The Edmond P. Talbot Middle School on Melrose Street will be closed through Thursday so that a company can conduct environmental testing at the school, Superintendent Meg Mayo-Brown announced late Sunday afternoon.
“As a result of the recent events at Westport Middle School, we
initiated testing for PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) at Talbot Middle
School and B.M.C. Durfee High School.
"These two buildings were selected for testing because their
construction occurred when the use of PCBs was permitted, particularly
in window caulking,” Brown said in a letter posted at 5 p.m. on Talbot's
website.
Brown said the caulking at the high school did not show the presence of
PCBs, but contractors of Talbot “most likely used several types of
caulk, and that the caulk contained PCBs.”
A question-and-answer session about PCBs in older schools is also posted on the site.
The two-story brick school in the eastern end of the city was built
around 1970 on an 8-acre site near North Watuppa Pond and Lafayette
Park. It holds 500 to 600 students in grades six to eight. Elizabeth
Coogan is the principal.
School officials planned to dispatch notification of the school closing
and testing at about 6:30 a.m. Monday morning via Talbot’s
direct-connect phone calling system, Mayor Will Flanagan said.
An informational meeting to share information and answer questions from
Talbot families and staff has been scheduled for Monday at 6 p.m. at
the Matthew J. Kuss Middle School, 52 Globe Mills Ave.
Brown said updates will continue to be provided directly via the Talbot school website, www.fallriverschools.org/talbot.cfm, and the high school’s broadcast channel, FRED-TV, Channel 17.
Flanagan, chairman of the School Committee in that capacity, said he
recommended the school be closed during testing and that details would
be released through Brown.
“Until test results are complete, I don’t want people in the building,”
said Flanagan, who said school officials were to be commended for
taking a proactive approach.
Brown said an environmental testing company would begin examining air
samples to determine if the levels of PCBs, organic compounds that are
known carcinogens, exceed those in U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
guidelines.
Results will be available 48 to 72 hours after that, or by Thursday at
the latest, Brown wrote in her open letter to Talbot families and staff.
The superintendent emphasized that safety is the priority. For
background, she said Congress banned the use of PCBs in 1976, and that
all of the city schools, except Talbot and Durfee, were built before or
after the period when the compounds were allowed.
The other buildings were not identified as needing testing, Brown said.
To determine if any PCBs from caulking materials are present,
environmental testing companies advised school officials to conduct an
air-quality test.
“In order for the PCBs to be present in the air, the caulking material
would have to deteriorate and become small enough to become airborne
through dust particles fine enough to remain in the air,” Brown wrote.
She said when testing was complete, school officials would release results to the community and discuss the next steps.
Westport Middle School remediation from PCB contamination has been under way since being identified this summer.
Most of the school was opened for students and staff a week ago after
repairs officials estimate will cost upward of $2 million.
The presence of high levels of PCBs in the soil at the city pier near
Heritage State Park has precipitated a cleanup along the 4-acre site
that is expected to begin next month.
Email Michael Holtzman at mholtzman@heraldnews.com.
