Evening star., 1926-03-31
Conflict Among District and
School Officials on Needs
Is Blamed.
$4,000 OF FUND USED
FOR OTHER PURPOSES
Decision Must Be Made Between
Old Dangers and Steel Cur
tains for Two Halls.

Conflict of opinion among District
officials. school officials and the fire
marshal has resulted in specific rec
concentrations for the elimination of
fire hazards in Washington schools
going unheeded for seven years, 1t was
revealed today in connection with
the annual report of the fire marshal.
made public by the District Commits
sioners yesterday.
A study of expenditures of the re-
pair fund of the public schools for
the fiscal year just concluding fur
ther shows that despite the fact that
the Board of Education has placed
correction of fire hazard as of first
importance in the expenditure of the
repair fund, less than half of the
money set aside for fire hazards under
this policy has been spent.
Instead. approximately $4,000 of
the fire hazard appropriation has been
diverted 10 correction of sanitary de
fects in the schools and to other pur-
poses.
Strictpr Policy Seen.
A more strict adherence to the
spending of repair fund money for
correction of fire hazards was fore
cast today in the light of the insist
ent demands made by The ire mar
shal that several hundred fire haz.
ards be eliminated. The matter is
expected to he the subject of pro
longed discussion at the meeting of
the Board of Education next Wednes-
day.
The outstanding example of al
legged failure of District and public
school officials to heed the warning
of the fire marshal is seen in the
recommendations which have been
made annually since 1919 that outside
fire escapes be installed in IS old-type
three story school buildings. The
average cost of eliminating this fire
hazard would be 81 900 a building.
Business Manager Raymond o.
Wilmarth estimated that it will take
$50. 900 to eliminate all of the items
contained in the latest fire marshal's
report, and he points out that under
the existing working rule of the board
only 10 per cent of the expected $780,
900 appropriation for the repair fund
can be used for this purpose. This
means that if the full 10 per cent of
the repair fund is used for fire hazard
SOU.uUU worth OIL WOTk
must again so over.
Sanitary Needs Cared For.
1t was admitted today in school
circles that criticism might he eX-
pected from the fact that the full 10
per cent of the S450 900 repair fund
appropriation. under which the school
are now operating has not been de-
voted to elimination of fire hazards
as sanctioned by the board policy. 1t
is pointed out. however, that the
S25, 900 which has been diverted from
this allotment has gone to take care
of sanitary work of what was claimed
to be of utmost Importance.
The major items of the SS0, 900 fund
needed to eliminate all fire hazards
are: Installation of outside fire es-
capes in sixteen buildings, $50, 900: in
stallation of steel curtains at Central
and Dunbar High Schools, $50 600.
From present indications it will he up
to the board to decide which will be
the more important, the purchase Of
the steel curtains or the authorization
for the fire escapes.
The solution of the whole matter
is believed to be a more sizable ap-
preparation for the repair fund, as
the school officials and the members
of the board have conscientiousiy APP
portioned the money they had in the
channels they believed most needed it.
More Frequent Inspection Urged.
That more strict attention will be
paid to the recommendation of the
fire marshal, however, appears GER
tain inasmuch as Charles +. Carusi,
member of the board, at recent
meeting gave notice that he intended
to have semi-annual fire inspection
of schools instead of annual. The
board, at that time. adopted a resolu-
tion introduced by Mr.. Carusi, call
ing upon the fire marshal to make
Continued on Page 2, Column 81