RICHMOND, Va. -- In the weeks leading up to a massive fire that destroyed William Fox Elementary School, a Richmond Fire Department captain warned leaders with Richmond Public Schools of "extreme neglect" to fire safety and accused the district of a "complete lack of effort" ensuring schools were safe for occupancy.
On February 11, 2022, the night Fox Elementary went up in flames, the school remained in violation of eight fire codes including a faulty fire alarm panel.
The violations were documented during an inspection conducted in August 2021 — six months before the fire.
Though they were supposed to have been fixed and then checked by the fire department for compliance within a month, a reinspection never took place.
In efforts to investigate why not, the CBS 6 Problem Solvers obtained dozens of pages of communication records between the fire department and the school district through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. FOIA grants the public access to documents held by government agencies.
Those emails detailed what were described as "ongoing roadblocks" to the Richmond Fire Department's attempts to do its job to complete required annual school inspections across the district.
The contents of the records led to Richmond Public Schools (RPS) Superintendent Jason Kamras and Richmond Fire Chief Melvin Carter sitting down with CBS 6 Problem Solver Tyler Layne for an exclusive joint interview.
“I can't recall a school fire of this magnitude in recent years, at least in my tenure as an employee for the City of Richmond, and that goes back to the '80s," Chief Carter said in his first interview about the Fox fire since the day after it happened. "It was a taxing event from the number of resources that were used and a taxing event in answering the many FOIAs that existed. In its totality, it has been a pretty daunting experience."
Between 2019 and early 2022, RFD and RPS relied on Dropbox links, emails, and in-person interactions to keep record of inspections, schedule inspections, and share information about violations.
"The process wasn't efficient. We could have done better, I think the chief would agree, on both sides," Superintendent Kamras said. "And we've learned from that."
The records showed a majority of the communication between RFD Deputy Fire Marshal William Spindle and RPS Director of Facilities Bobby Hathaway.
Spindle also heightened correspondence to RPS cabinet officials including Chief of Staff Michelle Hudacsko and former Chief Operating Officer Alana Gonzalez when he ran into issues accessing facilities to fulfill inspections.
“It was brought to my attention at some point that our fire marshals were having some difficulty getting back into the schools," Chief Carter said.
The first documentation of a challenge arose in April 2020 when schools were closed due to the COVID-19 shutdown.
Spindle emailed Kamras alerting him of troubles gaining access to buildings and asking for contacts who could help remedy the problem.
In March 2021, Hudacsko emailed Spindle that RPS wanted to schedule updated inspections and correct outstanding issues, asking for a list of violations as RPS prepared for reopening.
Spindle replied that RPS was notified of 35 schools with violations in 2020, and as of March 2021, the facilities remained noncompliant for nearly a year. He added every principal was given a notice of violation after each inspection.
When the CBS 6 Problem Solvers asked why violations were not corrected as the buildings sat empty, Kamras said the district was facing a myriad of setbacks stemming from the pandemic.
“There were a number of challenges during that year, right? We didn't have a full complement of staff, even, for example, custodians. Many of them were out who would have addressed some of these things, our facilities team, due to COVID,” he said.
Kamras added his staff had prioritized other tasks to include upgrading air filtration systems, installing new HVAC technologies, and improving bathroom plumbing.
The following year, another round of school inspections was completed in the late summer and fall 2021.
At the time, Spindle told Hathaway, Gonzalez, and custodial supervisors in July 2021 that he noticed a "common theme" of schools missing fire inspection alarm reports and sprinkler inspection reports.
An August inspection at Fox Elementary showed violations should've been corrected within about a month from the inspection date. RFD, however, did not circle back to schedule reinspections to check on violations until December.
Chief Carter said the delay was due to "critical" staffing shortages in the department's operations division, which is the unit consisting of firefighters who respond to emergencies.
During that time, Carter said Spindle was pulled from the fire prevention office to assist firefighters.
“Lieutenant Spindle, even though being assigned to the operations division, still tried to reach out to get these things accomplished. Is it ideal? No, but it does show that he was persistent, and as a fire marshal, he really tried to close the gap to get this done," Carter said. "The process wasn't perfect."
But Spindle could not get into the buildings for reinspections, because RPS Facilities Director Bobby Hathaway did not respond to Spindle's multiple attempts in December to check on the violations that were documented in the fall.
On January 6, 2022, Spindle sent an email to Hudacsko with the subject line, "ongoing roadblock."
He told Hudacsko that Hathaway would refuse his phone calls, hang up on him, and ignore text messages as Spindle tried to ensure "life-saving measures were in place for students and staff."
"The latest timeline of events has our office in a challenging position as we are seemingly being denied access to reinspect the schools after documenting over 200 violations in RPS," Spindle wrote. "Is there anyone working for Richmond Public Schools who can help us? Although we are being met with ongoing roadblocks to do what is required, this reflects poorly on our office."
Hudackso replied 11 days later, on January 17, 2022, thanking Spindle for his patience and asking if this was an "urgent issue."
Spindle responded the same day that it wasn't urgent for Hudacsko but again asked for a contact who is "currently in charge of facilities as outlined by the Department of Education."
He added, "Mr. Hathaway has placed himself in a position of extreme neglect when it comes to the Richmond Fire Department. The communication has been onesided and our offices are in need of someone that can help us from RPS."
In an interview with Kamras and Carter, the CBS 6 Problem Solvers asked both leaders if they viewed this as "extreme neglect."
"That's characterized by the lieutenant at that time. Those are his words, and I'm not sure what that dynamic was, so I cannot respond to his characterization," Carter said. "Just listening to or reading the words, it's pretty strong."
“I think as the chief said, that was one person’s perspective," Kamras said. "Again, I’m going to say, should all of this have been addressed as soon as possible? Yes.”
"What was the communication breakdown," Problem Solver Tyler Layne asked Kamras.
“I don’t know," Kamras responded. "But the bottom line is that should have been taken care of and it wasn't."
On January 20, 2022, Hathaway told Spindle he's "interested in resuming fire inspections at our facilities. Can [you] provide the most recent spreadsheet you have for remaining items as we look to schedule these inspections in the near future?"
Spindle replied with frustration, copying Hathaway's supervisor, Gonzalez on his email:
“We should not be in this position, sir. In 2020, it was outlined that the Richmond Public Schools system has shown a complete lack of effort in ensuring that the schools are safe for occupancy before the start of each school year. The dismissal of our offices’ efforts appears utterly disrespectful of the time we spent inspecting the schools and wanting the students to be in a safe environment."
Spindle went on to say that Hathaway has had more than enough time to provide evidence of work completed on violations to include missing ceiling tiles, fire alarm inspection reports, and electrical hazards.
He said that asking about them four months later alluded to none of them being corrected.
When asked if Kamras took any action to hold Hathaway accountable, Kamras said, “I’m sorry, I can’t talk about personnel.”
But the CBS 6 Problem Solvers confirmed Hathway received a $30,000 raise to his salary in May 2022, bringing his pay to about $150,000.
Though the Fox fire would occur just weeks after Spindle's warnings of neglect and unsafe schools, Chief Carter said none of the violations found at Fox impacted the cause of the fire.
However, the violation of a faulty fire alarm panel did impact how firefighters responded the night of the blaze.
Firefighters responded twice to Fox on February 11.
During their first response, crews spent about 30 minutes searching the exterior of the building, while struggling to get inside the school due to RPS night security not answering RFD's calls to allow them access.
Once inside, crews searched Fox for about 12 minutes and cleared the building. They would come back to Fox less than 30 minutes later to find it consumed by flames.
Though RFD has received questions about the length of time they spent inside the school, Carter said his crews did their "due diligence" and found "no obvious indicators of fire or smoke inside of the building" before "confidently" leaving.
When asked how firefighters could've missed the fire, Carter pointed to the lack of a properly working fire alarm panel. Because the panel was in "trouble mode," it did not indicate the location of the emergency.
"The part that we are accustomed to in Mr. Kamras' buildings or anybody else's buildings, if they're present, is an ability to know what area is in alarm. In the absence of that, we do just a search of every floor, every level, to try to determine to the best extent possible, what may be the cause. In events like this, the overwhelming majority of those cases, nothing is present, nothing is found," Carter said.
“So essentially without that indication, you’re kind of flying blind," Layne asked.
“Basically, yes," Carter said.
Moving forward, both agency leaders said their partnership is now stronger than ever in three areas: systems, relationships, and infrastructure.
“Our two teams now talk every single week. In addition, I have a weekly safety meeting with our head of security or head of facilities, and other individuals, where we track— where are the violations? When are they due to be fixed," Kamras said. "Out of this tragedy, we have developed a lot of closer relationships. So now, there's a human connection, and folks are much more willing to pick up the phone and say, 'Hey, what's going on with this? What's going on with that?'"
Carter added, "There's probably more proactive collaboration on the front end than there ever has been, at least in recent memory in my time in my role in the department. I'm thankful for that. I think, unfortunately, through this tragedy, we've really advanced the collaboration and our ability to proactively address issues before they become issues."
Kamras said all school fire alarm panels have now been tested, repaired, or replaced and all are able to communicate properly to emergency channels. He added each building is equipped with an emergency key box to allow first responders into facilities when necessary.
"My number one priority is the safety of our kids and our staff. Every parent deserves for their kids to come home as good as they were when they sent them to us," Kamras said. "I believe, in partnership with the chief, we are an even safer school system today than we ever have been before."
Carter said all school inspections for the current academic year have been completed.
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