HKS Headquarters Construction Update – Week 25

On-Screen: Text on a white background that reads: “New Building Update, Week 25″.  The scene then changes to Joe Bruno standing at the corner of a white room with a window overlooking the street to the left.

Joe: Hey folks, this is Joe Bruno, C.E.O. at Helen Keller Services. We’re nearing the end of the project. So what you’re gonna see and what you’ll see as I’m talking to you is essentially a completed office. One thing we don’t have in yet is all of the furniture. You’ll see lots of the desks and the work areas, what you don’t see are the chairs and all the other finishing parts, but they’ll be coming in in about five days.

On-Screen: The scene cuts to several images, including shots of empty wooden desks in a large open space, an office with a desk wrapping around two corners, more desks in a different open space, and an office with a large, back-to-back two-person desk. The scene then cuts back to Joe talking.

Joe: So. we already have given notice to our staff. They are now taking whatever they have in their offices, deciding what files are required, deciding what can be thrown out, what has to be put into archive, so they’re doing that right now. And within a week or so, we will start moving staff into this building. Now there are punch list items that are gonna have to be done, many of them will be done before the move-in. But once they do all that clean-up and the main punch list items are done, those that require a clear space for the workers to complete, then we’ll begin moving in. There may still be a few things that have to be done, but essentially as of today, we have a completed space without all the furnishings. So we’re all pretty excited about this project. The office is beautiful, as you can see. For the future, the big items for us are the temporary certificate of occupancy, which we are very close to having completed. The fire alarm system has to be approved and tested, actually by the New York City Fire Department, which is being coordinated as I talk to you right now. We do have to still deal with approvals from the New York State Department of Health and others for the Children’s Learning Center, and that will not actually take hold until we get the temporary certificate of occupancy in our hands. Once we have that, they will come in and I know they’ll act very promptly for us. So, literally, we’re just a few weeks away from being all of us in our new space, at 180 Livingston Street. Signage is up. All the rooms are identified. Room numbers, soon we’ll put the names of all the people working in rooms and all the work stations that are up there. So it’s a pretty good time.

On-Screen: The scene cuts to several images, including a shot of a large vertical Helen Keller Services sign on a brick wall, a shot of a sign hanging on a dark wooden wall that reads “Helen Keller Children’s Learning Center”, a shot of a silver sign hanging on a glass background that reads “A-03”, and a shot of a silver sign hanging on a glass background that reads “C-22, Classroom”. The scene then cuts back to Joe talking.

Joe: Final clean-up will be done by a service that’ll come in soon, clean everything to the type of level we want when the staff moves in and our consumers come to meet with us. It’s been a great journey. I’m sure I’ll give you one more of these at least. And then maybe we’ll add in the ribbon cutting ceremony. We might even do something at the gala, which is coming up in a couple of weeks. But look forward to talking to you again. Bye!

On-Screen: Text on a white background that reads: To learn more about our 125th Anniversary Gala, and to RSVP, please visit: helenkeller.org/hks/gala The scene then changes to the Helen Keller 125th Anniversary logo, and blue text that reads “#HKS125” on a white background. [End of Transcript]