KENSINGTON, Md. — An asbestos warning sign at the construction site for a new Bethesda-Chevy Chase Cluster middle school has alarmed some residents who live in the Kensington neighborhood.
The neighbors complain that the school system could improve its communications with the public about the project. Asbestos causes cancer.
“I told my grandchildren that I thought they should stop walking their dog by that site, at least for the time being,” says Kathleen Holmay, who lives within two blocks of where the Montgomery County Public Schools is building the middle school.
The site was once home to Kensington Junior High School, which was demolished long ago and was turned into a park. Montgomery County Public Schools leaders hope the new school will ease overcrowding at Westland Middle School, the only middle school in the Bethesda-Chevy Chase Cluster.
“We just saw that sign appear … and we saw guys in hazmat suits with masks on looking like they’re doing something pretty serious up there,” says John Sonnier who lives across the street.
A spokesman for MCPS says that construction has been temporarily halted because the excavation has uncovered the asbestos floor tiles from the demolished school.
“We have coordinated with the required state agencies and intend to start the abatement process,” MCPS spokesman Derek Turner said in an email.
The hazardous materials operation is scheduled to begin Monday, Turner said.
Meanwhile, neighbors say they wish the school system would provide more information about the construction project and some say posting an asbestos project sign on the site’s chain link fence appears to them to be the minimum requirement.
“The original school was buried under the ground here, and it would have been good for MCPS to let us known that that school originally had asbestos,” says Laura Dennis, a neighbor.
The school system hopes to open the new middle school in 2017.
