NAACP says repairs should wait

The Charleston NAACP says it fears that the Charleston County School Board will make fixing the seismic problems at the former Rivers Middle campus a priority while other downtown students languish in temporary buildings scattered across the county.

This past fall, the school board promised to spend at least $25 million renovating and seismically upgrading the downtown building with any money left over from its ongoing construction program.

But the board learned last week that six downtown buildings couldn't withstand a 5.0 or greater earthquake, and the district doesn't have money to make the needed seismic upgrades.

Compelled by safety concerns, school leaders plan to ask the board for permission to relocate more than 1,300 students and their teachers into open buildings elsewhere as soon as this summer.

Dot Scott, president of the Charleston NAACP, said the school board shouldn't move forward with repairs to the Rivers campus while other occupied downtown school buildings have the same problems.

Until the board figures out how to pay for the seismic upgrades at those buildings, it should put plans for the Rivers campus on hold, she said.

"We need to be fair about it," she said.

Part of the Charleston NAACP's concern with the Rivers building stems from the charter school, the Charleston Charter School for Math & Science, that is temporarily housed in mobile units on its campus until the renovation work is completed.

The Charleston NAACP has fought for years in opposition to the charter school, and has said it believes that the school's organizers intend it to be a privately run, publicly funded, segregated school.

Charter school leaders have said that's not true, and 57 percent of the school's approximately 300 students are minority.

The Charleston NAACP also is pushing for the charter school's students to be moved off the Rivers campus if and when other downtown students are moved.

If they're allowed to stay, their presence there and in the proximity of a seismically problematic building could be leverage for charter school supporters to push the repairs forward, she said.

Although the Rivers building could collapse during an earthquake, students who use the nearby mobile units, gym and cafeteria wouldn't be any more endangered than students at most any other county school, said Bill Lewis, executive director of the district's building program.

School Board Chairwoman Ruth Jordan said the board has not received any official recommendations from the superintendent, but expects to hear those by March 22. Prospective relocation sites have not been named.

Jordan said the board made the decision to commit $25 million to the Rivers building before it was aware of the seismic issues at other downtown schools. That money may end up not going to Rivers because an empty building does not take precedence over other downtown buildings being used by students, she said.

"In light of the new information, it has all changed," Jordan said. "Everything is up for grabs at this point."

Jordan would have to convince four other board members to join her in undoing the board's vote on the $25 million for the Rivers building and spending that elsewhere.

Reach Diette Courrégé at 937-5546 or dcourrege@postandcourier.com.