Habersham County public schools are closed Thursday, Feb. 19. Twelve month employees should report to work at 10am. County school superintendent Matthew Cooper made the announcement shortly after 3:30 Wednesday afternoon. He says he made the call early because many families are displaced due to power outages and he wanted them to be able to plan accordingly. “We have 1,500 (families) without power and with the winds picking up tonight and in the morning there could be more power outages. Also, I’m told we have 20 roads closed right now in Habersham County due to downed trees and power lines.”
Cooper says dangerous windchills forecast for tomorrow were the overriding factor in his decision. Wind chills in Habersham are expected to reach ten below overnight and stay below zero until mid-morning. Cooper says he felt it was best not to get students and buses out on the road in weather like that. “Student safety is our top priority. The buses have been sitting for five days. That’s five days those buses have not been cranked up to pick up children,” he stresses. He says county school transportation director Tim Dockery expressed his concerns about running the buses and Cooper says the concerns don’t stop there. There also are concerns about power and water at school facilities. “In the past, our sprinkler systems have burst and caused flooding,” he explains. He says the school system is now taking steps to try to avoid that.
Habersham County’s 7,000 students have been out of school all week. They were out on winter break Monday and Tuesday when the ice storm hit. Ironically, those days off were set aside before the beginning of the school year; they were snow days the students had not yet used. Now that they have used them what does that mean?
Superintendent Cooper says as of now, students will not have to make up any of the days they have missed.
“We ned to thank Governor Deal. He has been proactive and placed Habersham under a state of emergency. Because of that, we will recive additional grace days.” Cooper says the state can issue up to four grace days and with tomorrow’s closing, Habersham will have only used two. Teachers and staff will have to make up time missed but there are days still left on the school calendar at the end of May for them to do that.
While temperatures are expected to be slightly warmer on Friday, the forecast is calling for a chance of snow. See 7-day forecast
Cooper says he’ll make a decision about holding school on Friday, Feb. 20, no later than 5:30pm Thursday. “Our hope is that we can have a full day of school Friday, however, we are concerened about the timing of the snow arriving Friday afternoon.”
Now Habersham will continue to bring you the latest developments as this wintry weather unfolds.
