Santa Fe Middle School closed due to gas leaks

For the third time in a month, a Cleveland ISD campus is being closed due to gas leaks. On Thursday, Santa Fe Middle School, located in the Colony Ridge communities south of Plum Grove, experienced gas leaks that caused the building to be evacuated. Students were sent next door to Santa Fe Elementary School, which had gas leaks on two prior occasions.

The gas leaks at Santa Fe Elementary School are fixed, but now the school district must address problems at the middle school, according to Cleveland ISD Superintendent Stephen McCanless, who is understandably frustrated that these issues keep arising on buildings that were just recently constructed.

“We are assessing the situation right now at the middle school. We have transportation folks on standby in the event that we dismiss early,” he said. “Parents who want to collect their middle school students are welcome to do so now. Otherwise, they will remain at the elementary school until we make a decision about whether or not we will dismiss early.”

McCanless said the District will be hiring investigators to determine the source of the leaks.

Santa Fe Elementary and Santa Fe Middle School were first opened in August 2022. Both campuses are located on the 7400 block of CR 3540 in the Santa Fe community of Colony Ridge, south of Plum Grove. Both were built by Pogue Construction, using plans designed by Huckabee Architects with Lockwood, Andrews and Newnam, Inc. (LAN) serving as the construction manager.

The two campuses were funded through a portion of a $198 million, “zero tax rate increase” bond that was approved by voters in 2019. 

UPDATE: According to Cleveland ISD:

A quick update on the gas smell issues at Santa Fe Middle school today. 

Repairmen were on campus this morning completing final work from a repair project on a hot water heater from Wednesday, March 22nd.  Unbeknownst to the repairmen, as they purged the gas line to clear out air pockets it was forcing natural gas out of the unit’s exhaust system which caused it to collect in a room next to the hot water heater.  

Even though there was NO LEAK present today on campus, it was still the safe and responsible decision to move all Santa Fe Middle students next door to Santa Fe Elementary until the exact cause of the smell could be determined.

Repairmen have completed the work on the hot water heater and the campus is safe for students to return.

Friday will be a regular school day at Santa Fe Middle School.  Thank you parents for your understanding and patience as we work diligently to keep every student and every staff member safe in our facilities.