School cafeteria can't reopen yet
The cafeteria at School 25 in the Jersey City Heights section flunked an inspection by city health officials yesterday morning when they found fresh mouse droppings, city and school officials said.
The cafeteria, which serves 723 kindergarten through fifth-graders, was shut Tuesday.
Inspectors yesterday found mouse droppings in the kitchen and dining area and it appears the exterminator called in by school officials treated the area for a cockroach problem instead of mice infestation, said city spokeswoman Jennifer Morrill.
School officials were told they need to put down glue traps and seal openings around entry doors so mice can't enter the building, Morrill said.
"We are not looking to fine them (the Board of Education)," Morrill added. "We are looking to insure that the cafeteria is safe and that no one gets sick from any diseases that could possibly spread from mice activity."
An employee at the Kennedy Boulevard school, who didn't want to be identified, said the mice problem is nothing new and has spread to classrooms.
"And now that food is being eaten in the classrooms it is going to get worse," the worker said.
Custodians were scheduled to work though the night if necessary to rectify the problem, said Board of Education spokesman Gerard Crisonino.
Students at the school ate breakfast and lunch in their classrooms, which would be cleaned thoroughly at the end of the day, Crisonino said.
The school had cold lunches brought in, he said. Normally, the school doesn't prepare hot meals, but heats food already prepared in the kitchen, he said.
In the meantime, some 300 students and their teachers at the School 23 Annex on Duncan Avenue went without heat Wednesday afternoon and half of yesterday due to a broken valve on the school's furnace, Crisonino said. The boiler was fixed yesterday about 1 p.m., he said.
