THE Church Street headquarters of the Kingston and St Andrew Corporation has not been operating in conformity with standard fire prevention practices, a recent inspection by the Fire Department has found.

The findings were released at Wednesday’s meeting of the Disaster and Public Health Committee of the council, prompting Mayor Desmond McKenzie to order that recommendations by the Fire Department be implemented within three weeks.

On Wednesday, McKenzie told the meeting that no sub-committee was necessary to determine how the recommendations should be implemented, and instructed city engineer Norman Shand to immediately implement the Fire Prevention Division’s recommendations.

“The recommendations must be implemented right away, anywhere the money has to come from,” McKenzie said.

The Fire Prevention Division recommended that four automatic smoke detectors be installed on the ceiling of the third floor in the building section, the city engineer’s office and the registry/filing sections.

The Fire Prevention Division also recommended that the acting town clerk, Lincoln Evans, “ensure that the (2.27kg) five-pound CO2 fire extinguisher is replaced into the vacant extinguisher box” in the building section.

The division said, too, that the CO2 fire extinguisher in the city engineer’s office needed to “be serviced as presently it needs to be charged”.

Instructions were also given that a dry chemical fire extinguisher be installed in the passage leading to the third floor staircase, and also for a fire alarm to be placed near this fire extinguisher.

In addition, the Fire Prevention Division recommended that a fire hose reel, of a minimum of 18.75 mm diameter, non-kinking reinforced rubber, be installed in the vicinity of the third floor staircase.

The Fire Prevention Division has also found the ground floor of the KSAC’s headquarters wanting, and instructed the KSAC to install three automatic smoke detectors to serve the typing pool section and to put a fire alarm onto the wall on “either end of the passage in the vicinity of the staircase”.

The city council was also told to install fire extinguishers in the lunch room on the ground floor and in the city treasurer’s section on that level.

Also, the Fire Prevention Division said the KSAC’s filing room should face the car park, making it less susceptible to destruction in case of a fire.

According to the Fire Prevention Division, the KSAC should also store items in the filing room on pallets, to create aisles and cross aisles between piles and to also install four automatic smoke detectors at strategic points in this section.

It was also recommended that the KSAC:

. ensure that housekeeping be improved throughout the entire building by the removal and disposal of all useless combustible materials such as old newspapers, boxes and chairs;

. provide and install exit signs over exit doors and directional arrows along the passageways to indicate the exit routes from the building;

. ensure that all useless or hanging electrical wires are removed or placed in conduits by a certified electrician; and

. provide and install a single stage manual/electric fire alarm system “with stroboscope which is audible throughout the premises”.