Government Fleet, July/August 2020

City of Germantown Tenn Contact Eddie Johnson Units 210 On Road 71 Off Road Staff 9 Overcoming Challenges Extensive flooding damaged two pieces of fire apparatus The city reached out to other government agencies through its mutual aid agreements and relied on contracts with private ambulance companies while fleet overhauled the engine on a damaged pumper and ordered a new ambulance City of Houston Fleet Management Department Contact Marchelle Cain Units 9651 On Road 1331 Off Road Staff 379 Overcoming Challenges The solid waste fleet was severely aged and highly prone to breakdowns Staff members worked to obtain enough Federal Emergency Management Agency FEMA funds to replace most of the aged equipment City of Irving Texas Contact Debbie Jackson Units 837 On Road 497 Off Road Staff 31 Overcoming Challenges Technicians were challenged with balancing time between police vehicle upfitting and repair of the rest of the fleet Staff members went through a lean Six Sigma process and reduced the upfitting process to three to four days for police vehicles City of Kelowna British Columbia Canada Contact Alf Soros Units 327 On Road 282 Off Road Staff 17 Overcoming Challenges Fleet had to implement a new software that did not have a fleet module Staff members worked with the city to ensure fleet needs were met creating a custom scheduling tool to integrate the new software with the e mail system for intuitive scheduling City of Lakeland Fla Fleet Management Contact Gary McLean Units 1156 On Road 196 Off Road Staff 28 Overcoming Challenges The fleet lost its shop supervisor while prepping for hurricanes and working without a fuel station Staff sourced more tanker trailers and a second fuel truck to increase its emergency stores and retrofitted both fuel trucks so they could dispense and transfer fuel from trailers to vehicles THE REMAINING FLEETS ARE LISTED IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER Charleston County S C Fleet Operations Contact Michael Filan Units 871 On Road 184 Off Road Staff 29 Overcoming Challenges To help attract new technician hires fleet staff worked with Human Resources to expand job ads to online services social media and new areas such as high school technical courses and an automotive intern program Chesterfield County Va Fleet Services Contact Craig Willingham CAFM Units 2583 On Road 500 Off Road Staff 90 Overcoming Challenges With a low unemployment rate in the area recruiting technicians has been a challenge especially for the evening shift Fleet management revised its hiring requirements allowing more time to obtain required licenses and provided a shift differential of 1 hour for new candidates City of Boca Raton Fla Contact Tony Remige Units 723 On Road 143 Off Road Staff 17 Overcoming Challenges The fleet team implemented telematics to help recognize weak points and make improvements Now it can track vehicles in real time and identify vehicle location and use improving operations City of Buckeye Ariz Contact Michael DePaulo Units 394 On Road 66 Off Road Staff 95 Overcoming Challenges To cover workload with the existing number of technicians fleet management did an extensive oil analysis to extend the interval between preventive maintenance visits and monitored factory warranties to avoid nearly 40000 in labor costs City of Cape Coral Fla Contact AJ Forbes Units 867 On Road 785 Off Road Staff 20 Overcoming Challenges Fleet staff have continually worked to improve its natural disaster response plan which was carried out successfully through both a major tornado and hurricane in past years SPONSORED BY JULY AUGUST 2020 GOVERNMENT FLEET COM 23