Dealing with Asbestos in Orange County Public Schools Grand Jury 2015-2016

All but one of Orange County’s twenty-eight school districts have (encapsulated) asbestos present at one or more its schools.

Although current EPA standards provide that encapsulated asbestos does not present an immediate hazard to people who come near it, any physical disturbance and/or weathering which damages that encapsulation and releases asbestos fibers into the air will present an immediate hazard to anyone exposed to those fibers. Hence, broad-based awareness of where encapsulated asbestos is located is essential to avoid disturbing it such that it does become a threat to students and staff.

Many school districts are not in full compliance with the AHERA regulatory requirement to have applicable AHERA reports available in the main offices of each school for public review.

Many school districts are not in full compliance with the AHERA regulatory requirement to identify at each school in their district a “Designated Person” and to train each Designated Person to EPA-defined standards.

Although nearly all school districts train their facilities and maintenance staff on hazardous materials management, many fail to provide hazardous materials training to their teaching and administrative staff.

Orange County public schools are subject to very infrequent EPA inspections for AHERA compliance.

Inadequately managed construction efforts at more than one Orange County public school have led to expensive and disruptive hazardous materials events. Many Orange County school districts lack one or more documented requirements for contracting for construction 2015-2016 Orange County Grand Jury Dealing with Asbestos in Orange County Public Schools that implement generally recognized best practices for dealing with hazardous materials. Such written best practices include: a. Performing all work at schools that deals with, or potentially deals with, hazardous materials at times when students and staff are not present, b. Controlling the scope of construction/modernization/major repairs undertaken in any one year to remain within the district’s ability to manage the efforts, c. Separately contracting for hazardous materials inspection, abatement, and construction work once hazardous materials are abated, d. Including clear schedule performance requirements in every contract, e. Defining intermediate schedule milestones for all construction-related work that is expected to take over one month to complete, and f. Requiring monitoring by district senior staff of progress on construction work via personal walkthroughs of the work in progress.

Many school districts with public charter schools approved and financed by their district, lack, and have not provided their charter schools with, written definitions of the respective roles and responsibilities of the district and the charter school in dealing with hazardous materials and with AHERA regulatory compliance.

Many school districts rely on paper documents for recording key information such as facilities data, facilities construction and repair plans, and AHERA reports.

Some school districts have no documented facilities plans, and many districts that have plans lack key information in their plans such as estimated costs, funding sources, and schedules for work initiation and completion.

Many school districts fail to post key safety-related information on their web sites such as upcoming activities at school facilities involving the abatement of hazardous materials.

Despite the fact that all Orange County school districts serve highly language-diverse communities, several districts have no provision for communicating with their community in any language other than English.