State spends $550,000 on fire watch at International High School
By Jayed Rahman
Published: August 19, 2015
The New Jersey School Development Authority (SDA) spent $550,000 for a six-year fire watch at International High School on Grand Street.
Fire watch officers were assigned to the school from September 2008 through September 2014, said Edye Maier, spokeswoman for the SDA.
“The fire watch was in place while the building underwent a retrofit of the smoke evacuation system and installation of an upgraded smoke control panel,” said Maier.
The fire watch was part of an agreement that allowed the high school to obtain a temporary certificate of occupancy from the city. The city’s fire department provided a fire fighter for the fire watch; however, in 2009 the SDA opted to hire a private company that provided the fire watch, said school officials.
School district officials have said the Grand Street high school obtained a permanent certificate of occupancy in June 2014.
International High School was the last high school built by the state in Paterson. The four-story, 113,927-square-foot school building designed to educate 528 students includes 15 general classrooms, a computer-aided design (CAD) room, four science labs, a technology lab, a home economics room, language labs, art rooms, music rooms, a gymnasium, an auditorium, a cafeteria, and a kitchen, according to state records.
In another fire watch earlier this year, the owner of an industrial building on Shady Street owed the city $97,920, after a 102 day watch. A fireman was posted out side of the building 24 hours a day.
The high school, erected over a demolished public housing project, opened in September 2008.