Jackson Heights Life

As far as I can tell, the only thing the Fillmore is not doing is redistributing the fire safety plan during fire prevention week. Most fire safety guidelines are apartment-based, not building based (as seen above).

Yes, let's endorse the idea that boards have no responsibility beyond the minimum required by law. Indeed, in your world, the public owner of the building in the London fire has no responsibility whatever for the death of what is known to be 79 people and likely to be over 100.

Here's another view. Maybe Fillmore Hall and the rest of the buildings in historic Jackson Heights should get a grip on the fire hazard and deal with it proactively, instead of dumping the issue on individual apartment owners and effectively telling them to fend for themselves, so that lots of people, when there is a fire in one of these buildings, don't wind up burning alive.

I believe that the Fillmore board and Elite, Fillmore's management company, won't get it until residents tell them that in the event of a fatal fire, there will be a demand to investigate with a view to charging board members and Elite employees personally with manslaughter if not murder. And the surviving residents won't be paying your legal bills.

The boards of other buildings in Jackson Heights should think very carefully about that.

And if you think I'm kidding, those charges are actively being considered in relation to the London fire, including against the London equivalent in that case of what we call a co-op board.

I have lived in a few apartment buildings in my life in three countries, and I have never seen anything as incompetent on fire safety as I have seen at the Fillmore, and what I suspect is going on generally in this neighborhood.

Unless I'm missing something, Jackson Heights historic buildings are brick, lathe and plaster and in the event of a fire could go up like a matchbox.

If there is an evacuation plan in my building, I have never been told what it is. I do know that there is no sprinkler system and that the doors between wings of the floors, if they are supposed to be fire doors, are a joke. Apart from Exit signs, there is no fire evacuation information posted anywhere in the building. To the best of my information, there is no fire alarm system. There is certainly no way for a resident to trigger an alarm.

I have no information on fellow residents on my floor who may need assistance in the event of a fire.

There has never been a fire drill and there has never been a public meeting with the fire department.

I live on the sixth floor and luckily have a choice between the fire escape through a window (which I have never tried to use), a stairwell 15' away and a roof 25' away. I have no idea which to choose in a given situation, except that I assume (not that anyone had said so) that the elevator 5' from my apartment is a bad idea.

I actually don't know whether there is a system in my building to warn us of a fire and to get out.

Each month, I get an envelope containing a bill for maintenance. Not once has this envelope included fire information. And there is not a single word about fire on our building's website.

Meanwhile, our board debates how much to spend on the garden, and has no problem finding time to post notices about "board approved" social events.

The London fire has got me thinking about fire safety. I have some questions.

Does your board:

1. hold fire drills and, if so, how often?
2. supply instructions on what to do on your specific floor/section of floor in the event of fire? If so, how often are these instructions sent to you and are they ever updated?
3. hold information sessions, preferably attended by NYFD reps, on fire safety? If so, how often?
4. made recent investments in fire prevention/control? If so, what investments?
5. in the event of a fire, have a plan to ensure that all residents are notified immediately?

I'm raising these questions because the answers, in the case of the building in which I live, are not encouraging.

Would like to know what is happening elsewhere.

P.S. Today the NY Times published a detailed analysis of what went wrong in London. While high rises differ markedly from the buildings in Jackson Heights, the article sure prompts one to think about fire safety: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/24/world/europe/grenfell-tower-london-fire.html

Accidental Double post

Redge: Let me state this more clearly: Drop it now.  Participating on this board is not "hiding behind a pseudonym."   The right to use an anonymous username is a fundamental characteristic of this particular online community.  If you continue to give erospolitico a hard time about this, you will be suspended from the forum.

If you want to start a general discussion about this forum's policies, feel free to do so.   But stop targeting individuals for participating.

I already said that erospolitico has a right to use a pseudonym. I questioned using that right when the subject is Community Board business, erospolitico being a member of the Board. The distinction is pretty simple, but if you have a problem with it, go ahead and suspend me.

Queenskid2,

As a practical matter, negative Board votes are a hell of lot more than advisory.

As for the rest of my post, it certainly does speak for itself.

It's called democracy.