A fire marshal’s inspection of Congregation Torah Ohr, the temple whose program of Orthodox religious instruction for North High School students has spurred controversy among school administrators and parents, was requested by Great Neck Alert Fire Company Chief Raymond Plakstis, not the Great Neck Public School district as previously reported.
Nassau County Chief Fire Marshal Thomas Tilley had told the Great Neck News that the Feb. 15 inspection, which the congregation passed without penalty, originated with a request from the school district.
But Plakstis said that he acted in his role as fire chief after receiving a letter by North High School principal Bernard Kaplan to all school parents warning about the program, not because of any request for an inspection by school officials.
“I felt that [there should be an inspection] because there were a number of children involved, and the words ‘going through the side door’ bothered me,” Plakstis said. “I requested the fire marshal’s office do an inspection to ensure everything was safe.”
Plakstis said he was motivated by his concern as a parent that, if children were entering the congregation through a side door as described in Kaplan’s letter, the congregation may have been violating fire code. He said that no danger was found upon the completion of the inspection by officials from the fire marshal’s office and a Village of Great Neck building inspector and that his concerns had been addressed.
Tilley told the Great Neck News last week that inspectors found no code violations after receiving a request originating from the school district to look into whether the congregation, which serves food to students during the study sessions, was using proper equipment to prepare the meals.
His statement that Great Neck Alert’s call to the fire marshal’s office was the result of a request for inspection from the school district was based on a misunderstanding, he said Monday.
“That’s what I was under the impression for,” Tilley said. “When I originally heard this part of the story, I got it as the chief got it from the district who gave it to us.”
Plakstis said he received the same letter as all Great Neck North High School parents received, addressing concerns about the congregation’s instruction of students during the high school’s open lunch period.
Tilley said his understanding had been that Plakstis had received a direct request for inspection from the schools, which he said he knows now to be in error after conversations Monday with Plakstis and school officials.
The original source of the request had no bearing on the actions taken by the fire marshal’s office, Tilley said.
“Regardless of how we got it, we were going to do an inspection” after Plakstis’ call to the department, Tilley said.
Kaplan later retracted his letter and apologized after criticism from the Anti Defamation League.
Kaplan’s response to the temple’s program drew both criticism and support from residents and civic groups. The ADL called his actions an unconstitutional infringement on private religious practice and a Facebook group protesting the letter drew over 1,000 members, while the head of the interfaith Great Neck Clergy Association called the temple’s offering of religious instruction to children without their parents’ consent unethical.
Debate over the program spilled over during a Feb. 11 school board meeting, with parents discussing whether Kaplan overstepped his bounds in sending the letter or whether Torah Ohr’s program was inappropriate.
