MAINTENANCE

Maintenance is the routine care, repair, and upkeep performed to keep equipment, buildings, or systems functioning properly and prevent unexpected failures.

Key Types of Maintenance

Preventative Maintenance: Routine, scheduled inspections and servicing done to catch small issues before they cause major breakdowns

Corrective Maintenance: Repairs made after a piece of equipment or a system has already malfunctioned or broken down.

Predictive Maintenance: Monitoring equipment condition using data and testing to predict when a part is likely to fail so it can be replaced just in time.

A maintenance engineer designs, plans, and oversees the preventive and corrective maintenance of machinery, equipment, and building systems to ensure safe and efficient operations.

Key Responsibilities:

Strategy & Planning: Develops preventive and predictive maintenance schedules to minimize downtime.

Troubleshooting & Diagnostics: Analyzes mechanical, electrical, or automated system failures to find root causes.

Compliance & Safety: Ensures adherence to health and safety regulations, such as OSHA standards.

Budget & Inventory Management: Oversees maintenance spending, parts procurement, and spare parts inventory.

Team Leadership: Coordinates with maintenance technicians and outside contractors.

Required Skills & Qualifications:

Education: A bachelor's degree in mechanical, electrical, or industrial engineering (or a related technical diploma).

Technical Knowledge: Proficiency with mechanical, pneumatic, hydraulic, and electrical systems, plus the ability to read blueprints and schematics.

Software: Experience with Computerized Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS).

Work Environment: Most commonly found in manufacturing plants, facilities management, energy sectors, and commercial real estate.

A Maintenance Director (often called a Chief Engineer or Resident Buildings Superintendent) in a Mitchell-Lama development oversees the physical plant, equipment, and structural upkeep of government-supervised, affordable middle-income housing complexes in New York.

Because Mitchell-Lama properties are usually large-scale, aging high-rises with strict government oversight, this role is highly specialized. It requires blending heavy technical expertise with rigorous regulatory compliance.

Core Responsibilities:

Regulatory Compliance & Inspections: Ensures the complex passes rigorous physical audits, such as HUD REAC inspections, and field reviews mandated by New York City's HPD or New York State's HCR.

Union Labor Management: Directly supervises, schedules, and trains the b uilding's maintenance staff and technicians, which frequently involves directing Local 32BJ union employees.

Capital Improvements & Rehabilitation: Coordinates large-scale structural upgrades, boilerplate repairs, roof tank maintenance, and elevator overhauls while coordinating with outside contractors and the co-op board.

Apartment Turnover: Accelerates the renovation of vacant units to safely and quickly onboard new tenants or shareholders pulled from the mandated Mitchell-Lama waiting lists.

Emergency & Systems Upkeep: Manages the constant operational stability of the building's central heating, hot water, waste disposal, and ventilation systems.

Strict Budgetary Controls: Unlike luxury real estate, these budgets are strictly bound by affordable housing guidelines. Financial requisitions often require city or state agency approvals.

Required Qualifications:

Experience: Typically requires 5 to 10+ years of large-scale residential property maintenance experience.

Certifications: Relevant NYC certificates of fitness (e.g., Standpipe/Sprinkler, Low-Pressure Boiler Operating Certificate).

Software: Proficiency in specialized affordable housing management software keep records of service request, respond time, vacancies, timeline of restoration, photos of any work

Our maintenance department is capable of doing many things, including restoring apartments except for laying down rugs. Painting, installing cabinets, any carpentry work, basic plumbing, basic electrical work they can do. Our maintenance can do 90% of any work that we need here, the only thing that they cannot do is large scaled work. They cannot rewire an apartment, they cannot replace the pipes in a whole building or even a line, they can, however, change the pipes in our apartment, fix a leak in our showers in the wall, they can fix an electrical socket or a hallway light. They are supposed to put concrete caulking on holes, fill the cracks on a wall, indoor or outdoor, that is a major part of PREVENTING, PREDICTING, and PRESERVING.

Our maintenance director I thought would be licensed in either plumbing or electricity, which would have made his salary, bonus and living space understandable, even acceptable. The changes that I’ve experienced tell me different. Our buildings have never been dirtier, our elevators I don't think have been out of commission for this long ever. What I have experience is an unprecedented turnover of our maintenance crew including the losing many our long time employee. Suddenly we have a large. number of unfamiliar faces working on our homes and in our homes. What were the criteria’s to replace our long time employees? In 2022 an outside hire for the west side, when that job could've gone to someone who's already been working here and saved us money. A Deer compact tractor valued at $20,000. was also purchase during the same time, was this purchase necessary? The new truck, may be a little more reasonable purchase, at least a useful one. How often has the tractor been used for snow removal? Were these additional expenses contributing to the 2023 maintenance increase? I was dismayed to hear how the maintenance director responded to Shareholders at a meeting, who was expressing their concern about lack of heat in their units during the cold season and instead of addressing the issue, his response was “ you shouldn’t be walking around in lingerie”. Maintenance personal live on the property to provide 24 hour service, which we have not been getting under the prestige maintenance director, for the past few years you get an answering service. Shareholders have needed to make various requests for service during the day, that was never an issue before. Both management and the board supervises maintenance and I know of at least two shareholders who have fallen and sued because of the unkept grounds. I think that most people would have re-glued the surface, after the first incident. The doors on my floor started to be painted in April 2026, I wonder when the work is going to be completed? It could be poor scheduling or inept workers but we have a problem. He is not working to help us at all.