Portable classrooms hit the road

Terry Webster

Thursday, Sept. 23, 1999 | 11:12 a.m.

Have portable classrooms, will travel -- all over the Clark County School District.

A caravan of nearly 900 portable classrooms is one way the school district, the nation's eighth largest, attempts to cope with exploding growth and a transient population.

Despite a construction schedule providing for about one new school a month, the growing student population is spilling over into hallways, auditorium stages and other areas unintended for classroom instruction.

When that happens, Sharon Dattoli moves in. And a portable classroom usually follows.

Most of them are used for overcrowding while others provide classroom space during building renovations.

The district is growing by about 13,000 new students a year, according to school officials. And about 33 percent of the student population will move during a school year.

Dattoli, who oversees all of the district's portable classroom activity, said she can barely meet the demand for them.

"Administrators and parents will call me saying they thought they saw a portable classroom somewhere that isn't being used," said Dattoli. "They are desperate for space."

"I've had people ask if I have any that I keep aside, just for emergencies," she added. "These are all for emergencies."

Just carting them around costs about $2 million a year, an amount Financial Services Manager Ruby Alston calls a "sizable chunk."

In 1996, the district made about 60 portable classroom moves. Now it's over 300 a year, said Dattoli.

It's costly because they have to be dismantled and transported by a qualified mover. Then, all building codes have to be met, along with the proper utility hook-ups, site preparations and other measures.

Depending on how many are purchased, the district usually spends anywhere from $250,000 to $500,000 a year on portable classrooms, Alston said. Currently, the district has 805 with 92 more on order.

Several portable classrooms -- the oldest date back to the 1960s -- are being removed from the fleet this year. School officials said the older ones are in poor condition due to their age and being uprooted and moved numerous times.

At a cost of $35,000 to $40,000 each, including installation, at least $3 million will be spent on them this year, with funding coming from the Capital Improvement Building Program. Combined with moving costs, the total portable classroom tab moves well into the $5 million range.

The average cost of one new elementary school building in Clark County is $7.1 million, according to a study prepared by the Council of Educational Facility Planners International.

Most Clark County schools have had portable classrooms at one point, said Dattoli.

Silverado High School on Silver Hawk Avenue currently has the most. With 25 portable classrooms on site, the school has reached its limit.

"There's no place else to put them," said Principal Aldeane Ries. "We've already done away with the staff parking lot and then we had to take away some of the student parking so it could be used for staff parking."

According to Ries, using portable classrooms is better than having students attend double sessions. She calls them "lifesavers."

"We can't put kids on the roof. This is the largest school the state has ever had," Ries said of her school's 3,645 student population.

Then there are elementary schools where portables are eating up playground space, Dattoli said.

Some parents simply don't like them.

"We don't want to end up like Cartwright (Elementary School), with portables lined up all around the outside of the school," said Joy Stoops, parent and PTA president at nearby Lamping Elementary School.

Clark County Classroom Teachers Association President Sue Strand doesn't like them, either.

"We understand why they are necessary, but nobody wants to be in a portable," said Strand, who also has safety concerns relating to them.

"The biggest problem I'm seeing with them is a lack of communication between the portables and the main buildings," she said. "Some of them are not hooked up properly or the air conditioning doesn't work right. I'm not saying they all are like this, but there are a lot of them."

Strand said the district should make sure every portable classroom has an intercom or cell phone.

"If something ever happens, they are asking for a lawsuit," she said. "I also hope parents are asking what kind of security is in place."

One question parents have asked is: Why doesn't the district build bigger schools?

The prototype for elementary schools provides for a program capacity of 650, but on a year-round basis up to 920 students can be rotated through the school.

"We wouldn't want the elementary schools to be bigger than the middle schools," said Dusty Dickens of the the school district's Demographics, Zoning & Realty Department.

Site management, programming and staffing becomes more difficult as schools get larger, she added.

But are they getting bigger, anyway?

"People are coming in droves," said Dattoli.