The Haines Borough’s Public Facilities Department is investing in a new program to more efficiently track and schedule maintenance of municipal facilities.
The borough recently purchased Facility Dude, a cloud-based maintenance management system that will allow borough staff to prioritize scheduling of maintenance, track expenses for different types of work, and schedule preventative, routine and non-routine maintenance.
The program costs $1,500 for the first year with set-up and training, and about $1,800 each following year.
Facilities director Carlos Jimenez, who referred to the program as a “one-stop shopping center,” said the system will help to both keep track of maintenance information and consolidate it all in one spot. For instance, Jimenez could look up “Fourth Avenue” in the system and get the history of all the grading, paving, and other work that has been done on the street.
Right now, it’s almost impossible to get that information. “I couldn’t tell you how many times Fourth Avenue was graded last year,” Jimenez said.
The program will also allow borough staff and building tenants to submit work orders electronically, instead of calling Jimenez or maintenance technician Ed Bryant. Each facility will have two staff members trained in the program.
So if a cabinet at the library is broken, the library director can get online and send the work order over for Jimenez to sign off on.
“I think it is going to be a good thing,” Jimenez said. “Once it launches, it should open up my time to work on other things.”
Manager David Sosa said Facility Dude will also help with the budgeting process. “This program will enable more detailed tracking of maintenance for facilities, roads and the vehicle fleet, which will provide deeper insight into use and costs, aiding both operating and capital project decision-making,” Sosa said.
Jimenez received preliminary training in the program this week. Staff is working on entering data in the program to get it as up to date as possible.