Putnam County Schools renewed a nearly $4 million custodial services contract with ABM Custodial Services that includes monetary penalties for missed shifts and service delays.
Putnam County Schools Deputy Director Tim Martin said the district must rebid any contract every five years but can renew the agreement in the intervening years. The school system previously experienced performance issues with multiple cleaning companies in the area before returning to this provider.
“There are some penalties if, you know, if they’re notified of a problem in a building and it doesn’t get finished or if it doesn’t get taken care of within a certain number of days then we can penalize them monetarily,” Martin said. “If we have, we specifically put into the contract, you know, if a day porter, the person who’s there when kids are in the building, if they don’t show up on time any single day, if they don’t show up on time or if they don’t show up at all, we can penalize them for every hour that that person is not in the building. So yes, there are penalties and of course there’s also a clause in there that we can cancel the whole contract if we’re just completely unsatisfied with the work that they’re doing.”
Martin said the renewed contract costs just under $4 million. The district considered its options before making the decision to renew the one-year agreement, Martin said.
“We did not talk about discussing with other companies this year because things have been going pretty well with ABM,” Martin said. “We have spoken about bringing the contract back into house, but that is a very expensive prospect. It would probably cost us about double what we’re paying ABM currently.”
To improve accountability, the district implemented a system that allows teachers to have direct input on the cleanliness of their classrooms. Each room now features a QR code that staff can scan to report issues directly to the building manager.
“So, if the teacher comes in in the morning and their room hasn’t been cleaned correctly the night before, they can hit that QR code and put in a comment and it goes straight to the building manager so that that room can be addressed right away,” Martin said. “And that has probably helped more than just about anything that we’ve done.”
The school system used ABM before the current contract, and that previous agreement did not end well regarding the quality of service. The district has since seen better service after the company brought in different managers and a new regional manager.
“I do think it’s a fair price,” Martin said. “Each time that we give ABM a raise in their price, their people get a raise, and so that’s been one of the things that we discuss with them every year. And this price also has an increase because we’re adding a new building, so that actual price won’t take effect until July the 1st when we also expect to have the Early Learning Academy on, so we’ll have an additional building added into that contract.”
The new contract price will officially take effect on July 1.