Abstract:
The study examined existing maintenance policy for government bungalows, the
current condition of the government bungalows; identify the challenges confronting
maintenance departments of public institutions and make recommendations for effective
maintenance policy and innovations that would curtail the building maintenance
problems in public institutions in Birim Central Municipality. The field investigations
focused on government bungalows of GHS nurses quarters, GPS, and Akroso SHS. Three
different housing types were defined for data collection and discussion including:
bungalows, tenement (flats) and single unit houses. Through the application of multi stage cluster sampling and random sampling techniques, 65 buildings were covered in the
survey. The research revealed that on the whole, 93.3 percent of all government
bungalows of public institutions surveyed have problems with maintenance. The age of
the buildings, Lack of maintenance culture, Inadequate funds and high maintenance cost,
Pressure on building facilities by large number of users and Poor construction work and
maintenance work done by maintenance personnel of the institution were identified as
causes of maintenance problems. Stakeholders in the housing sector also added to the
problem as a result of lack of preventive maintenance plan, low capacity of maintenance
personnel in terms of staffing and training, absence of an effective national maintenance
policy, apathy and lack of patriotism on the part of some public employees occupying
government bungalows. Recommendations made include the need for public institutions
to embrace preventive maintenance practices, periodic inspections of buildings‘
conditions, adequately staffed maintenance departments, effective national policy on
maintenance to protect buildings, establishment of a maintenance awards scheme and
maintenance fund.
Description:
A Dissertation in the Department of CONSTRUCTION AND WOOD
TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION, Faculty of TECHNICAL EDUCATION, submitted
to the School of Graduate Studies, University of Education, Winneba in partial
fulfillment of the requirements for the award of Master of Technology (Construction)
degree.