Foster McHome has seen a lot of changes since he began working at the UF Physical Plant Division 24 years ago.
He remembers when there were more than 1,000 employees and when he felt his trade school skills were valued. He remembers when a worker cleaned only one floor of a building.
University budget cuts have brought difficulties for more UF employees than just the professors. Physical plant employees working to maintain 900 campus buildings are feeling the effects as well.
McHome, 59, said there are too many buildings and not enough workers. UF pays about 800 physical plant employees.
“It used be fun to come to work,” said Maryann Longarzo, 52, who has worked for the Building Services Department since 1998. “Now, we come exhausted.”
All UF salaries increased by 2 percent in 2009, said vice president for Human Resource Services Paula Fussell. Since then, the university has issued merit-based raises, and then a 3 percent raise, intended to offset Gov. Rick Scott’s now-overruled order that state employees contribute to their retirements.
Building services employee Alberta Hopkins Walls, 63, said her workload at the Particle Engineering Research Center has doubled in the last four years.
She has been president of the 3340 chapter of the American Federation of State, Municipal and County Employees for about eight years.
The chapter has about 15 members, Walls said. UF no longer hires 30-year contract union members, instead hiring non-union workers through one-year contracts.
Walls expressed concern about private contractors replacing the Physical Plant Division.
Fussell said the university is not planning to outsource the division. Some vacant or unnecessary jobs, however, have been eliminated or reassigned to other workers.
Curtis Reynolds, vice president for business affairs at UF, said the division has been testing out what he calls high-performance work teams for about six months. The goal is for groups of workers to service designated areas.
The initiative could save money, said Reynolds, who used to be the physical plant’s assistant vice president. However, he said the method only seems effective for clusters of buildings.
He said there is no plan to downsize, but the primary concern is to best serve the university with available funds.
“If that means getting more efficient, we’ll do it,” he said.
McHome said work conditions aren’t what they were 24 years ago, but he still has a wife and two daughters to support.
“We’re here because we need a job,” he said.
