PORTLAND, Maine - In the wake of the deadly Portland fire that claimed six young lives earlier this month, dozens of landlords attended a public meeting Wednesday night focused on a subject that's now in the public spotlight - fire safety.
Following the deadly Noyes Street fire, Brit Vitalius says one thought above all probably went through every landlord's head: "That could have been me as a landlord."
Vitalius, who's president of the Southern Maine Landlord Association, organized this informational session on fire safety to address some of the questions - and doubts - now in the minds of other landlords
"We could have had a fire in our building and maybe something wasn't perfectly up to code," he says. "Maybe the smoke detectors weren't right, maybe an egress wasn't clear, and it's really got all of us thinking about these issues."
Capt. David Petruccelli of the Portland Fire Department says it starts with the basics, like having the property address clearly marked - and not just on the outside.
"For us, the addressing inside the building is as important as the addressing outside of the building," Petruccelli says. "Once we get in, for us to get to an apartment or a unit quicker, having that laid out by floor and by suite number, room number, makes a big difference for us."
And, according to city code, most residences also need to have at least two exits - in case fire is blocking one of them. And one of the biggest challenges for landlords, says Petruccelli, is keeping those exits - and the hallways outside - cleared of bikes, boxes and other stored belongings.
"We all need to figure out a way to educate the tenants better on storage, because it isn't just trash build-up," he says. "A lot of them, it's their belongings that are in the hallway because they don't have room, or a storage unit, or someplace to put it."
Landlords are also being urged to educate tenants about the importance of keeping smoke alarms - and carbon monoxide alarms - in working order. Code requires a smoke alarm on each level of a living unit, in each bedroom and immediately outside the bedroom.
But many landlords complain of tenants dismantling them, or taking the batteries out when they begin to chirp. The Landlord Association's Brit Vitalius suggests a requirement that tenants fill out a form acknowledging that smoke and CO detectors are installed and working and agreeing to contact the landlord immediately if any of them malfunction.
"As landlords, what we can try to do is have as safe a building as we can, and then document that we have a safe building," Vitalius says.
"Just because you're code compliant doesn't mean you're as safe as you ought to be," says Mark Cummings, president and principal engineer at Fire Risk Management Inc., an engineering consultancy based in Bath. He says fire codes are only the minimum standard for safety, and landlords are advised to go beyond them, where necessary, by installing sprinkler systems or having fire extinguishers on hand.
"There are going to be buildings - and I've been in many of them - that are code compliant, but from my perspective they may still be falling short of what I would consider having adequate fire and life safety," Cummings says.
And there are other standards beyond code that a landlord should meet. William Exley is with Clark Insurance in Portland. He says insurance inspections often identify fire hazards that must be addressed, even if they are code compliant.
"Any existing hazard in an apartment building that remains uncorrected, that a reasonable person or a reasonable landlord should correct, represents a liability hazard," Exley says. "And if it remains uncorrected and something bad happens as a result, then you can't use code as a defense for that."
"It was just a good reminder, you know, just to hear all of the pieces again," says landlord Dave Gulick, who, along with his wife Maria Crouch, owns 10 rental units in Portland and Brunswick. Gulick says the meeting offered a good refresher course on what's expected of landlords: "The types of detectors, and flammable liquids, and monthly checks."
"A reminder to get the bicycles out of the hallways," says Mark Cummings. "You know the tenants: 'Oh, I left it there for...,' you know."
"It's all important," Gulick says.
"All of it," agrees Cummings.
Concerns, they admit, may have slipped to the back of some landlords' minds until the recent tragedy at Noyes Street, which the state is still investigating.
View the city of Portland's fire code.
