Building upkeep without a building coordinator

Believing that none of us is as smart as all of us, I have a question.

Now that I am training all of the leadership that uses our stake center how to schedule their events without having to go through me, I have noticed that a very important human element has been lost and I would like to know how this is overcome in other stakes around the country. In the past, when someone would call to ask if the a given date was available for an event I would take the opportunity to get their e-mail address and send them an abbeviated building cleaning checklist which had been developed by myself, the agent bishop and the Stake RS President. This checklist ensured that at least the party making the request knew how the building needed to be left when they were finished with their activity. We recently had a stake men's basketball tournament which lasted Friday night and all day Saturday. We happened to have two teams of building cleaners (one in the morning & one in the evening) clean the building that day. The second cleaning team reported that the building was a wreck, the nursery was a disaster (as it had been left a mess from children playing in there while daddy played basketball), the cultural hall was strewn with trash, the bathrooms looked like they'd never been cleaned and the halls were littered with paper. What are the policies that other stakes have in place to prevent this from happening in their buildings. Sadly, there was a convert baptism that took place one hour after the basketball players left the building in sorry shape. "Hi, welcome to our flithy building."

I'm not sure how my stake handles it (because I think it's been ingrained into our member culture), but here's how I'd approach it:

At the next training opportunity, hand a copy of the cleaning checklist to everyone who has a key to the building. If it's handed out with a few words from the stake president, that would help.

Secondly, I'd post the list inside the member janitor's closet. Hopefully someone is bright enough to know to grab a few brooms and clean things and will see the list. Certainly, our members are sharp enough that if they see anything left in the main room, they have to sweep it up.

And of course rules are nothing without enforcement: I'd send reprimands down the "chain of command".

In addition to russellhltn's comments there is a point of responsibility for each scheduled event. That person is either the person listed on the calendar as the editor for the event or a POC listed in the details of the event. If I schedule an event for someone else I most definitely make sure there is someone who is responsible at the event and I list that person in the details for the event. Failure to care for the facilities results in that person being counseled by their bishop. If I schedule the event I also send an e-mail to the POC for an event a few days before the event reminding them of their responsibility for the building.

Our stake has developed a building use policy document that references the policies in HB2 and adds items specific to our stake and for our members. It is an evolving policy document that we review with bishoprics each year and ask them to review with their respective ward councils. As with any church policy/information, the challenge is "getting the water to the end of the row". How does the typical member have access to the document and understand the responsibilities (largely cleaning up and security) when scheduling and using church buildings? We post the building use policy in the stake and each ward's lds.org newsletter section. URLs to the policy are placed in every ward bulletin.

Perhaps a cool feature of some future revision of calendar would be the ability to put some custom text or URL to the newsletter site where you edit event details. That would at least provide a visual prompt that there is a policy for scheduling the building and would provide the link for someone to view. That said, JD's point about the POC being ultimately responsible for understanding the responsibilities for using the building is key.

The online calendar system for scheduling does change what has been traditionally done. As the stake building scheduler, I find that I spend the majority of my time educating leadership and members on how to use the system rather than scheduling. I really enjoy that interaction and requires me to step out of my comfort zone at times. Especially when members are not technical or are frustrated with some of the limitations that the current systems has.