Solon superintendent: Roxbury remediation plan finalized; work to start Wednesday, estimated 6-to-8 weeks

Superintendent Bolden told the Solon City Board of Education on Sept. 29 that the district has finalized an environmental remediation plan for Roxbury and that contractors are scheduled to begin work on Wednesday, with an initial estimate of six to eight weeks to complete cleaning and follow-up testing.

The plan matters because air tests at Roxbury returned positive results in one wing, prompting an environmental cleanup that the district says must be done before students can safely return. Bolden said the district has coordinated with environmental consultants, an environmental attorney and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency to move forward quickly.

Bolden said the district is running three work tracks simultaneously: student and staff continuity at temporary sites, environmental remediation of the Roxbury building, and long-term building restoration and community communication. "We essentially had a 3 track met we're basically operating on 3 tracks simultaneously. Track 1 is a student and staff continuity," Bolden said, describing temporary classrooms at Parkside Church and other locations and the logistics of moving materials each weekend.

On the cleanup: the superintendent said air testing of the North wing produced positive results while the South and East wings returned negative air samples. "The East Wing and the South Wing all had negative tests when the air samples came in. The same testing that we did in the North Wing...they believe it was the roofing work and specifically the roof drains," Bolden said, explaining the consultants' current hypothesis about the source.

For the unimpacted wings, Bolden said contractors will perform an "environmental cleaning" using HEPA vacuums, wipe-downs of horizontal surfaces, and real-time air monitoring during cleaning. If those rooms test negative after cleaning they will be sealed and cleared for reuse. For the North wing, which had positive air samples, Bolden said the district expects a deeper mitigation that will remove porous, unsealed materials "from the ceiling to the floor" and dispose of affected soft materials; solid surfaces and electronics will be cleaned and saved when possible. He said mission-critical paper records will be scanned before removal so student data remain accessible.

"Our work plan has now been finalized. It is finalized and work is scheduled to start on Wednesday. They are anticipating somewhere in the 6 to 8 week range to fully complete the cleaning and remediation that's going through it," Bolden said.

Bolden told the board the district filed with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency and obtained approval for an emergency abatement filing so work could begin sooner than the standard waiting period. He cautioned that the six- to eight-week estimate assumes no delays, and that procurement of replacement ceiling materials, flooring and lighting could extend the return-to-school timeline. "If things worked perfectly 4 weeks, but they were skeptical that that would be the case, it's really gonna be closer to 8 weeks. And as I said to them, we would rather you do it right than right away," Bolden said.

Students from Roxbury have been relocated to Parkside and Parkside Church while the district stages operations; Bolden described daily logistics for classrooms, recess and food service at the temporary sites. He said the district will publish all remediation testing and related documentation on a public "Roxbury Environmental Hub" when available and will continue to field questions through a posted FAQ.

The district plans in-person staff training with an outside vendor, TSI, and will continue to follow AHERA-related inspection schedules. Bolden said prior inspections showed the district's identified asbestos-containing materials were not friable and that the Roxbury remediation work will follow federal and state protocols for testing and abatement.

Board members did not take formal action on the update; the report was presented as an informational item.

The district urged families and community members to consult the environmental hub and FAQs for the latest schedules, and said it hoped — though did not guarantee — to have Roxbury ready either in time for the winter break or early in the new year, depending on how remediation and replacement-material procurement proceed.