A boiler gone berserk left behind at least $110,000 in flood damage at Española middle school that took a “small army” of Española School District employees and contractors a week to fix.
Water poured from broken pipes and through the “B” wing of the middle school — home to about a third of the school’s classrooms — on Dec. 28 during the holiday break, leaving behind three inches of standing water that ruined carpets, floors and walls, District Projects Manager Paul Salas said.
Salas said a large air bubble, likely caused by repairs on city water lines on Industrial Park Road, caused the boiler to shut down, and that led pipes to freeze and burst. Salas said he thinks the air entered the pipes when the Rio Arriba County Health Commons project, west of the middle school on Industrial Park Road, was being connected to city water lines. City Water Department Director Marvin Martinez said the city advised the District that it would be doing the work Dec. 13 (a Saturday) and the District should open all the faucets — and that was not done.
Salas said he is still completing an estimate of the damages and repair costs, and is waiting for teachers to complete claims for damaged books, furniture and classroom equipment,
So far, costs include $18,300 owed to contractor Chacon Builders, which was hired to replace drywall damaged by the flooding, $33,342 owed to ATI Security for removing security cameras damaged by water spraying from ceiling pipes and $3,327 to ProSec, which was hired to help clean up the mess, according to a draft cost estimate. ProSec is the private company owned by Rio Arriba County Commissioner Elias Coriz that provides security guards in District schools.
Superintendent David Cockerham said the District hired ProSec for the job after all the middle school’s custodians declined to help with the emergency cleanup.
“(The custodians) say they’re always ready to work overtime,” Cockerham said. “We were willing to pay them overtime, but we asked for custodians and none of them came in.”
Salas said the District also considered hiring a custodial service, but the ProSec’s rates were the same or lower. ProSec charges the District $17 an hour per employee provided, according to its contract.
Coriz said the arrangement was made in a hurry, but he understood his employees provided the labor as individual contractors, not as employees of his company.
“(Salas) called me for help, they were looking for people. I told him we’re licensed to provide security, we’re not licensed to push brooms,” Coriz said.
Coriz said his employees would likely bill the District individually, or else ProSec would bill the District and funnel the money straight to them. He insisted ProSec would not make a profit from the incident.
Once cost estimates are completed, the District plans to file a claim with its two insurers and with Hartford, the boiler manufacturer, District financial specialist Mary Salas said.