Road closures delay reopening for Watauga County Schools after Helene

Watauga County public schools remain closed for a third week following the devastation of Helene in western North Carolina.

Officials say damaged infrastructure is one of the biggest barriers to resuming classes. As of Monday afternoon, there were 188 documented road closures in the area. 

Because of that, Watauga County Schools Superintendent Leslie Alexander says it’s not currently possible for the district to run its regular or limited bus routes to take students to school. 

“Unfortunately, there's still some damage in some of those secondary roads where you can't safely get a bus through," Alexander said. "So now we're going to look at what would community stops look like, and can families get kids closer to town where we can safely pick them up on a bus? So just working through some of those logistics is kind of where we are right now.” 

If the district can set up community stops, Alexander says students will get back to school more quickly. But if they have to wait to resume normal bus routes, it could be several more weeks. 

Other barriers to reopening include 30 displaced staff members and significant flood damage to the pre-K-8 Valle Crucis School. Alexander says the district needs to find a temporary place for those students to go when classes eventually start back up. 

“We found a couple of community sites that we are hoping to partner with,” she said. “But that's not as easy as it as it sounds, because you still have to have health inspections and fire inspections to make sure that you can safely put students there.”

A new Valle Crucis school was already being built and did not sustain damage in the storm. But Alexander said it’s not scheduled to be completed until sometime between December and February.

Amy Diaz covers education for WFDD in partnership with Report For America. You can follow her on Twitter at @amydiaze.