Last week Scarborough School Board members and School Department employees painted problems with the sewer system at the high school as minor problems that can be expected with any large construction project.

The superintendent and at least one School Board member also expressed frustration at the amount of scrutiny the construction of the high school has received.

The problems between the board and the council began during the initial construction of the $27 million high school. Councilor Jeffrey Messer was at the forefront of a series of inquiries into the quality of construction. At the time, the board spent more than $20,000 to have the building inspected. After three backups and a four-inch sag were found in a portion of the school’s sewer system, councilors again began asking questions about the quality of the construction work.

At Wednesday’s Council meeting Councilor Sean Babine requested that a joint meeting be held with the board. The council voted not to hold a meeting, waiting instead for Thursday’s Board meeting to see if their questions were answered.

Members of the Town Council had been invited to hear a presentation on the high school’s sewer problems and to ask any questions they had about the recent repairs at last Thursday’s School Board meeting.

Norm Justice, the School Department’s facilities manager, gave the presentation on the three backups that occurred in the acid neutralization tank required to handle any waste from the science labs. After his presentation, members of both the school board and the Town Council asked questions.

In Justice’s presentation he addressed a number of the Council’s questions, saying the backups were not severe and small problems are to be expected, there was never any danger to students and that the Board was forthcoming with all information

After Justice’s presentation and during the discussions about the sewer, the meeting turned to placing blame for the poor relationship between the council and the School Board.

Board member David Beneman partially blamed bad relations between the Board and the Council on Council Chairman Steve Ross during Ross’s questions about the high school construction.

“There is a slim majority in the Town Council that has repeatedly kicked the School Board in the head,” said Beneman. “I really want to address this to you. You’re the chairman,” he told Ross.

Beneman told Ross he believes there were many 4-3 Council votes that harmed the School Board that may have gone differently if Ross had gone against the majority.

“We wouldn’t have had budget cuts if you hadn’t jumped on the bandwagon,” said Beneman. He added that there wouldn’t be problems between the board and the council if Ross had voted differently in many cases.

Ross ignored Beneman’s comments and returned to his questions about the high school’s construction.

Superintendent William Michaud opened the meeting by saying that he hoped that Justice’s presentation would be an end to the controversy over the high school construction.

“Once again, I would say we have political action to maybe undermine the School Department,” said Michaud. “Once again, we have letters to the editor that are breathtaking in their falsehoods. What we had occur was a very minor backup in the system and Mr. Justice very appropriately took action.”

During Justice’s presentation he praised all the contractors involved in the high school’s construction, including Pizzagalli, the company responsible for the pipes and the recent repairs.

“I can’t say enough about Pizzagalli and the sub contractors,” said Justice. “This is the best project I’ve seen in 18 or 19 years.”

He also said air quality testing was never necessary and students were never in any danger. “Anyone who took the time to do a simple search would find that dioxin isn’t even in this kind of waste,” said Justice.

According to Justice, the repairs to the sewer were not only minor but that these kinds of problems often happen with large construction projects. He told the board that when the middle school was built the boiler broke one year after the school opened. The manufacturer claimed it wasn’t installed properly and the town paid $20,000 to replace it.

After further investigation by Justice he did find a problem with the boiler, had a report done by the University of Maine and presented it to the manufacturer. Ultimately, the town was paid back.

“That’s just one example of what I do for the town of Scarborough,” said Justice.

Justice also said no information was ever kept from the Board. Initially, said Justice, the backups did not cause any red flags. It was only when Clean Harbors emptied the acid neutralization tank on May 18 that Justice started to suspect there might be a further problem.

At that time, said Justice, he called EcoClean to come and investigate the pipes. As soon as he received the report on June 12 he reported it to Michaud and called Pizzagalli to come and repair the four-inch sag in the pipe.

Councilor Carol Rancourt was also at the meeting and praised both Justice and the Board.

“By being a former member of this board I have complete faith in Norm,” said Rancourt. “I can’t say how much Norm has cared about our buildings and our school department.”

Rancourt also said that since she has been on multiple building committees she believes errors are inevitable. “This project has gotten undue scrutiny, and not everyone has been involved in a major building project,” she said. “In every single building I’ve been involved with there have been problems. You can’t do major construction without some kind of problem.”

After Rancourt, Ross began to ask Justice about how long the high school will be under warrantee.

Beneman answered for Justice saying that those are legal questions Justice can’t answer. According to Beneman, there are different warrantees for different areas of the high school. Some things, such as the roof, said Beneman, have a longer warrantee.

Board member Diane Messer asked that the entire sewer system be checked as soon as possible. “I don’t have a problem with the Town Council,” said Messer. “I do have a problem with this Board. We keep saying words like ‘minor’ and ‘routine.’ How do we know that there aren’t more problems?”

Beneman answered Messer, saying that there are no signs of other problems and that there can be no guarantees.

“David, we’re just not going to agree on this,” said Messer.

At the end, Michaud told the Board he hopes the sewer problems are well behind them.

“What have we learned?” said Michaud. “We learned that it was routine. It was fixed. It’s over. Anyone who tries to claim more is just trying to gain political opinion.”