Long Island school district gets sent box of bullets instead of art supplies it ordered

A Long Island teacher was shocked to open a package that was supposed to contain an order of art supplies for the start of the academic year — but was instead a box full of bullets.The educator at the Eastport-South Manor Jr.-Sr.

High School on Tuesday was unpacking newly delivered packages of supplies the district purchased from Blick Art Materials, one of the oldest and largest family-owned art supply retailers in the United States, when they saw an unfamiliar box, district superintendent Joseph Steimel said. The teacher decided to open it and discovered a smaller box inside with a shipment of bullets with a label indicating it was meant to be sent to a sports store, according to Steimel.“Please be assured that at no time were any students or staff in danger — based on the preliminary investigation, it is clear that this was a severe packaging and shipping error made by the external vendor or distributor,” Steimel said in a statement sent to parents in the district. “The District will be making contact with the supplier, to investigate exactly how this logistical error occurred and to ensure it does not happen again,” he added. The superintendent said that after the teacher’s discovery, they contacted Suffolk County police, who have since taken possession of the bullets, law enforcement officials confirmed to The Post. Blick Art Materials is just as confused about the blunder as the district is.“We were informed yesterday that an unopened box of ammunition, shipped from a company in Louisiana to a sporting goods store in New York, was mistakenly intermingled with one of our shipments to a school in Manorville,” a company spokesperson said. “The sporting goods store is not a Blick customer, and the ammunition supplier in Louisiana is not a Blick vendor — Blick Art Materials does not sell, store, or package ammunition in its facilities,” they added. A school board meeting scheduled for Wednesday night, just one day after the discovery...