News
SAD
15- outsourced cleaning company quits
By Elizabeth Prata
Gray-The sixth cleaning company has now left their
contract behind and the schools will likely be cleaned
by in-house staff. The outsourced company cleaned
Russell, Memorial and Dunn Elementary schools, and
the Central Office from 4 to 11 p.m. weeknights.
Big meeting
On Tuesday, members from the Wilson5 Service Company
met with Superintendent Victoria Burns, Business and
Finance Director Terry Towle, Maintenance Director
George Litrocapes, and SAD Technology Director Craig
Moore. The meeting was short and at the moment that
the SAD Administrators asked Wilson5 to void their
contract, Wilson5 produced a letter that said they
will leave in two weeks. Above, left to right,
Wilson5 's Roscoe Rayburn, Edward Wilson, James Woodman.
The Monument: Prata photo
At issue are a variety of topics that have surfaced
with this cleaning company and the others that preceded
Wilson5. The SAD Administration say that the cleaning
companies are not cleaning to School Department standards
spelled out in the contract. Wilson5 says that the
union-custodial employees are inhibiting their work
so that the union can have the field to themselves
again.
Whose fault is it?
At the November 17, 2004 Board meeting, after the
previous company left, Board member Tod Bennett said
that the track record of going through so many companies
over the last few years raises questions. He thinks
that the Board is not acknowledging that cleaners
are leaving because the Board needs to get a better
handle on the District's management of them. Wilson5
Vice-president Edward Wilson and General Manager James
Woodman agree. Both said that they do not think that
the SAD is truly interested in making this effort
work.
Mr. Woodman said in an interview with The Monument
that he sees one of the problems as attitude. "There
are a lot of people here that do not want to see this
work. The union used to do it and they would like
to see their jobs back." He said that the Maintenance
Director's wife is a union employee and a custodian
at one of the elementary schools. "Through e-mail
and hand written notes she would send the reports
that our work was not done or not up to standard,"
Mr. Woodman said. "That is a little bit of a
conflict of interest, I believe."
Ms. Burns said, "I have received much documentation
from teachers, custodians, and principals that show
that the schools were not clean buildings." One
of the solutions the SAD had attempted was to remove
George [Litrocapes] from overseeing the work and put
Craig Moore in his place to inspect. "George
was amenable to that," Ms. Burns said. The solution
didn't improve things and the daily reports kept coming
in that the work was not done to spec.
"The SAD does not want this to work"
Mr. Woodman said that in addition to the problem of
the SAD's attitude, the second problem was the way
the contract was written. "For example, we kept
getting reports that a bathroom at Dunn School was
not cleaned. I thoroughly asked my manager, Roscoe
Rayburn, and he said they were cleaned. I questioned
George. I discovered that the issue was one gasket
around one toilet that had been changed prior to our
coming in on the job. The toilet swap-out had left
a fairly permanent black mark, and with that mark
there we would be written up as not having cleaned
the whole bathroom. We repeatedly asked them to be
specific as to where the problems are, not just mark
the whole room off."
Mr. Woodman cited another example that the cleaners
were written up leaving the doors unlocked at Russell
School. "I noted to George that we are not the
only people that have keys. Many of the teachers have
keys too. We do not control who comes and goes on
the weekends. Finally, George said that we had a point."
The SAD maintains that the company did not do the
work adequately. On a tour of Russell School as reports
were coming in one morning, Mr. Towle and Mr. Litrocapes
showed where the company had left streaks where the
wax was dug up from having a buffer machine that was
not adjusted properly, and areas where the buffer
was swept around obstacles instead of moving the obstacle
to clean under them.
Mr. Woodman said, "We're not perfect. We spent
$2,000 in the last few weeks buying additional equipment
that would satisfy the SAD. That was a new machine,
one of the ones we had purchased in the last few weeks
and we were learning how to use it." Mr. Woodman
noted that the Wilson5 Company has been in business
for 23 years and cleans seven schools in Manchester.
"We also have contracts all over the country
with the Federal Government, whose standards and specifications
are extremely stringent. We have excellent references
and we do our best for the customer," Mr. Woodman
said.
Despite the $$ loss, Wilson5 is out
Mr. Wilson said that the company has purchased thousands
of dollars of equipment and invested valuable time,
which will now prove to be a financial loss. "Other
districts have had great success and real savings
with outsourcing custodial services for their schools…the
failure of this contract coupled with the past failures
with other contractors shows a failure on the part
of the MSAD 15 to not only the taxpayers but the people
who charged you with the responsibility to carry out
this program."
The SAD has standards
Ms. Burns said that she "knows that there are
questions out there as to what is wrong, with people
asking 'is it us or is it the companies?'" She
added that she also knows that the "perception
floating around is that it is the union who hindered
the previous companies' work. But it was actually
George who advocated for advertising again, because
of the savings. He wanted to give it another try."
Ms. Burns said that "There aren't many contacted
cleaning companies in many schools and there is a
reason for that. We feel there needs to be a certain
amount of people in the schools, cleaning. To say
that we refused to let them do a good job is ludicrous."
Ms. Burns recommended at the Board meeting Wednesday
night that the cleaning be done in-house.
http://www.MonumentNews.com/2005/news/217/217a.shtml
