District reviews indoor-air-quality report, plans HVAC work using prior HVAC grant funds

Regional School District 08 officials on March 11 presented the results of a state-mandated indoor air quality assessment and outlined recommended HVAC repairs to bring the high school and middle school systems into compliance.

The district’s facilities lead, Michael Schlehofer, said the consultant’s report recommends installing outdoor airflow control sensors in the rooftop units (25 at the high school, 17 at the middle school) and recalibrating or replacing demand-control ventilation devices that monitor CO2 in several units. “They want to install outdoor airflow control sensors in the 25 rooftop units,” Schlehofer said, and added the recommendations include recalibration or replacement of CO2 control devices in seven high-school units and two middle-school units.

Why it matters: the work is intended to ensure compliance with the state requirement for air-quality assessments and to improve ventilation and monitoring. Schlehofer said the district is evaluating incentives with its engineer and noted an initial funding source: “we have about 385,000 to put towards these recommended repairs,” drawn from an earlier HVAC/grant reimbursement tied to the media center, weight room and locker-room project.

Details and timeline: Schlehofer told the board the work that requires physical access to units would likely occur over the summer or after school hours; some control programming can be done during school days. He emphasized there were no immediate public-health threats identified in the report and that items requiring urgent repair had already been addressed during the assessment.

Next steps: administration said it will develop a more detailed budget and share proposals with the facilities subcommittee before bringing recommendations to the full board. The district will also seek incentives that could reduce up-front costs.

The board received the report; no formal vote was required at this meeting.