APPA Library

"To Defer or Not"
Author:
Published In: Facilities Manager
Date: January/February 2004

APPA News Column.  Based on a 19995 survey, APPA had estimated that the price to fix the backlog of repairs in higher education would be $26 million.  In a October `0, 2003 The Chronicle of Higher Education article, APPA Executive Vice President Lander Medlin was quoted as saying that since the survey, the estimate has probably increased by 25 percent.  Experts say that as appealing as it is to defer maintenance because of budget crunches, larger maintenance fees will almost always result.  Brooks H. Baker, APPA president from University of Alabama at Birmingham acknowledges that replacing plumbing is not as glamorous for donors as putting money into new buildings. Matthew C. Adams of Adams Consulting Group, cautions, "Anything that helps make a facility safer--such as the replacement of aging fire-detection systems--should be the the last project deferred and the first taken up again."

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