Wendell Elento

A Common Story at Unsprinklered Buildings Best practices for conducting a fire- and life-safety evaluation.

WENDELL ELENTO

My last meeting with the resident and property managers of an unsprinklered high-rise residential building did not start well. I was early to the meeting, so I found parking and connected with the property manager who apologized and told me she totally forgot about our meeting.

I had 20 minutes, so I returned phone calls and was checking emails when the resident manager called out to me to follow him. Disheveled and sweating, he walked me quickly to their electrical room and proceeded to tell me he did not have time to understand his fire alarm system and the requirements to upgrade his system. “I already gave the property managers all of those proposals and then the previous property manager leaves and the new replacement manager tells me to get revised quotes, and I tell them I did that. I am so frustrated. I don’t understand what I need to do. I thought it was their job!”

When I started to explain what is required, he became angry and shouted, “I don’t have time to decipher all that legal stuff. I got other things to do!”

The property manager arrives, jumps into the conversation and tells the resident manager:“Please be open to Wendell, he is trying to help us sort out the fire alarm upgrade process and help us understand it and get to first base. Can you hang in there?”

The resident manager quieted down and a cool breeze seemed to blow itself into our conversation. Fifteen minutes later both the resident and property manager felt relieved and encouraged in having both a high-level view but also a first-base view for their fire alarm system upgrade journey. The property manager asked me to call her boss and do this training for him and her fellow property managers. “We all need your training. It is different and you helped us figure out what is our first base and what it will take to get to home plate.”

The journey is complex, and the route riddled with legal potholes, twists and turns. But if I can at least provide some tips, guidance, a couple of best practice ideas and a little fruit from hundreds of hours of sweat equity to save you angst and frustration to simplify the fire alarm system upgrade journey for you, then I think we did our part to make a part of Honolulu a safer place to live. Honolulu County is where I live and work, too, and if we can make one building fire- and life-safety-fit, it helps everyone in Honolulu. Fire- and life-safety needs to be everyone’s high priority, all the time and not only as a reaction to the recent grave tragedy back in 2017.

There are several key aspects of the Honolulu City and County’s Ordinance

19-4 that should be in the discussion by AOAO boards, property managers, licensed design professionals, electrical contractors and fire alarm system vendors.

The story about the site and property manager is real, and all too typical.

The following are a few best practices that I’ve picked up:

1. Pick the right professional.

They should be a licensed design professional with an authorized seal or stamp and be authenticated under Hawaii Administrative Rules. Look for professional engineers or architects who have fire safety knowledge and experience.

2. Schedule the fire- and life-safety evaluation as soon as possible.

If your building is 75 feet or taller and is unsprinklered, the first thing you should recommend to your board of directors is to get a quote from a professional engineer with stamp to conduct the fire- and life-safety evaluation

(FLSE). Please keep in mind that there are only a few companies that do FLSE and there are 300 or so more buildings that need to complete their FLSEs. Important note: I will take a couple of months to complete a FLSE. The early you get this going, the better. 3. New fire alarm design. The fire- and life-safety evaluation will provide the key information needed by professional engineers to provide you with the right quote for fire alarm design drawings. The other important item is your original permit set electrical and fire signal drawings. By providing those original permit set drawings to the professional engineers, this will reduce research and drawing fees. Bottom line, the new fire alarm design is the most important part of this entire process.

4. Decide to bid to electrical contractors, or to fire alarm system providers or design-build.

With the new fire alarm design drawings in hand, now you can go out to bid. You can either go the route of design-build and choose the fire alarm manufacturer and local dealer for that manufacturer to help your board navigate this electrical construction project. Your partner (local dealer) can help you put out the bid to three electrical contractors so that the board can meet its three-proposal due-diligence requirement. Or you can put out the drawings and bid specifications to three fire alarm system service providers and have them bid on the project to include electrical, patch and painting, hazard abatement, permitting, fire alarm design and HFD final inspection. With the new fire alarm system drawings in hand, you will have more control and success in managing either process.

5. Level the bidding playing field.

To help you to better analyze the above proposals, it is a best practice to do at least these two things (which I borrowed from Douglas Engineering Pacific). Tell each fire alarm system service provider that in their quotes they should list each device, its cost and its unit installation cost. Then ask each for a five-year warranty that includes parts and labor. The former will prevent price gouging (and change orders by identifying the entire bill of materials up front) and the latter will prevent lowball upfront quotes that turn into runaway maintenance cost headaches. Just requesting these two items will help you level your request for quote process and put you and your board in the driver’s seat. In other words, it will give you that apples-to-apples scenario missing from many bid scenarios. 6. Execute now! Simply, do something. As of March 12, according to HFD, only 30 properties have completed their fire- and life-safety evaluations. That leaves 327 properties the balance of one year to get their FLSE completed.

7. Call your fire alarm system

service provider. ❖

Wendell Elento is the director of sales at Island Signal & Sound, a local 40-year fire alarm system sales and service provider. He spent the last 20 years in technology integration, sales and service. Reach him at 845-1351 or wendell@islandsignal.com.

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Here is a quick list (not comprehensive and in alphabetical order) of companies and their respective contact information who make themselves available for Fire and Life Safety Evaluations and the subsequent, Fire Alarm System Design Drawings to meeting current building and fire codes:

Allana Buick and Bers is an A/E Firm Specializing in Mechanical Engineering and Design—Eamonn Kinsella, Director, Business Development-Hawaii; email: ekinsella@abbae. com; phone: (808) 218-6112 C2C Engineering is an A/E Firm Specializing in Mechanical Engineering and Design—Alex Mench, P.E., Mechanical Engineer, Principal; email: amench@c2c-engineering.com; phone: (808) 726-1545 Coffman Engineers, Inc. is a Full Service Multi-discipline Engineering Services—Robert Bigtas, P.E., FSFPE; Principal, Fire Protection Engineering; email: bigtas@coffman.com; phone: 808-526-9019 Douglas Engineering Pacific is a Full Service MEP Fire Protection Firm—Douglas Buhr, P.E., Electrical Engineer, specializes in Fire Safety; email: dbuhr@douglasengineering. com; phone: (808) 808) 524-2434 and Nate Wilbur, P.E., Electrical Engineer; email: nwilbur@ douglasengineering.com; phone: (808) 687-6886 Notkin Hawaii Inc. is a Consulting Mechanical, Electrical, and Plumbing (MEP) Engineering Firm—Keith M. Chan, P.E., LEED® AP, President and Principal-in-Charge; email: keithc@notkinhi.com; phone: (808) 941-6600 The Bergeman Group is a Construction Management and Project Management Consulting Firm –Dana Bergeman, CEO, email: dana@bergemangroup.com; phone: (808) 492-1119