Arson investigators are tracking the cause of a fire that damaged six classrooms at Kahului Elementary School on Friday night and will keep its 960 students off campus until Thursday.
“I was just saddened because it appears — and I know it’s still pending investigation — it appears that it was arson,” said state Rep. Justin Woodson, who has two children in the school. “It’s troubling because all they are doing is hurting kids.”
“Why would you burn down parts of a school for kids?” he asked. “I just don’t understand it.”
The fire involved classrooms in a central building as well as portable classroom in a different area, suggesting that it was deliberately set. It also affected the school’s water lines, according to the Department of Education.
No one was hurt. Damage was estimated at $1.2 million, with $900,000 in structural damage and $300,000 in damage to contents, according to the Maui Police Department.
“Half of the building was obliterated in terms of the fire engulfing it,” Woodson said. “In the back of the campus, a portable was completely consumed by fire.”
News spread quickly after the fire broke out at 9:30 p.m. Friday. Firefighters brought the blaze under control at 11 p.m. and extinguished it by 12:50 a.m. Saturday.
“Everyone was heartbroken,” said Woodson’s wife, Stacy, who attended the school herself as a child. “They were shocked that in our neighborhood, our community, this kind of thing happened. … When you see the building, it’s sad. It’s all charred up and the grass is black.”
The school will remain closed to students until Thursday as dangerous sites are secured and staff work out logistical and academic contingency plans.
Students in preschool through fifth grade attend the Central Maui school. The damaged classrooms housed third- and fourth-graders.
The fire has prompted an upwelling of support from the community, including online donations to a Kahului School Fire Relief Fund set up by Stephanie Castro, president of the Parent Teacher Student Association. Donations to Kahului School PTSA are tax-deductible and will go to replace items that were lost.
Although some people were eager to drop off donations of school supplies, administrators asked to delay such gifts until Dec. 18 or later, since space is at a premium as they scramble to find room for displaced students on campus.
“The biggest push in terms of support is simply monetary donations through the Kahului PTSA,” said Stacy Woodson, a PTSA officer. “There is no storage problem with money.”
“The DOE is probably going to do a lot of the replacement as far as the building space and the hard material like furniture,” she said. “But a lot of miscellaneous things won’t be covered.”
In April 2010 a fire gutted three classrooms at the school and caused an estimated $500,000 in damage.
Monetary donations may made payable to Kahului School PTSA, c/o Kahului Elementary, 410 Hina Ave., Kahului, HI 96732; or online at www.gofundme.com/welove-KES.
