Cinco de Mayo at School Goes Up in Flames

It may not be much of a Cinco de Mayo for the students at Malabar Street School in Boyle Heights. An arson fire early Thursday swept through a three-story building at the predominantly Latino campus, causing an estimated $250,000 in damage.

Beyond the classrooms, textbooks and equipment lost in the blaze, teachers and students were most upset about the loss of 20 brand new folklorico costumes that were to be worn next Friday during the school’s festivities marking the May 5, 1862, victory of a small, ragtag Mexican army over French troops.

“We got the costumes in yesterday,” moaned second-grade teacher Lorena Fuentes. “Now they’re gone.”

She had stored the brightly colored clothing in Room 35, where authorities said the fire apparently was set about 1:30 a.m.

Some students fretted about other props to be used in next week’s long-anticipated festivities.

“Our (hand-made) machetes got burned up,” said Jose Omedo, a dejected 7-year-old.

Hearing the youngster’s lament, Fuentes ventured: “Maybe we’ll use rulers.”

Nearly 50 firefighters went to the Eastside school in the 3200 block of East Malabar Street when a fire was reported in the middle floor. Fire officials said the flames spread from Fuentes’ classroom, eventually gutting three other classrooms and burning a hole in the roof. The fire was controlled in 45 minutes. It was contained to one of several buildings on the school grounds.

Arson investigators were certain that the blaze was intentionally set. Obscenities were scrawled in red paint in some of the damaged classrooms.

School Vandalized

Principal Alma Pena-Sanchez said the fire may have been the work of young street toughs who in the past have vandalized the school for no apparent reason.

“This is the work of some misguided young people,” Pena-Sanchez said.

As work crews and fire investigators sifted through the charred classrooms, the principal and other administrators scrambled to keep the school open.

Malabar is used as a voting precinct for local elections, and in the fire’s aftermath the cardboard polling booths were pressed into service as temporary classroom walls, allowing four classes to meet in the school auditorium.

It was a noisy scene as Room 40 in one corner fashioned crayon-decorated folders for personal papers while, in another, Room 39 struggled with multiplication problems. Two other classes, including Fuentes’ second-graders, were squeezed into the school library.

Pupils to Be Bused

Next week, at least two sixth-grade classes will be bused to two Eastside elementary schools, Harrison and Kennedy, for the rest of the school year because of fire damage. And administration of the state assessment program test for third- and sixth-graders, scheduled for Thursday, was put off until next week.

Eventually, though, the talk came back to the Cinco de Mayo celebration.

“Hey, we’ll keep going,” Pena-Sanchez vowed. “We’ll have it, but it may not be much.”