Efforts to kill smell don’t sweeten school

By Emily Richmond

Friday, May 7, 2004 | 11:15 a.m.

A group of teachers and students at Advanced Technologies Academy say despite a year-old lawsuit and complaints about a persistent smell at the school that has made them sick, the stench is still there.

This week, the city's hazardous materials team was called out and other complaints about the smell were lodged, with no resolution.

The sewer smell has been around, off and on, since a new wing of the magnet high school opened in August 2002, some teachers and students say. Despite complaints of persistent headaches and nausea from the smell, no one from the Clark County School District, the fire department or air quality experts has been able to find a concentration of any gas that would make people sick.

No dangerous levels of any toxin or chemical, including the hydrogen sulfide gas common in sewers, have been found at the school site, said Dave Broxterman, administrative manager for the district's facilities division. Several visits from Las Vegas Fire and Rescue's hazardous materials team -- including one on Tuesday -- have turned up nothing, Broxterman said.

The district paid an outside environmental services company $31,000 in September to spend 30 days monitoring the 2501 Vegas Drive. The consultant's report showed all test results came back negative, Broxterman said.

In addition to testing the air at the school the district has examined the sewer system, replaced suspect pipes and realigned ventilation shafts, Broxterman said.

"We've spent hundreds of personnel hours on this -- it's very frustrating," Broxterman said.

Rich Warren, who has taught criminal justice at the school for eight years, compared the smell to "a Porta-Potty at the race track on a hot day."

Warren, one of the plaintiffs in the lawsuit, which was filed in May 2003, said he has experienced excruciating headaches and required sinus surgery because of the bad air at the school. He believes harmful levels of hydrogen sulfide gas, a known sewer by-product, are being released into the school.

"There is no question in my mind that there are chemicals in the air there (at the school) that are dangerous to the teachers and the students," Warren said.

David Francis, one of the Las Vegas attorneys representing the students and teachers, said his clients' primary goal is to get their school back.

"This is arguably the top school in the district, the students have to apply to study there," Francis said, noting the campus had been honored by the U.S. Education Department last year for outstanding test scores. "They just want an environment where they can learn."

Bill Hoffman, senior counsel for the district, declined to discuss the specifics of the lawsuit.

"We are defending against the allegations because we believe they are unfounded, but it would be inappropriate to discuss it in further detail while the case is pending," Hoffman said.

Pam Young, who has taught law classes at the school since it opened in 1994, said she has struggled with a variety of symptoms and illnesses including lung irritation. Young said one of her doctors is encouraging her to seek a transfer to another school, something she has put off in the hopes that the district would finally solve the problem.

"We've been dismissed and ignored," Young said. "That's why we went to the attorneys."

Dr. Tom Higgins, an emergency medicine physician at University Medical Center who is also board certified in medical toxicology, said he was unaware of any studies that showed physical harm from low-level exposure to common sewer gases. Standard tests by any Haz-Mat team would show if there were dangerous levels, Higgins said.

"For harm to occur you need high levels of exposure in a confined area," Higgins said. "What's the real problem here -- mysterious gases that no one can find or people and attorneys trying to make money off the district?"

Mark Merchant, spokesman for the Environmental Protection Agency's regional office in San Francisco, said accidental overexposure to high levels of hydrogen sulfide gas can result in respiratory illnesses, eye and nasal irritation and even death. In a report released in June the EPA concluded there was inadequate research data to estimate the effects of lower levels of exposure over extended periods of time, Merchant said.

David Hassenzahl, assistant professor of environmental studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said there have been studies that show physical symptoms can result from stressful situations.

"If people are experiencing unpleasant odors and don't know where they're coming from, that can be a source of stress," said Hassenzahl, who specializes in risk assessment. "That alone might result physical illness even if there's nothing chemical causing it."

A person's sense of smell ideally serves as a danger detector, Hassenzahl said. Natural gas companies actually add reduced sulfur compounds to their nearly odorless product so that people will smell leaks, Hassenzahl said.

"It's when the levels of hydrogen sulfide gas are so high that you can't smell it, you're overwhelmed, that the potential for danger is likely to be much greater," Hassenzahl said.