[sudo-discuss] should we hire someone to clean up after events?

Sun May 5 20:14:09 PDT 2013

Romy & Yo's-

And let's hear it for the times when janitors and trades-workers of all
kinds were able to earn dignified family-sustaining wages doing the work
that really needs to be done.  Contrast to the ponzi-scheme economy
where selling fraudulent mortgages produces obscene fortunes while
cannibalizing what's left of the middle class.  Solidarity among working
people is what made the difference in the 20th century, and it can work
again in the 21st century.

Re. cleaning:

Professional cleaning crews work efficiently because they have the right
tools and the right methods, and very often they work as teams.  We can
do this.

At minimum we should have:

a)  A broom and long-handled dustpan set.  The best ones for dealing
with large spaces, are the Rubbermaid long-handled dustpans that are
open in the front, and come with brooms of compatible size.  These tools
make it easy to sweep up spot messes on the ground, including dropped
items, crumbs, etc.: and it's the spot messes of this kind that often
make the difference between an area looking clean and looking messy.

b)  A duster on a long enough handle to enable getting at areas above
head height, such as door frames and shelves.  Accumulated dust is an
allergen and it also makes a place look neglected.  The point of dusting
is to get the dust off the surfaces, so it settles on the ground and can
be vacuumed later.   

c)  A trigger-spray bottle of Windex or equivalent, and a supply of
cleaning rags that can be laundered.  These aren't primarily for windows
but for cleaning & wiping tables, equipment, and other surfaces that are
closer to the ground and subject to grime, spills, and so on.  Those of
us who are inclined toward chemistry can experiment with creating our
own version of Windex: basically it's dilute ammonia with a little bit
of detergent.  (Never mix ammonia and bleach: poison gas!)

d)  A trash container that's easy to tote around the space and fill up
with whatever dropped objects, swept-up stuff, and so on.  It can be
used as a collecting container: the load can be sorted into recyclables
and trash when it's transferred to the main bins.  The point of this is
to save oneself the effort of having to walk back and forth to the main
bins with every handful of "stuff."  Best of all are 5-gallon pails,
which can be found "used" and scrubbed out, or bought cheaply at
hardware stores.  You can carry two around at once: one for trash and
one for recycling, saving some sorting later. 

e)  An upright vacuum with a hose attachment.  We already have one. 
With frequent spot-sweeping by hand (broom & long-handled dustpan),
vacuuming only needs to be done occasionally, once a week or every other
week.  The most efficient way to vacuum is with a helper who can help
move furniture before you get to that part of the room, so the vacuuming
can go on without interruptions or need to maneuver around objects.

Re. methods: 

Aside from "patrol" cleaning such as sweeping up spills or picking up
occasional bottles: Start by picking up large objects and work your way
toward the crumbs.  After picking up & sweeping up, start from above
head-level and work your way to floor level.  Vacuuming comes
second-to-last, and cleaning surfaces with Windex & rags comes last of
all. 

Liquid spills are best cleaned up as soon as they occur (the supply of
cleaning rags should be accessible for this), so they don't become
dried-on or sticky and hard to remove later. 

Left-behind piles of food & drink containers on tables mean there's a
need for small convenient refuse containers (5-gallon pails work for
this also) near the places where the messes accumulate.

Vacuuming makes noise that some people find distracting, and involves
moving furniture, so it should be done at the beginning or end of the day.

We have a Roomba: a little carpet-cleaning robot with brushes and
vacuum.  This is in serious need of being cleaned and reconditioned,
with new brushes, filters, and battery pack.  But once it's in working
order it can be turned loose on the big room every other night, and will
relieve the need for vacuuming more than once a month or so. 

Everyone has their own personal list of clever cleaning tricks, and we
can start compiling these for reference, on a wiki page.

Cleaning can become like inertia: at first it looks like a big task that
takes much effort to get moving, but after it's going along routinely,
it takes relatively little effort to keep it up.

-G.

======

On 13-05-05-Sun 10:25 AM, Romy Ilano wrote:
> It would be interesting if the organizers of events could find a
> cooperative way to make cleaning fun for each individual guest... Make
> a game of "who'll pick up beer bottles?"
>
> Re: janitors 
> My uncle recently retired as a janitor at a Florida school. He was
> debt free and able to return to his home country with a great pension.
> He bought and paid for a house car and saved despite coming from a
> crime ridden poor third world country 
>  Lets hear it for janitors they do great work 
>
> ---
>
> Romy Ilano
> Founder of Snowyla
> http://www.snowyla.com
> romy at snowyla.com <mailto:romy at snowyla.com>
>
> On May 5, 2013, at 10:08, "mattsenate at gmail.com
> <mailto:mattsenate at gmail.com>" <mattsenate at gmail.com
> <mailto:mattsenate at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>> Cleaning is life. But even if each of us tried our best to clean up
>> after ourselves, there will be aggregated filth, incrementally built,
>> plus the cost of natural shuffling, displacement--such is the burden
>> of use and optimization! I think we should:
>>
>> Communicate more clearly the necessary standards for common space.
>>
>> Provide all event holders with a checklist for set up and break down
>>
>> Clean up after ourselves and each other collaboratively
>>
>> Recognize that some additional amount of cleaning is required and
>> therefore create good systems for cleaning natural, aggregate mess.*
>>
>> * my personal politics hope we can do this specific type of work
>> without direct financial incentive.
>>
>> // Matt
>>
>> ----- Reply message -----
>> From: "Gregg Horton" <greggahorton at gmail.com
>> <mailto:greggahorton at gmail.com>>
>> To: "Romy Ilano" <romy at snowyla.com <mailto:romy at snowyla.com>>
>> Cc: "sudo-discuss" <sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>> <mailto:sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org>>
>> Subject: [sudo-discuss] should we hire someone to clean up after events?
>> Date: Sun, May 5, 2013 9:48 AM
>>
>>
>> I think we should hire a fellow sudoer and use the cash as incentive.
>> Whoever wishes to do it that month can. 
>>
>> Or people can learn how to pick up after themselves. 
>>
>>
>> On Sun, May 5, 2013 at 8:44 AM, Romy Ilano <romy at snowyla.com
>> <mailto:romy at snowyla.com>> wrote:
>>
>>     SudoRoom is a hackerspace. Our skillset is not cleaning,
>>     especially cleaning the big main room.
>>
>>     *- Should we put aside $30-60 every time a group holds an event
>>     in our space so that we can pay someone to clean up the common room?*
>>     *- Should we pay someone $30-60 once  month to clean the common
>>     room for us?*
>>
>>     I brought this up because we are realistically not going to get a
>>     lot of members to clean the space. we are hackers. it is not our
>>     skillset. There is not going to be a magical day when a
>>     hackerspace finds that all of its members find cleaning to be a
>>     pleasurable act.
>>
>>     We are good at starting projects, drinking beer, looking for new
>>     spaces, but we are definitely not great at cleaning.
>>
>>     Our landlord G is also receptive to the idea of us hiring someone
>>     to clean up the common room after big events. 
>>
>>     I personally suck at cleaning, I'm into doing it, but I would
>>     rather spend my time hacking and working on projects. I spent a
>>     bit of time cleaning up the space Saturday morning, wiping down
>>     the tables int he main room and vacuuming to prepare the space
>>     for the today I learned.
>>
>>
>>
>>     _______________________________________________
>>     sudo-discuss mailing list
>>     sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
>>     <mailto:sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org>
>>     http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss
>>
>>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> sudo-discuss mailing list
> sudo-discuss at lists.sudoroom.org
> http://lists.sudoroom.org/listinfo/sudo-discuss

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://sudoroom.org/pipermail/sudo-discuss/attachments/20130505/9df918ba/attachment.html>