School’s flood repairs nearly done

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Whitehall High School has been seeing it’s last bit of updating this summer before the fall semester begins, with the school nearing completion of a new roof and the gym floor being completed. This is the last portion of renovations after the devastating storm that flooded the school a year ago.

“Our high school gym floor is complete, bleachers are in, and everything is done in the gymnasium itself,” said school superintendent Patrick Dee.

After dealing with the flooding, the school was facing many repairs. Flooring needed to be removed, walls needed to be repaired, and even asbestos treatment. After a year of fixing and cleaning, the building is almost completed.

“They are basically at this point in the locker rooms, we’re waiting for the new lockers to come in and they should be here shortly, then the locker rooms will be completed,” he said.

It’s not just the high school receiving its finishing touches, the elementary school is also nearing completion.

“The floor needs to be painted at the elementary school,” Dee said. “The stripes and those sorts of things but the gym floor is down and in.”

Dee mentioned that the elementary school’s roof has been completed and now all that is left for roof repair is the high school.

“The elementary roof is complete, that was done as part of the project last summer,” he said.

However, the district has run into some small issues with the repair of the high school roof.

“The high school roof, the issue was the insulation that goes on top of the roof,” he said.

According to Dee, there should have been some tapering with the insulation. That’s where they hit a small bump in the road but are already fixing the issue.

Roof repairs being made to Whitehall High School

“What we needed to do was get the proper insulation and that was here quickly,” he said.

There has been another problem to arise with the roof repair on the high school which is production problems for the materials needed because of the coronavirus.

“The rubber roofing that goes down on top, they are still trying to locate that to complete the high school roof so the rubber membrane. The contractors are having a hard time trying to locate that at this moment,” he said.

With the rubber roofing being hard to find, the school district has started to plan when contractors will be able to work on the roof if it is not finished before students return. Rather than working while students are in session, construction will take place after school is out of session.

“The roof in itself, as we anticipated, may be completed or may not be for the school year, but that work will be done during second shift when the materials do come in so the contractors will be working on the roof when our students are out,” he said.

As for the fall semester, the state has yet to issue a plan for schools in regard to how instruction will continue.

“We’re sitting here at the end of July and still have zero guidance from the state of New York,” he said.

Dee discussed how the state not issuing a plan is impacting in Whitehall.

“We’re hopeful that the social distancing will be limited and we’re hopeful we’ll have our busses,” Dee said. “Although nobody is thrilled about masks, if masks let everybody get back into our facilities, then so be it. But at this point, our intent is to have 100% of our students back on our campus in September.”