Lima, Ohio-headquartered Allied Environmental Services Inc is gearing up for the busy summer season to provide school facilities with services aimed at environmentally sensitive projects such as asbestos removal and repair, AHERA 3-year inspections, laboratory chemical management and disposal, neutralization tank cleaning and underground storage tank upgrades.

“It is much easier and safer for schools to complete certain projects when class is out of session and there are fewer building occupants,” said Chad Reynolds, Allied sales manager, in a statement. “When dealing with hazardous materials such as asbestos, mercury or lab chemicals, it is sometimes necessary to temporarily isolate a section of the building, which is not easy to do during the school year.”

With over 5,000 asbestos abatement projects completed, Allied is a certified asbestos abatement contractor in both Ohio and Indiana. The company is supported with a permanent and full-time staff of certified asbestos abatement workers and supervisors.

The company also offers hazardous waste management services, which are specifically helpful in situations of science lab maintenance. Services available include waste characterization, classification and sampling, lab packing of laboratory chemicals, as well as the transport, recycling, and disposal of wastes under the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act, photographic and x-ray developing solutions, mercury-containing devices, shock-sensitive materials and pressurized cylinders.

“We collect a lot of mercury and mercury devices from schools during the summer break when storage areas are cleaned and inventoried”, Reynolds stated. “At this time, schools also replace equipment including mercury thermometers, thermostats and light bulbs/fixtures.”

For schools that utilize neutralization tanks in chemical laboratories, Allied offers routine servicing, cleaning and complete restoration of the tanks, which the company recommends should undergo limestone replacement every two to three years.

The company also provides installation, operation, closure or removal for underground storage tanks, which, if maintained improperly, can be at high-rick of releasing contaminants into the subsurface of a school site.

While some projects may include routine maintenance, other immediate projects may arise from unforeseen complications or issues that are identified during routine maintenance.

“Allied completes many projects for numerous school districts each summer and we always ask the schools to contact us early on to schedule work,” Reynolds said. “Fortunately, Allied is a 24-hour emergency response provider, so we can respond to any situation at a moment’s notice.”

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The Maintaining and Operating of Schools Goes Far Beyond Just Cleaning and Construction

School Construction News recently sat down with Ken Wertz, director of maintenance and operations of the Sharon Public Schools District in Massachusetts and president of the Massachusetts Facilities Administrators Associations, a professional organization that serves municipal and public K-12 schools in Massachusetts. The MFAA has provided support, networking and professional development opportunities for more than 39 years and, by sharing knowledge and resources, helps improve the performance and extend the life of public facilities.

Q: With the average U.S. school more than 40 years old, what maintenance and operations challenges are administrators facing?
A: Older school buildings provide unique operational challenges for facilities administrators. Older building systems do not provide the reliability associated with a stable learning environment. Replacement parts for some of the older systems are becoming harder to come by, along with technicians that are no longer familiar with working on some of the older components like steam distribution systems or pneumatic controls. The combination of an outdated building envelope with antiquated control systems makes it extremely difficult to maintain proper indoor air quality and manage energy usage. Another piece of the aging building equation that is often overlooked is the impact it has on technology in the classrooms. Older electrical distribution and low-voltage wiring systems cannot handle the increased demand that newer information technology brings to the table. Having this handicap greatly reduces a school district’s ability to deliver the tools needed for 21st-century learners.

Q: How energy efficient is the average school? Do you have any statistics?
A: The benchmarking research that I do for my work for Sharon Public Schools and as MFAA president is primarily focused in the northeast region of the country. With so many variables that are climate- and geographically driven, it is difficult to put a qualitative average efficiency rating on all the high schools throughout the country. The only agency that has data and evidence for national averages that I completely trust is the EPA’s Energy Star program (www.energystar.gov).

I currently utilize Energy Star’s Portfolio Manager to track all of my building utility usage. Portfolio Manager is a free online resource that allows you to track your building’s energy performance and benchmark it against similar buildings across the country. If a building earns a ranking of 75 or higher, it is eligible for an Energy Star award.

Q: What energy efficient strategies should be implemented in older schools to achieve a cost savings?
A: There are countless upgrades to building systems that can be performed in older schools to help with energy efficiency. I would strongly urge districts to first establish an energy conservation plan. Without first establishing a clear plan and creating a baseline to measure your performance, there is no way of knowing how you are doing. I see districts make this mistake time and time again. Document your starting point and consider where it makes sense to focus your efforts. If you are just starting, then establish a district-wide policy, a plan, regulation document and a best practices guide for all your buildings to follow.

A majority of energy savings can be obtained with no-cost or low-cost initiatives. Changing the culture of the building and how systems and equipment functions are the low-hanging fruit that districts should tackle first. Are timers and adjustments working as they should? Are custodians reducing temperatures and lighting levels during the school vacations? Are boilers running at optimal temperatures based on outdoor temperatures? Simple things that will show up during energy building audits that require little, if any, funding and can save upwards of 10 percent of your utility expenses.

After a district has established its plan, it can then work with utility providers or state governments to see which energy grants are most advantageous to pursue for building system upgrades. Lighting upgrades, pumps and VFD drives, heating controls, boiler upgrades and building envelope improvements are all areas that should be investigated as possible energy upgrades to a building.

Q: For new school construction and renovations, what energy considerations need to be included?
A: There are countless resources for establishing best practices when designing a new or renovated space. Collaborative for High Performance Schools and the U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED system, along with EnergyStar.gov, all offer recommended guidelines for constructing a sustainable and energy efficient facility.

Unfortunately, not all communities can afford the additional costs with building a CHPS or LEED facility. In those cases, communities should work closely with their designer to establish which energy conservation pieces are required in their facility in order to maximize efficiencies while still maintaining their project budget.

Some items that would be considered during these discussions are condensing boilers, DDC (direct digital control) heating controls, occupancy sensor for both lighting and heating/cooling, low E glazing, high efficiency transformers, LED lighting, increased insulation, reflective roofing materials, photo voltaic arrays, geothermal heating, wind farms, low-flow plumbing fixtures and lighting controls, to name just a few.

Q: What preventative maintenance strategies must be practiced as a whole in school districts across the country?
A: Preventative maintenance (PM) work is, unfortunately, oftentimes put on the back burner in public facilities. With the current state of doing more with less, it is difficult to keep a maintenance team and school district focused on the importance of PM work. District administration and school boards should be educated on the merits of PM work. It would be very difficult to have a well-developed PM system without support and buy-in from the top-level school administration. This is why many schools, businesses and well-known establishments have been investing in reliability centered maintenance schemes to ensure all maintenance is carried out at the right stage.

All schools do perform some level of PM work. Regulated and mandated life safety inspections, sprinkler, fire detection, elevators, fume hoods, fire extinguisher, emergency lighting and generators is all work required to be performed by legislation and codes, and all of which falls under the umbrella of preventative maintenance. This could be considered tier I.

Tier II would be filter changes, belt changes, lubrications, boiler tune-ups, damper adjustments and floor refinishing. All of these are not mandated, but clearly are critical tasks that have to be performed in order to avoid equipment failure and air quality issues in a facility.
In all of these cases, PM work should be tracked using a work-order management system. There are several companies that provide this service to public schools. Some are software options, while most have shifted to a Web-based platform. The system should allow for reporting functions and integrate with the department’s normal work-order management system to provide ease of use for the maintenance team.

Q: Finally, what are the most important preventive maintenance items that schools should implement?
A: Life safety and all code or governmental mandates must be performed. These items would include elevator inspections, sprinkler inspections, fire detection inspections, fume hood inspections, fire extinguisher inspections, integrated pest management, asbestos AHERA inspections, Radon testing and playground inspections … There is absolutely no way that these items can ever be deferred.
A great framework for starting an energy conservation plan can be found at: www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=guidelines.guidelines_index

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By Paul R. Schreyer, northeast regional manager for The Gordian Group Inc. Schreyer has 15 years of experience in developing job order contracting systems for schools, universities and other large facility owners, including the New York City Department of Education. He can be reached at p.schreyer@thegordiangroup.com.

As students count down to summer vacation, administrators and facilities managers gear up for the construction season — an ideal time to complete projects such as bathroom renovations, ADA upgrades, classroom conversions, and the paint and flooring jobs that pile up over time. Now is the ideal time to prepare.

Many small- to medium-sized summer projects, such as parking lot repaving and ADA upgrades, may be too large for in-house staff, but not large enough to justify a complete design-bid-build cycle. One efficient, effective and flexible procurement method is the job-order contracting (JOC) process, which in my experience allows school officials to complete a large number of routine repair and renovation projects with a single, competitively bid contract.

Many school districts have hundreds of small- to medium-sized construction projects and no way to manage them, much less design, bid and award them. Under the JOC process, there is no need to design and bid each project individually. Instead, contractors bid an adjustment factor on a book of preset unit prices for a variety of construction tasks, such as a square foot of painting, a square foot of ceiling tile, chalkboards, doors, hardware, etc. Using accurate, locally developed prices makes contractors more comfortable with the contract and enables them to submit more competitive bids.

Depending on the owner’s bidding options, the JOC contract can go to the lowest responsive and responsible bidder or the contractor deemed to offer the best value. Once the contract is awarded, the owner can ask the contractor to perform a series of projects. For each, the contractor is simply paid the preset unit prices multiplied by the quantity, which is in turn multiplied by the competitively bid adjustment factor. Once a project is identified, the contractor and school officials meet at the job site to conduct a joint scope meeting, where the contractor can see, touch and understand all aspects of the job.

There are advantages to conducting joint scope meetings and pricing projects through the JOC process. First, the price is not dictated by the schedule. Schools that identify projects in the spring can schedule the work to start the first day of summer vacation. In addition, the fixed-pricing mechanism gives school administrators greater control over budgets and flexibility in determining priorities. Administrators can request pricing for a series of projects and decide which projects to complete to make the most of their budget.

Examples

Independent studies have concluded that school systems using the JOC procurement method versus traditional bid projects will save money. JOC has also been shown to significantly decrease procurement time, which results in more projects completed.

A 2011 audit of the Los Angeles Unified School District’s JOC program showed that the district saved significant time over the 6,000 job orders it issued. District construction officials reported that JOC was twice as fast as the formal, traditional bid method, since it eliminates the typical 30 to 45 days needed to advertise and open bids. In addition, the audit revealed that out of 2,500 JOC projects, the district saved an average of 9.26 percent in costs.

Similarly, a 1998 report on the New York City Department of Education found that its JOC program saved considerable time over the traditional procurement system. Several high-priority projects were completed within a week, and of the 200 projects completed at the time, an average of 7.7 percent in costs was saved.

School districts of any size can take advantage of the JOC process available through cooperative purchasing networks.

One example is Wakefield High School in Arlington, Va., which was built in 1952 and recently required major renovations. After three traditional bid attempts went over budget, the school district used a cooperatively purchased form of JOC to select projects based on priority and proposal amounts. In April 2009, the school district ordered 10 projects to be completed before the first day of school in September. All were completed on time and a total of $100,000 under budget.
In Ohio, Dublin City Schools used its cooperative JOC process to complete an emergency repair on an air-conditioning unit compressor just days before school started. A joint scope meeting revealed that another compressor was not properly working. Work on both projects was completed within budget and just nine days after the project was identified.

Conclusion

Schools have unique scheduling demands when it comes to repair and renovation projects, which may make the JOC process ideal for districts. School administrators can use JOC to prioritize projects based on actual costs, not estimates, and meet tough deadlines. Use JOC to get a head start on repairs and renovations — and be ready to start construction when the last school bell rings.

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Claudio Bazzano knows these struggles all too well. He sees them from two perspectives: as president of the Connecticut School Buildings and Grounds Association and executive director of facilities for Hartford Public Schools.

Formed in 1974, the association is a Bloomfield, Conn.-based professional trade organization that works with school facilities directors, custodial and maintenance supervisors, school business officials and suppliers to share knowledge and provide continued training in areas that affect the education industry.

Bazzano has been in the maintenance and facilities end of the education industry since 1998. With 43 schools and two administrative buildings, Hartford Public Schools spans more than 5.5 million square feet over 200 acres and serves 24,000 students. Bazzano was promoted to his current position in July 2011, following stints as director of buildings and grounds and floor mechanic.

While he said he loves what he does, a lack of funding has made his job more difficult.

“The current economic climate has made it difficult to increase or even maintain maintenance budgets,” he says. “The prices of commodities and services rise every year. A zero budget increase actually results in a 2 to 3 percent reduction in capacity. And there has also been a rise in unfunded legislative mandates, both at the state and federal level and all of these mandates have the safety of the school community at heart. Unfortunately, the timing has created an additional hardship to budgets.”

With the average age of the U.S. school around 40 years old, maintenance and facilities departments have their work cut out for them, especially when it comes to achieving energy cost savings. Since most older schools lack efficient energy-control systems, Bazzano said the following tasks will often show an immediate return on investment: lighting retrofits by replacing T-12 with T-8 and T-5 lamps; adding occupancy sensors to hallways, large instructional areas, gymnasiums, auditoriums and classrooms; and adding LED lighting and timers for parking lots.

“The energy efficiency and reduction industry is evolving every day,” he said. “For new construction and renovation projects, equipment is being developed at such speeds that equipment accepted for construction and design today may already be considered outdated by the time construction is completed. Generally, the timeline for new construction or a renovated school project is 12 months for design and procurement, and 18 to 24 months for construction.”
A HweHe sdacomputerized automated energy management system (EMS), he said, ties all the energy-efficiency initiatives together. Electromechanical systems can be preprogrammed to meet occupants’ needs and ramped down when schools are empty, often for up to 12 hours a day. The system can also grow as new buildings are added or renovated.

Preventative Maintenance Tops List

Whether a facilities department oversees an old or a new school, Bazzano said preventative maintenance should top the to-do list.

“Preventative maintenance is usually associated with capital-intensive industries where equipment runs 24 hours a day,” he said. “The loss of equipment due to failure then has direct cost to the company. Since schools are generally unoccupied for half the day, a predictive type of maintenance schedule may be a good business move.”

Implementing a predictive maintenance program can be fairly simple provided there is adequate funding. The task becomes cumbersome, Bazzano said, when upper management has to be persuaded to throw in extra funding for this type of maintenance.

“In a manufacturing setting, any equipment failure that slows or stops production can be easily quantified,” he said. “In a school, the loss of certain mechanical components usually results in a loss of comfort, but can the loss of comfort be quantified in a reduction in learning?”

The basic strategy in preventative maintenance is to prolong the useful life of capital assets and lower overall costs. In general terms, the process is to identify the work to be done,
determine the frequency of the work, develop a schedule and set aside funding for labor and material.

“At the risk of stating the obvious,” Bazzano said, “the most important PM items relate to life-safety systems. This includes ensuring that sprinkler systems, fire alarms, fire extinguishers and emergency generators are inspected and maintained is critical to occupant safety. Following these, we then enter the areas such as boilers, HVAC equipment, compressors and elevators.”

Though Bazzano’s days are filled to the brim, he said he loves his career.

“The knowledge that you can be responsible for the safety and well-being of 24,000 children is staggering,” he said. “That concept is what drives me to continue to expand my knowledge of structural and mechanical building systems, in addition to all of the environmental dangers that can occur each and every day. We are all born with two things — what we do best and what we love to do. If we are truly fortunate, they are both the same.”

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The Cree fixtures met all of our requirements for high-quality lighting and cost savings, said Harold Beumel, director of facilities and planning, Everett Public Schools. He added that since the lights are designed for 50,000 hours of life, the school should see ongoing operational savings due to decreased energy consumption and decreased maintenance compared to linear fluorescents.

He anticipates a reduction in maintenance costs and interruptions to the students’ learning environment, since there would be no on-going need to change ballasts or lamps.

According to Beumel, the district plans for an all-LED school to be completed in fall 2012. View Ridge Elementary School plans to install Cree CR24 troffers, which provide higher-quality light, longer life and greater energy savings than comparable fluorescent options, delivering beautifully lit classrooms for years to come.

"Proper illumination is essential for academic settings," said Al Safarikas, marketing director, Cree lighting. "Not only do the students get to work under much higher quality light than the previous fluorescent fixtures, but schools can also save significantly on maintenance and energy costs, allowing administrators to invest in other academic priorities."

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