BROKEN ARROW, Okla. — Five classrooms at Union Public Schools’ Moore Elementary who have been without heat since early October likely won’t have it fixed until next year.
While this has been an issue for a couple of months, it’s become more of a concern due to the cold winter weather.
With their holiday break a little more than a week away, Union Public Schools said they’re doing what they can to minimize disruptions inside the affected classrooms.
According to Joshua Robinson, the Director of Operations for Union Public Schools, the school realized the five classrooms didn’t have heat when they performed their winter checks.
“When we did our winter checks going from cooling season to winter season, we noticed that several of our older RTU units had compromised heat exchangers, so it’s not safe to run them when those things are compromised,” said Robinson.
Unfortunately, Robinson said this happens every year.
“We lose heat exchangers every winter. It’s a part of the heater that goes out over time and so when we find one that’s bad, we turn it off and order a new one.”
Beyond Moore Elementary, this issue affects multiple other schools within the Union school district during the winter.
“We have 25 properties, so we have heat exchangers that go out all over the district, so there’s other spaces around that are dealing with this as well.”
While this is a common problem, Robinson said it’s rare for this many heaters to go out at one school. He explained the units at Moore are older, so the district is looking to replace them and has put them out for a bid.
“We could make repairs to them, but these units are so old we felt it was a better use of public dollars to buy new ones instead of repairing an old janky one. We have a bid out for all new units and it opens next week.”
Until then, students will be staying bundled up in their classrooms with jackets and blankets.
The heat in the five Moore Elementary classrooms is set to be restored in January or February at the latest.