Richmond Superintendent can't recall if he knew about alarm issues before Fox fire

'Obviously this was a clear misstep'

By: Melissa Hipolit
Posted at 7:26 AM, Jun 14, 2022
and last updated 12:21 PM, Jun 14, 2022

RICHMOND, Va. — Richmond Public Schools (RPS) Superintendent Jason Kamras said he did not recall if he knew about a multitude of issues with the fire alarm panels at multiple schools prior to a catastrophic fire that destroyed William Fox Elementary.

"Obviously this was a clear misstep, so I am not going to try to convince anyone otherwise. Clearly, this should have been fixed. It wasn't," Kamras said in an interview with CBS 6 Problem Solver Melissa Hipolit.

As fire alarms started failing throughout the Richmond Public School System in late December through early February, staff submitted work orders, and Richmond Schools facilities contacted the alarm monitoring company, Richmond Alarm.

And, yet, after a catastrophic fire that destroyed Fox Elementary School, Richmond Alarm found at least 25 Richmond school buildings had alarm panels that were not testing properly, including Fox.

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But, the reality is none were fixed.

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