Fired up over school inspections

The small origami fans that adorn haiku poetry artwork will need to be removed from a board to conform to a recent fire marshal examination at Felida Elementary School. (Photos by TROY WAYRYNEN/The Columbian)

Dexter the Dragon used to be a small, stuffed dragon. Since fire marshals visited his home in Linda España’s third-grade class at Felida Elementary, he’s evolved into a paper cutout.

As they have every year, Clark County fire marshals and Vancouver fire officials have trolled school hallways and pointed out combustibles. But this year, some inspectors were more zealous than before.

Mike Reynoldson, the parent of the fourth-grader at Felida Elementary, was dismayed to hear that the comfy reading nooks, bean bags and throw rugs had been pulled from the school’s library because they were deemed too hazardous. It didn’t compute, he said, seeing as the library is filled with books.

“It’s now much more sanitized, there’s hardly anything on the walls,” Reynoldson said. “You know how proud kids are to explain their work, so it’s just unfortunate. Maybe it’s the rules, and that’s how it should be. I guess that’s fine, but it’s sad if that’s what it comes to.”

After fielding a wave of complaints, Clark County Deputy Fire Marshal Richard Martin met with school officials and relented on some points.

“I have heard that some art stuff got taken down that probably shouldn’t have,” Martin said. “We’re working on it with the school district. We don’t want to get sideways with the school district, either.”

In fairness, the strict inspections probably shouldn’t have been so surprising. The Clark County fire marshal, Vancouver fire and school districts met to hammer out a policy more than a year ago. The international fire code was too vague, Martin said, and doesn’t address school art on walls. And there was also the discomforting fact that a Rhode Island fire inspector had been sued after a 2003 nightclub fire killed 100 people.

Creativity, Martin said, shouldn’t be quashed, but there are some structures that, to fire officials, are clearly dangerous. Like the papier-mâché tunnel students had to walk through to enter their classroom, or the floor-to-ceiling three-dimensional paper art. Several of the inspection reports also noted decorations hanging from the sprinkler systems.

So some things had to come down. The policy says that ceilings should be cleared of streamers and paper chains, and that no more than 20 percent of walls be covered.

“We literally had building operators measuring down to a single percent to maximize their space,” Vancouver schools safety director Mick Hoffman said.

But teachers were frustrated, they told Hoffman, because many of those items had been around for years. Why were they being dinged now?

“We say just because it wasn’t caught doesn’t mean it was OK,” Hoffman said. “We’ve gone from one side to the other. Obviously our main concern is kid safety. But do we have to go so far? Schools are supposed to be inviting atmospheres.”

For parent Reynoldson, this feels like yet another obstacle for teachers who, as it is, field new mandates after every legislative session.

“Teachers always have to fight something,” Reynoldson said. “To have an environment that’s fun and engaging, they’re fighting that. Somewhere or another, they’ve got to have some flexibility.”

Isolde Raftery: 360-735-4546 or isolde.raftery@columbian.com.