A big building, especially a commercial or government one, is like a ship complete with a captain, his first mate, and crew. It’s the same in the U.S. and most countries that have enough will and financial resources to keep up what they’ve built. (Planned obsolescence is another story.) The upkeep of the urban core falls not only to jack-of-all-trades individuals on tight budgets, but to professionally trained and well paid building maintenance and construction crews assigned by contract. Before retirement I was part of one such crew as a Storekeeper I for 19 years at the State Office Building in Kansas City, Missouri.
Our department, Facilities Management, Office of Administration, was like that ship; the captain was the Building Manager who in better times oversaw a full crew consisting of two office secretaries, a Security Chief, Housekeeper (supervisor), and Plant Maintenance Engineer (PME) who directed the maintenance staff. I worked directly under the Building Manager, thank goodness. My office was on the dock, a distinctly different world of storerooms, cement, city and over-the-road trucks delivering all kinds of cargo. At the same time I worked in the Seabees (Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 0215) in Belton, Missouri as a reserve in a less glamorous cluster of warehouses.
Much of my duties included supply runs that took me all over greater Kansas City and even into Johnson County, Kansas on occasion. I called the more frequent routes my “trap run.” In many cases they were highlighted by visits to the “City Counter” which was a combination trade school and blue collar brain trust. Aside from the counter's' free WD-40 pocket protectors and occasional Jolly Ranchers and the free hot dogs at Rensenhouse on Wednesdays, I miss the ordinary gruff and mostly dirty maintenance men fetching their parts and/or supplies and the seasoned old timers who knew what their visitors wanted sometimes before they asked. There was Jerry at Electronic’s Supply, Susan at Commenco (Motorola hand radios), retired Harold at Dorfman Plumbing, and Bernie and Kevin at U.S. Supply among others.
Such people are like senior staff NCOs who get the job done despite the interference of the officers. From this symbiotic relationship between visiting manufacturer’s representatives, counter men with memories like elephants and the sympathy of bartenders, and the practical hands-on experience of the worker bees, America’s infrastructure survives. Despite the monetary benefits of on-line ordering with outfits like Grainger, there’s nothing like that special and overlooked relationship at City Counters that solves everyday problems and gets the job done.
