From Dateline (October 23, 2003)
Custodial Ranks Are Hit Hard by Budget
Cuts
Campus members can look no further than their office
waste bins to understand how the state budget cuts are affecting
Cal State Fullerton.
The custodial ranks are down by 23 positions, and
to meet the needs of the university, faculty and staff members are
being asked to pitch in and empty their individual trash cans into
large, centrally located trash bins that will be emptied daily.
“Our department is doing the best that we can
in light of the budget reductions and we continue to make strides
whenever possible,” said Willem van der Pol, director of physical
plant. “Unfortunately, right now the reality is certain tasks
that used to be carried out on a regular or daily basis will now
be done less often.”
“Facilities Management has developed a new
set of priorities to ensure certain areas receive the attention
necessary to support our academic mission,” said Willie J.
Hagan, vice president for administration, in a universitywide memo
released this week.
Cleaning and trash collection will continue on a
daily basis in classrooms, restrooms, building corridors, entrances
and exits, elevator floors and performance theaters. Trash collection
also will occur daily in non-teaching labs, practice rooms, balconies
and patios.
Non-teaching labs and practice rooms, balconies and
patios will be cleaned once a week, as will replacement of light
bulbs and the cleaning of floors and elevator interiors. Office
cleaning, such as dusting, vacuuming and spot-cleaning carpets,
will be provided every two weeks, and other cleaning efforts –
stairwells, conference and multipurpose rooms, library stacks and
windows – will be conducted as needed.
Custodians worked with management beginning last
spring to deal with the shortage in manpower. The goal, said lead
custodian Sandra Malone, was to “find a way to do our jobs
with the number of employees we have.”
Custodians are now working in zone or team cleaning,
where each team member performs a specific task such as vacuuming
or emptying trash, explained Malone. “Previously, one person
was responsible for doing all the tasks for a floor or specific
area,” she noted. Now a team handles several floors or an
entire building. “It works. We can provide a good level of
service despite not having the number of people we would have had
if vacancies were filled.”
Malone leads a team that works in the Education Classroom,
Com-puter Science, Engineering and Ruby Gerontology buildings, as
well as Titan House. “We have a sense of togetherness....When
we finish a building, we can look back and feel confident that we
did our job.”
“Without those 23 custodians, we had to made
some tough decisions about just what our current level of staffing
could achieve,” said van der Pol, who noted that in a better
budget climate vacant positions would be filled and additional custodians
would be hired to meet the needs of existing and new buildings as
they come into use, such as the expanded Kinesiology and Health
Science Building.
“We, like the rest of the campus, take pride
in how well the campus looks. We understand the importance of the
campus grounds looking clean and neat, the facilities clean and
in good condition. Our main focus right now is to provide the best
service we can while dealing with the challenges that we face.”
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