Maintenance and operations (M&O) requirements dominate the life-cycle cost of a school facility. Historically, facility managers have struggled to secure funding to meet these requirements. Many deferred-maintenance issues result directly from M&O underfunding. However, new approaches and technologies now enable facility managers to use cost-effective and repeatable models to project accurate and defensible M&O requirements.
Typically, a facilities manager requests annual M&O funding by adjusting the previous year's spending based on the general economic factors and the financial position of the industry. But this practice can be shortsighted — it ignores the tools and data that can tie M&O funding levels to facility performance over time and can reduce a manager's ability to secure proper funding.
School facilities managers can use a more defensible approach to facility portfolio management — one that reinforces the value of proper funding and the impacts of underfunding. They can take advantage of methods, technologies and data available to assist in such efforts.
Current practices
Facilities managers use several methods to determine annual M&O budgets:
-
Ask for the same budget as last year, adjusted for inflation or for a change in the size of the facility portfolio.
-
Base the budget request on actual expenditures in the M&O categories and use the actuals as a basis for adjustment.
-
Estimate funding for facilities on an equation or square-foot basis that places all costs into a single category. Then calculate the percentage of those funds that are directed to the M&O categories.
-
Determine how much other organizations are spending on M&O.
Unfortunately, none of these methods alone accurately articulates the real M&O funding requirement.
Developing models
Modeling is the use of a representative amount of data to predict the outcome for a large amount of data. When faced with providing a true “needs-based” M&O requirement for a large or diverse facility portfolio, a facilities manager must find a way to base M&O projections on the actual needs of thousands of different systems. Building these projections may be extremely expensive, if not impossible.
However, a facilities manager can determine the typical facility types and sizes with relatively little effort. By finding ways to categorize facilities (e.g., by function and size) and by identifying typical M&O requirements for each category, facilities managers then can use available technology to model accurate M&O numbers. The results can be applied to the total facilities portfolio to determine the aggregate M&O requirement.
A major reason for developing models is to show the true cost of M&O and its effect on facility performance. One must be diligent in documenting this approach over several annual budget cycles. When a facilities manager can articulate needs clearly and can describe the financial impact of preventive-maintenance tasks that were not accomplished, the result can be a favorable response to budget requests.
Once the models are developed, they can become a great asset. With minimal upkeep costs, models can be applied year after year and site after site. They provide an easy way to more clearly define the components of M&O, and can be applied to new and projected construction projects. Over time, by bolting M&O models onto existing computerized maintenance-management systems, a manager can incorporate actual M&O costs over time.
M&O defined
The total M&O model generally would be the sum of these individual components:
-
Recurring maintenance includes work activities that recur based on normal wear patterns on a periodic cycle of greater than one year and less than 10 years. Typical work includes painting, caulking, sealing and carpet replacement.
-
Preventive maintenance includes regularly scheduled maintenance activities (within a year) on selected equipment. Examples: inspection, lubrication and minor adjustments.
-
Unscheduled maintenance includes reactive service calls that can be accomplished by local staff or existing service contractors.
-
Custodial includes services such as sweeping, mopping, trash collection and restroom cleaning.
-
Pest control includes the elimination or restraint of any insect, rodent, nematode, fungus or weed.
-
Refuse collection includes collecting trash from a facility (room collection should be in custodial), placing trash in a dumpster, and disposing of it in an approved landfill.
-
Utilities include services delivered by pipeline or other line. Examples: sewer, water, electricity, natural gas and propane.
-
Site (or infrastructure) requirements include maintenance that is site-specific and is not included in facility tasks. Examples: landscaping, snow removal, tanks and utility line maintenance, and pavement sealing and striping.
The approach
Steps in developing an M&O model:
-
Categorize buildings into usage (or functional) codes. The activity or work function being performed in the facility affects M&O requirements considerably, and the challenge is to quantify the impact of these activities. Examples of usage codes: research, administration, warehouse, residence hall, library and school.
-
Determine which room types may drive M&O. Determining basic room uses such as offices, laboratories, warehousing and mechanical rooms is essential to developing custodial models.
-
Determine the different size ranges of the facilities within each of the usage codes. This can be accomplished initially by determining within each category when size starts to affect the complexity of mechanical and electrical systems. Also, as a facility increases in size, the types of structural and roofing systems become more varied, and interior finishes vary and increase in cost.
-
Find the facilities within each usage code that are nearest the average of each size range. These facilities will become the basis for the models.
-
Inventory the dynamic equipment in these facilities, inventory room uses and finishes that would be used in developing the custodial and recurring components of M&O, and gather any historical information on facilities.
-
Model development:
- Custodial
Develop room models as shown in Table 1 (above) to address the custodial component.
- Preventive maintenance
Use the dynamic equipment inventory in the development of this model.
- Utilities
Evaluate usage records and develop a three- to five-year average consumption, or a range large enough to capture general weather patterns, that can be adjusted for market factors. These factors can be found through several services on the Internet. Use can be developed into a square-foot cost to apply to other facilities in that model usage and size range.
- Pest control
Include contracted services that can be modeled based on the inspection and treatment frequencies that apply to the facilities and regional concerns.
- Refuse collection
This typically falls into the category of contracted services. This might be based on cubic yards or number of dumpsters to service.
- Recurring maintenance
Develop requirements from calculations of inventory for painting, caulking, carpeting, relamping and other activities. Recurring maintenance tasks are not annual activities, but events that happen periodically over a 10-year span; therefore, the cost of these tasks are calculated and annualized over that span to determine annual budget need. (This is much more accurate if you have a large portfolio of facilities in each usage code and size range.) A more accurate way to express recurring maintenance is to gather information as part of a 10-year condition assessment program for all facilities, and report and track the individual facility need as part of M&O.
- Unscheduled maintenance
Modeling unscheduled maintenance is difficult. Table 2 (p. 41) illustrates an analysis of a large facility portfolio where unscheduled maintenance values were based on deficiencies that required less than $2,500 each to correct. Several statistical tests were conducted to determine what variables affected the square-foot costs for unscheduled maintenance. The only variable for these facilities was age, and this exhibit reflects a natural rise in cost by age until the 26- to 30-year range, after which the model “adjusts” and starts increasing again.
- Site or infrastructure
Develop quantities and tasks from site plans, and apply cost estimates to determine site and infrastructure requirements.
- Custodial
-
Link the M&O model to the existing computerized maintenance-management systems (CMMS). Once the M&O model has been developed, it can be attached to the existing CMMS to enable users to generate M&O estimates for particular locations or on a facility-by-facility level. It also can be used to look at the implications of various financial scenarios on the facility portfolio over time and adjust M&O estimates to reflect actual costs.
Kincaid, PE, is president and general manager of Applied Management Engineering, Inc., Virginia Beach, Va. Dillinger is vice president, principal and program manager of Carter & Burgess, Inc., Fort Worth, Texas. Clayton is a managing partner at Tonda Technologies, Arlington, Va.
NOTABLE
7.58
Percentage of total district expenditures spent by school districts on M&O in 2006.
Source: AS&U's 35th Annual M&O Cost Study, April 2006
Typical room model, non-carpeted, 30' × 30' = 900-square-foot floor, 1,200-square-foot wall
Analysis of a large facility portfolio, unscheduled maintenance (data source: FCIS < $2,500)
