Hiccup in air conditioner leads to stifling return at JHS | News, sports, jobs

Dr. Kevin Whitaker, superintendent of Jamestown Public Schools, is pictured during Tuesday’s school board meeting. PJ photo by Eric Tichy

Problems with two air conditioning units at Jamestown High School led to a stifling return for students, teachers and staff last week.

Dr. Kevin Whitaker, superintendent of Jamestown Public Schools, said a compressor in one air conditioning unit failed while another unit struggled with a computer connection. “flaw.” Both issues were addressed in the best possible way as students returned to school last week.

“The start of school was great, except for the heat.” Whitaker said during Tuesday’s school board meeting. “I spent some time in high school connecting fans and checking out different websites.”

Whitaker said 50 fans were distributed to teachers to help beat the heat.

“I hope the future will be more breezy and not so hot.” He said.

Carly Rock, a student member of the school board, first brought up the uncomfortable conditions due to the lack of air conditioning at the high school.

“Talking to different students, the biggest problem they had was the heat.” Rock said. “Last week, the air conditioning broke down. So, with the heat outside, the mix wasn’t good at all — very, very hot in the building.

Paul Abbott, chairman of the school board, inquired about previous malfunctions with the units.

The district repaired the air conditioners, Whittaker said “partial solution” Parts are replaced when necessary. The units are large and require cranes to be placed on the roof of the high school, and will be addressed in the current capital project over the summer, he said.

“At some point in the future, in 15 years or whenever that is, or 20 years, there will have to be planning to replace those so that in the future we are not faced with a partial solution and things end up falling apart at the last minute.” The supervisor said.

In other news, Whitaker said Jamestown’s first home college football game of the season on Sept. 1 was “Really good attendance.” Jamestown defeated Baldwinsville by a score of 28-6.

“I wanted to take note of the fans, the Baldwinsville fans. They were great,” Whitaker said. “There was a whole group of people who traveled from the Syracuse area, which is very impressive. They were great sportsmen and we are very grateful to them. Our fans treated them very well.”