By Jennifer Mrozowski
The Cincinnati Enquirer

New superintendent Alton Frailey helps Antonius Crooms, a first-grader, with a math problem Friday at Washington Park Elementary. (Glenn Hartong photos) | ZOOM |

Just three days before the Cincinnati school board is expected to make a crucial decision on school construction plans, Superintendent Alton Frailey got his first look at two of the district's deteriorating buildings.

After inspecting drafty windows, cracked ceiling tiles, water spots where roofs leaked and outdated heating systems Friday morning, Mr. Frailey said the district's schools need to be repaired despite the failure of a $480 million bond issue.

"You can't expect teachers and students to excel and then put them in such dilapidated conditions," he said as he walked through Taft High School, built in 1954.

Mr. Frailey, who assumed his new job Nov. 11, launched a weekly tour of Cincinnati schools, beginning with Taft High in the West End and Washington Park Elementary in Over-the-Rhine. He intends to visit all 79 schools in the district by the end of the school year.

The board of education on Monday is expected to decide whether to continue with the first segment of a four-phase $1 billion school construction project.

Because the bond issue failed Nov. 5, the school district only has enough money to pay for the first phase, which includes building 15 schools and renovating two others. Renovations for Taft High were planned for the third phase, while a new Washington Park, estimated at $15.5 million, is in the first phase.

Loose ceiling tiles at Washington Park are evident on Mr. Frailey's tour Friday. He intends to inspect every school in the district. | ZOOM |

The board could decide to postpone phase one and spread the nearly $300 million for that phase across all schools. But Mr. Frailey said that won't resolve costly problems, such as making buildings compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

"That won't cover all the needs,'' he said. "We're not talking about building Taj Mahals, just adequate school buildings."

Taft High, partly renovated two years ago when it was turned into an information technology high school, was a study in contrasts Friday.

Air-conditioned, high-tech computer labs house state-of-the-art technology equipment and computer servers that look like time machines.

But just down the hall, cold air sailed through gaps in aging aluminum frame windows in rooms where ceilings showed water spots from rain leaking through.

"You go into the labs and then you pop back into the real world," said Principal Anthony Smith.

Less than a mile away at Washington Park Elementary, Mr. Frailey saw more drafty windows and exposed wiring and pipes running along low-hung ceilings. The three-story box-like building, built in 1958, lacks an elevator, which the principal said makes it difficult for students with disabilities.

"The heat works in some of the rooms," said Principal Mary Goodwin Corbin. "In other rooms, it doesn't.''Cornella Reynolds, a sixth-grader, said she met a woman in a shoe store who had driven past the school and thought it was condemned.

"That made me feel uncomfortable," said Cornella, who said students learn to deal with cold rooms.

"The kids have to put on their coats," she said.

Mr. Frailey declined to say when he would ask voters again to approve a bond issue but said sooner makes economic sense.

Interest rates on long-terms bonds are at a 40-year low - about 4.5 percent. Every percentage point increase adds $70 million to the interest costs over the life a 28-year bond, said Treasurer Michael Geoghegan.Mr. Frailey acknowledged that the district and the schools are doing their best to patch up leaking ceilings and walls, paint hallways and repair aged heating systems.

"I am seeing signs of doing things," he said. "But there's only so much you can put paint on."

E-mail jmrozowski@enquirer.com