GUSD officials halt construction operation at Horace Mann Elementary

When a mother dropped off her son at a local school for a winter camp on Tuesday, she became concerned when she saw construction workers using a cement mixer to pour concrete on the playground near her son’s classroom.

The area where a crew from Glendale-based Blu Construction was pouring concrete on a portion of a walkway was not blocked off from students, said parent Tania Saroyan, so she alerted Glendale Unified school officials.

The “cloud” that the cement truck reportedly produced also concerned her because her son has had severe respiratory infections in the past.

“My heart was in my stomach,” she said.

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Glendale school officials shut down the operation within 30 minutes, said Kristine Nam, communications director for Glendale Unified.

The crew had originally planned to pour concrete at Horace Mann on Dec. 28, when no children were present on campus.

However, when rain fell on that day, the crew postponed the work and returned on Tuesday to complete it, unaware that a winter camp was being held in a portable classroom on the playground, Nam said.

School officials apologized to Saroyan.

“They recognized it was a mistake,” Saroyan said.

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Kelly Corrigan, kelly.corrigan@latimes.com

Twitter: @kellymcorrigan