School district: Students safe at sites

Parents can pick up their children any time, but Douglas County schools will likely remain open until the end of the day, with the exception of Whittell High School and Zephyr Cove Elementary at Lake Tahoe, Director of Human Resources Rich Alexander said this morning.

"We had to make the call early this morning, around 4:45; we were already chaining up around 7 a.m.," Alexander said. "We can't pull the kids back, but we will be meeting with the transportation supervisor and will keep a close watch on the weather to determine how the rest of the day will go."

Alexander said all buses made it safely to school sites this morning.

"We count on the drivers for feed back," he said. "We don't want to send kids home to empty houses. There's no guarantee we can get in touch with all parents, so we'll hold them for the day. The kids are safe at school. We invite parents to pick up their kids if they want to."

Alexander said Whittell was closed because of a problem with its boiler, and Zephyr Cove was closed after drivers reported white-out conditions on Kingsbury Grade.

"In the mean time, this thing settled in here and really dumped," Alexander said. "We got to think of safety, and there's nothing safer in the snow than a bus."