'Above and beyond': Marietta schools staff celebrated for response to broken pipes

Jan. 18—MARIETTA — Nine school system employees were given a hero's welcome Wednesday in recognition of their work over the holidays to respond to burst pipes at local schools, caused by the winter storm over the Christmas weekend.

Marietta City Schools maintenance staff were treated to a catered lunch in the cafeteria of the Emily Lembeck Learning Center, which they personally cleaned up the day after Christmas. Later, they were celebrated by hundreds of screaming students at an indoor parade at Sawyer Road Elementary, where they labored for hours to remove water and debris.

"They're behind-the-scenes folks, and everybody deserves a parade every now and then," said Sawyer Road Principal Susan Graves. "We call them hero parades around here, and for this particular event, they certainly were our heroes."

District Maintenance Director Jimmy Pace said the problems started with a water leak in the ceiling of a restroom at the early learning center.

"While we were here (the early center), the sprinkler pipes thawed out enough to let loose. So then the sprinklers started pouring water in the cafeteria, hundreds and hundreds of gallons a minute. Then right after that, the hot water line turned loose in the cafeteria," Pace said.

Staff worked quickly to get the water turned off and clean it up as soon as possible, Pace said. But before they were done at the early learning center, Sawyer Road suffered burst pipes, both in its regular lines and sprinkler lines.

Sawyer Road's problems were more involved, Pace said. Four classrooms were impacted, along with the school's cafeteria and media center.

Graves was at home the day after Christmas, with a house full of people, when she got a call about the burst pipes from district Chief Operating Officer Chuck Gardner.

There was no delay in kids returning to school after the break, though. The impact on learning was not as bad as Graves initially feared — one teacher was displaced from their classroom for about three days, and the media center was back online after a week or so.

"We just are very appreciative, because they give up their time and energy," Graves said. "My understanding is they did it because they wanted the kids to get back as soon as possible. So I think that goes to show what Marietta is, it's kids first."

Gardner said the district is still tallying up the cost, but that the damages amount to more than $100,000.

"We're just appreciative of our guys and putting kids first and trying to provide world class service to our schools," Gardner said.

Workers stayed at Sawyer Road cleaning up water and debris until 2 a.m., according to Pace. Within 12 hours of the pipes bursting, the vast majority of water had been removed, and within 20 hours, an outside contractor had brought in all the equipment needed to mitigate the damage.

That equipment included fans and dehumidifiers which ran for days. The next task was repairing ceilings, plumbing systems and sprinkler systems.

Sawyer Road's cafeteria, alone, had 49 fans, a dehumidifier that had to be mounted on a 30-foot trailer, and a generator to power it all, Pace said.

Pace said his maintenance team is about 20 employees — "small but mighty" — responsible for maintaining 1.6 million square feet of facilities.

"We've got a phenomenal team. I'd match them against anybody in the state," he said.

Pace confirmed to the MDJ that his staff would be paid overtime for their work.

"You all will see it on your next checks," he said, turning to his colleagues as they chowed down on lunch from Carrabba's Italian Grill.

That afternoon, Pace and his colleagues walked the halls of Sawyer Road, high-fiving cheering students who held signs showing their appreciation.

The workers honored were Pace, Richard Collett, Robert Collett, Jeff Alvey, Anthony Munn, Thomas Hembree, Estefania Arias, Rocio Arteaga and Alfonso Villamisar.

"This is just an example of Marietta City Schools, they go above and beyond," Pace said of the district's gesture.