Property Maintenance, Safety, and Security

Property Maintenance

Over the past 10 years, churches throughout the United States have had frequent and repeated claims in three specific areas:

• Water damage—often due to improperly maintained roofs and gutters, bursting water pipes, and poorly maintained old sinks and toilets
• Break ins and thefts—often due to lack of exterior lighting, exterior motion detectors and alarms; and failure to lock up music and sound equipment between uses
• Slips, trips and falls—often due to improper wax used on floors, lack of ice removal during the winter, and improperly secured rugs

All buildings and equipment must be properly maintained. Programs that mandate frequent inspections of all equipment can be very costly. Conversely, when the church relies on maintenance and replacement of equipment after a breakdown, the process can result in serious property damage and can present an unsafe condition to people. Develop a maintenance policy that will both minimize the possibility of loss and be cost effective by inspecting the property twice a year.

For additional materials specific to facility risk, refer to Workplace Safety Is No Accident: An Employer’s Online Toolkit to Protect Employees and Volunteers, located at http://nonprofitrisk.org/ws/wsp.htm. This free toolkit provides detailed information about maintenance, construction and building repair, and checklists. Click on the title in the table of contents to access the information.

Employee Fidelity

Proper handling of the church’s money and securities is a primary concern for every church. Simple accounting procedures can separate the functions financial procedures
and assure that proper checks and balances are in place which will prevent the possibility of an employee fidelity loss. The primary goal is never to have one individual handle all aspects of the financial records. There should always be a separation of duties such as check writing, authorized signatures, record keeping and bank reconciliations.

Fire Protection and Prevention

The leading causes of fires in churches are: arson, faulty wiring and lightning, faulty furnaces and stoves, oily or painting rags left in a pile, overheated organ motors, carelessness with smoking materials, and carelessness using candles and Christmas decorations.

Preventing a fire from starting is the best protection you can provide for your church. An effective program is an active ongoing program. Quarterly self-inspections should be completed as part of an overall property loss-prevention program.

Checklists for a variety of exposures have been designed to reduce the risk of major failures and to identify any condition that may result in a property or life safety loss.

Slips, Trips and Falls Prevention Program

Slips, trips and falls occur in corridors, stairwells, aisles, exterior steps sidewalks, parking lots and often in the social hall. Slips, trips and falls are generally considered to be preventable in all but a few cases that typically involve the infirm or elderly who warrant our additional help and assistance.

The use of nonslip wax with a slip coefficient of 0.60 or lower is highly recommended. Educate your maintenance personnel to consider the slip coefficient when buying industrial wax. Maintenance workers should also be schooled to look out for and report or repair loose carpeting and linoleum, thresholds, stair treads and slip-prevention strips, and broken or raised pavement on walkways and stairways. They should be alert for unsecured electrical cords that hang or stretch across floors and remedy the situation. And they, and everyone in the church, should take responsibility for throwing their own trash into proper receptacles and picking up objects (papers, pencils, banana peels) that could cause someone to slip and fall. Exterior workers also need to be diligent about picking up debris, such as tree limbs and litter that could cause someone to slip, trip or fall. They should look for burned out light bulbs inside and out, and replace them immediately.

The proper maintenance of hand rails in both stairwells and by exterior steps is important. Make certain that the rails are securely fastened, free of splinters or rough spots and their finishes are maintained to prevent rust or other deterioration.