Colorado audit finds that state officials are failing to inspect schools
Local fire officials across Colorado are not surprised that a recent audit found that state officials were failing to inspect public schools as required by law. Local fire officials have been warning lawmakers and anyone else who would listen for years. "I haven’t seen a state inspector in 20 years," says Deputy Lake Dillon Fire Chief Jeff Berino. State officials say they are required by law to conduct about 150 inspections a year on new and remodeled schools. As many as eight inspections are required at each facility as construction proceeds. Existing facilities are presumed to have met the fire codes at the time they were built and are subject to inspections only during renovation. Frustrated local fire officials compiled a report for lawmakers in 2004 citing fires that got out of hand, school roofs that collapsed, and an elementary school where exposed electrical wiring was found the day before it was scheduled to open. Nonetheless, lawmakers have refused to give them the authority do their own comprehensive inspections. The Colorado State Fire Chiefs Association has been trying for years to transfer responsibility for school inspections from the Colorado Department of Labor’s Oil and Public Safety Division to either local officials or the Colorado Department of Public Safety’s Fire Safety Division.
Sen. Tom Wiens contends the Colorado Association of School Boards (CASB) opposed his attempts to transfer responsibility to local fire chiefs because local boards didn’t want to give up control. Districts complained it would be too costly for them to meet a plethora of local fire codes rather than a national standard currently used by state inspectors. Lauren Kingbery, CASB’s legal counsel, insists school boards opposed the bill because they want a statewide standard. School boards cited instances in which local inspectors imposed arbitrary rules such as landscaping that had nothing to do with public health and safety. "It wasn’t just an issue of local control and money," she says. Fire officials say local codes are necessary because weather conditions are different in the mountains than on the front range.
Lawmakers have approved a proposal to allow local fire departments to do their own inspections, with the state stepping in only if it can’t be done locally. According to the fire chiefs, the proposal requires rules on what codes need to be enforced before it can go into effect, and those rules have not been written. In response to the state audit, the Division of Oil and Public Safety has promised to improve record-keeping to determine what inspections are needed. It also has hired outside consultants to check 150 school buildings built within the past two years. In 2005 and 2006, the Division said, it reviewed and approved 305 school construction projects. Nevertheless, because the state only allots one day for each inspection, including driving time, some districts have never seen an inspector.
Summit Daily News
By Associated Press
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