By: Phillip Whitney
Our maintenance budget is $0, nothing, nada, zip. When Homer High needs something done around the school, they have to submit a work order to the Kenai Peninsula Borough. Once the work order has been submitted, it enters a queue based on importance, a broken door ranks lower than a broken toilet. The work order is also based upon the cost to the Borough, a broken boiler is more likely to be fixed and not replaced.
The Boilers in the back room!
While the school attempts to save electricity, and recycle, all the money saved gets poured back into the fuel tanks. The school spends about $1700 every two weeks, approximately $40,800 a year, said Diane Larson. To save more energy the school would need replacements to all of our energy using items such as lights, and boilers. But to even begin doing that the school would need the funding from the Borough. The borough meanwhile will continue to use the same equipment.
The school needs new boilers, a new track, a new handicapped ramp, and a new roof. The school is being charged more for its fuel oil, than average cost, based on the soul fact that its boilers are so inefficient. The old track has been condemned and if it doesn’t get fixed or replaced them we cannot have home footballs games. The handicapped ramp does not meet federal code and is too steep. The roof is slowly being penetrated by the expansion and contraction of the wood shingles and if it doesn’t get replaced then the school will have a leaky roof. Dr. Gee has commented about all of these items and said that it’s either up for bid, or the work order is being processed.
So the school is stuck, waiting for the borough to come up with the money necessary to repair and or replace equipment around the school. They cannot take action against this because neither of them have the funding for such improvements, but they will keep searching for the money, and any if not all the replacements will be several years in the future.