Quake Damage Closes Gym

Hidden damage from the Northridge earthquake has caused school administrators to shut the gym at Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth and sent federal inspectors scouring the school for other signs of hazardous conditions.

The damage was uncovered last week after falling acoustical tiles prompted an inspection of the gymnasium. Federal disaster officials, called in because the ceiling appeared to be sagging, discovered that wires and clips connecting the ceiling to its support structure had been damaged by the temblor almost three years ago, in January 1994.

“The moment we realized there was more extensive damage, we advised the principal to close the gym for safety because we didn’t want to take any chances,” said Julie Crum, the Los Angeles Unified School District’s director of design and inspection.

But the closure--which some parents complain has been shrouded in secrecy--has left the school without any large indoor meeting room; its multipurpose room has been closed for almost three years due to earthquake damage.

Crum said the extent of damage to the gym is not yet clear. “We hope to know in the next week or so how long the repairs will take,” she said. “We know it’s hard for a school when all of its major rooms are out of commission.”

The discovery has shaken some Lawrence pupils’ parents, who wonder whether other undiscovered earthquake-related hazards are jeopardizing their children.

“If the gym has a problem and we’re just finding out about it three years later, how do we know there isn’t other damage that hasn’t been found yet,” said Corinne Pincus, whose daughter Caitlan is in the sixth grade. “How do we know the school is safe?”

But Crum said that as earthquake repairs proceed, it is inevitable that new problems appear. Damage is still being discovered occasionally at many schools near the earthquake’s epicenter in the northern San Fernando Valley.

“It’s somewhat the nature of earthquake damage,” she said. “You can’t always see it until you get in there. . . . Oftentimes you’re in construction and you take a floor off and discover the concrete underneath is cracked. Or you’re filling in cracks in the wall and you remove the lockers and discover they extend into the floor.”

Crum said the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the state Office of Emergency Services maintain a special Hidden Damage Team to deal with such problems.

It is not yet clear, she said, whether the ceiling can be repaired or must be replaced.

In the meantime, physical education classes have been meeting on the school playground or--on rainy days like Monday--assembling in locker rooms, showers, the weight room or classrooms, where they play games or watch videotapes.

On Monday, some boys’ gym classes were treated to a videotape of last month’s championship boxing match between Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield. Other classes played volleyball in the shower room.

Coaches at nearby Mason Recreation Center--a city park that sponsors more than 50 teams in its junior basketball leagues--have been scrambling to find practice sites because many of their teams use the Lawrence school’s gym.

Many people are angry because they were not notified by school officials that the gym had been closed. Parents said they were not informed when school Principal Scott Schmerelson closed the gym two weeks ago.

“A lot of us are absolutely fit to be tied,” said Diana Dixon-Davis, a parent who serves on several of the school’s leadership councils. “The principal did not tell the parents, and did not even take the PE teachers aside and say, ‘Here are your alternatives for classes in the rain.’ ”

“So [last] Thursday the kids were sent out in the rain for PE,” she said. “A parent called me furious because her kid came home soaking wet.”