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Something’s foul at the Alternative High School. 

During the heavy rains, water seeped into some classrooms, soaking carpets and leaving a moldy stench in its wake, a school health specialist said. The flooding has been recurrent, she said, but only now is the Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) doing something about it. 

“It smells very bad,” said Milana Russin, 17, a student at the alternative school. “I remember I had to sit outside the classroom, it was so bad.” 

Russin’s English class accumulates water from both an overhead leak by the blackboard and water creeping up from the ground that leaves one- to three-foot wide puddles, she said.  

“I think there’s some drainage issues outside the classroom, because when it rains, all the water runs toward my classroom and just seeps in,” said Russin’s teacher, Andrea Pritchard. 

Alternative High School Principal Victor Diaz enlightened the district’s facilities department about the water seepage some two weeks ago, said Facilities Director Lew Jones. 

But Joy Moore, who educates students on health issues at the alternative school, claimed flooding has gone on much longer, and both Diaz and the school’s former principal have complained to the district. 

Diaz did not return calls to check that out.  

Jones said it is possible that Director of Maintenance Rhonda Bacot, who resigned a few weeks ago, knew about the high school’s flooding and odor problems. Jones is assuming Bacot’s position until a new maintenance chief is hired. 

Moore fears the flooding affects the well-being of her students, particularly those who are sensitive to allergens. 

“My point is, even if I help them eat better, exercise, get healthy, I send them back into classrooms that could trigger asthma,” she said. 

Pritchard confirmed that a few students have reacted badly to the odor. 

“I have some asthmatic students and there were one or two days when students refused to come into the classroom because of the smell,” she said. She does not, however, have any reason to believe this poses a health hazard, she said.  

The district has not yet conducted an assessment to determine possible health effects. 

The facility was completed in winter of 1999-2000. It comprises about 10 portable classrooms bookended by permanent buildings on Martin Luther King Jr. Way at Ward Street, and plays host to an additional BUSD campus, the Independent Study program. 

Independent Study Coordinator Mary-Louise Newling said water buildup is affecting her buildings, too. 

Though water does not typically infiltrate the program’s classrooms, she said there is some accumulation by the bathrooms. 

“This has been an ongoing problem,” she said. “My concern is there’s a smell at certain times in the bathrooms, and I’m concerned what the water is doing to the [building’s] foundation.” 

Maintenance staff visited the site on Friday, Newling said. Jones expects a full assessment to take place in the next 10 days or so. 

“We’re following up on it,” he said. 

Until then, the exact cause of the leakage remains a mystery.  

Urban legend points to the existence of a buried creek meandering beneath the school, said Ecology Center Executive Director Martin Bourque, which would explain why the site’s soil is perennially muddy. Lime treatments and other preventative measures were ordered up during the planning process to ready the soil for development, Jones said. But it may not have been enough. 

Drains in the area need a revamp, Bourque said. 

“They knew about the drainage issues, they just didn’t do a very good job designing [the school],” Bourque said.  

The lead architect for the project has since retired. Other project developers could not be reached for comment by press time. 

As for a solution, “My understanding is you can either look at where new drains need to be put. That’s the expensive route,” said Bourque. “Then there’s the band-aid solution which is where you can put in sandbags” and other stopgaps. 

Newling said the site is already fortified with water bags, and that a recommendation for new drains and pumping to move water away from district buildings was put forth.  

“I’m hoping we can get this remedied,” she said. “It smells, it’s bad for the foundation and there’s the possibility of mold.”