be updated or they would not be able to open the campuses on time. Board members asked if there were any alternatives.

“If we don’t do it, we run the risk that we can’t open in school, and then we’re going to have to put someone on firewatch to be able to move and proceed,” Sampson said.

Sampson said he was working off the state bid list and through the provisions of the board declaring the fire systems situation an emergency. 

The other emergency matter pertained to the discovery of “suspected mold” in the library and pre-k classroom at Salem Elementary School. Sampson said the building was closed for a two-week period in July, but when staff returned after that closure, they found that the fan of an HVAC unit was left running in the library and this classroom without the air conditioning on.

Because the unit pulls some air from the outside in the unit, it caused humidity of those rooms to increase causing condensation to form on books and the floor which eventually turned into the suspected mold. 

“We are calling it suspected mold because it has not been officially tested for mold,” Sampson said. 

Sampson said they had two bids for the cleaning services, but the lowest and best bid was from R&M Disinfecting Services for $6,500. 

If the work was not completed by the the time school started, Sampson said they could move the affected class to a different classroom at Salem until the issue has been resolved.