Maili Elementary awaits air conditioning
By James Gonser
Advertiser Leeward Bureau
MA'ILI — For decades, Ma'ili Elementary School students have endured the heat, farm odors and flies that are a fact of life in the rural farming community.
Cory Lum • The Honolulu Advertiser
Parents and teachers hoping to create a better learning environment lobbied the Legislature last year to provide air conditioning in classrooms and managed to get a $3.1 million appropriation for the school.
Sixth-grader Natacia Hauoli endures the heat in a portable classroom at Ma'ili Elementary School. The school received money for air conditioning but must wait for it to be installed.
That was 17 months ago, but it will still be at least another year before children at Ma'ili can study in cool classrooms and eat in a fly-free cafeteria. However, the project is moving forward, with a pre-bid meeting set for potential contractors at the school Sept. 5.
"It is like we will believe it when it happens," said principal Linda Victor. "But once we get through the bidding process and we see who gets the bid, we are going to be on our way."
State Department of Education facilities director Ray Minami said the Department of Accounting and General Services has been overseeing the project. A consultant was hired to come up with the design, which was reviewed by the school and the DAGS design branch.
Construction bids will be opened Oct. 9 and a notice to proceed issued in December, Minami said. Construction should start in December, with work being completed in late 2002. The design work is budgeted at $200,000, construction at $2.8 million and new equipment will run about $150,000.
"If all goes well, hopefully, it will be done in August 2002," Minami said. "If they run into unforeseen problems, it will probably be in December."
The project will include providing air conditioning to the entire school with electrical upgrades to support the system. Air conditioning is not generally allowed in cafeterias, Minami said, but because of the fly problem a special waiver was granted for Ma'ili. Minami said construction will take about a year because it is harder to renovate an electrical system than it is to start from scratch.
"Because of the existing outdated infrastructure, sometimes that makes it very difficult to retrofit or renovate," Minami said. "Architects and contractors say they would rather break the school down and build a new one."
Ma'ili, which opened in 1963, is on a modified year-round schedule. Classes started July 27. Victor said the school will remain open during construction. The project will be done in increments, with one building at a time being renovated.
"We've arranged it so we have some empty classrooms and can move classes around during construction," Victor said.
The school is surrounded by chicken and pig farms, and teachers and parents have complained for years that it is difficult to concentrate in the portable classrooms, where temperatures can reach more than 100 degrees in the summer.
Teachers say if they open the windows, dust and flies come in; if they close them, the room overheats.
Victor said the school has placed fans in every classroom to help with the heat, and fans were installed over the cafeteria doorway that blow air straight down to keep flies out.
"It has been really, really hot lately," Victor said. "There haven't been flies recently, but with the rain we've had and the manure, there will be flies soon. Construction hasn't started yet, but it is in the works, and we see the light at the end of the tunnel. With air conditioning, attitudes will skyrocket, I'm sure."
