An event rarer than the sight of late February snow in Portland occurred Wednesday: Portland Public Schools officials closed several schools due to zone-specific weather conditions.

KGW Photo

This school bus slid off Skyline Road on Tuesday, but no one was injured.

The decision to close only a handful of schools -- Ainsworth, Forest Park, Skyline Elementary and East/West Sylvan Middle Schools – goes against the district’s close-all-or-none policy.

However, in cases involving a district-wide late start, it’s unusual but not unheard of to close select schools, said Portland Public Schools spokesman Matt Shelby.

“With the delay first, that gives us enough time for a closure… time to assess the situation and do specific zonal closures,” he said. “With this particular storm, it was very elevation dependent, that’s why the decision was made to close just those four schools.”

School officials announced last-minute plans to close the schools about 8 a.m. They had announced the district-wide, two-hour late start at 5:45 a.m.

“If we don’t know and it’s on the fence, we’ll make the two hour call, because we can’t guarantee the safety of our kids on the way in and that gives us enough time to monitor the situation. But even with a two-hour late start, parents should continue to check the Web sites and watch the news,” Shelby said.

MORE: Snow moves back into Portland area

Dury snowy weather last month, PPS officials came under attack for announcing school closures late in the day as well as closing schools district-wide despite mild weather in many neighborhoods.

School administrators said at the time that conditions were bad on both sides of the river and it's against policy to close only certain schools.