Calais gym passes air-quality report> School committee hears inspector’s recommendations for repairing facility

CALAIS – The air quality report is in and, for the most part, the Calais Middle School gymnasium passed with flying colors.

Last month, the school committee was divided on the issue of whether a state inspector could evaluate the quality of the air at the middle school by simply walking through the gymnasium and giving it a “sniff test.”

School committee members Anne Perry and Nancy Gillis objected to the “test” method used, saying that they had expected the state to conduct a formal air quality test, not just a walk-through.

Two years ago, the school committee closed the 50-year-old middle school for health and safety reasons.

After a major rift in the city over where to house the middle school pupils, two double-wide mobile classrooms were moved onto the middle school grounds.

Pupils are attending classes in the portable buildings for the second school year. The youngsters trek up a hill to another facility for their gym classes.

A group called Friends of the Calais Middle School Memorial Gymnasium is working to open the gymnasium and agreed to pay for an air quality study.

The completed report prepared by Bates Environmental Health and Safety Inc. of Wayne was made public at the school committee meeting Monday night.

In his report, Gary Bates recommended that the school department continue to restrict access to the main part of the building, continue cleaning the gymnasium, install a mechanical ventilation system and clean the existing heat and ventilation equipment.

“Based on visual inspection of the gymnasium, the installation of physical barriers, and the reduction of pollutant pathways by caulking and use of ventilation, the facility should be acceptable for normal use by the general public and students, although there can be no guarantee that persons with environmental mold sensitivities will not be affected while using the gymnasium,” the report said.

George Taylor, who has spearheaded the effort to renovate the gymnasium, said the ventilation system was in place and worked well.

He said that they were awaiting certification by the State Fire Marshal’s Office.

If everything remains on schedule, he said, there could be a ribbon cutting ceremony on Monday to celebrate the reopening of the gymnasium.

During the school committee meeting Monday night, Perry and Gillis praised the efforts of the Friends group for having the air quality tests done and for the work they have done to make the facility useable.