photos by Boyd Loving
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, In July 2018, after a fire occurred in a classroom at the district’s Willard Elementary School. A subsequent inspection of a “smart plug” installations identified other similar devices at Willard and Orchard Elementary School that exhibited heat damage leading the district to promptly remove the devices in August 2018.
On October 28th Ridgewood Board of Education filed a lawsuit against five companies, seeking a refund and damages for purchase and installation of what it now claims were faulty “smart plugs” that started a fire at one school and others showed heat damage.
In a four-count complaint filed in Superior Court in Bergen County. The School board is seeking refunds totaling $431,704 paid to two companies, Johnson Controls and Boz Electrical Contractors for the purchase and installation. The BOE is also seeking compensatory damages for what it termed design, manufacturing and installation defects.
Ridgewood High School was recently awarded a Lemelson-MIT InvenTeam grant in the amount of $8500.00 to create a “Solar Aqua Tech” portable reusable water-sanitizing bottle. The Ridgewood blogs suggests next time the district have the students design and build the next “smart plugs”!
https://theridgewoodblog.net/ridgewood-superintendent-of-schools-addresses-willard-school-fire/
https://theridgewoodblog.net/fire-heavily-damages-classroom-at-the-willard-elementary-school/
Does the school really need to spend 1/2 million $$$ on Smart Plugs?
This is why the school budget is so bloated.
(and probably why they want to take your school budget vote away…)
Love to see the business case for this. Where would the 1/2 million of savings that would justify this come from? And don’t say something soft and unmeasurable like “increased security”
What exactly is a smart plug? What does it do?
Sue the bastards!
Just vote no!
Half Million on Smart Plugs.
No wonder they don’t like Dani & Kwak questions.
Why did it take 2 years and 3 months to file the lawsuit?
Joe Biden has plugs but they are not “smart”. Obviously…
What official signed off on the electrical inspection?
This is the prestigious Willard School District. Anything goes!