City mechanics Dana Nichols and Craig Parsens have just enough time to wipe the sweat from their brows now that mowing season is nearing a close.
The two city employees are responsible for repairing and maintenancing more than 200 vehicles in Athens — arriving to the Athens City Garages on West State Street at 7:30 a.m. every weekday and staying until 4 p.m., sometimes forgoing lunch.
For $22.58 an hour, they see that each police car, firetruck and leaf blower hits the streets in its best possible shape. None of the city’s elected officials drive the city’s vehicles.
Still, Nichols can’t help but tremble a bit when he sees a lawnmower from the Athens Parks and Recreation Department roll into the garage for repair.
“Mowing season kind of wears me down,” Nichols, who has been working as a city mechanic for 12 years, said. “The Parks and Rec guys we call Mr. 140, because they’re mowing 140 acres. And they break them, they bust them, they roll them into ponds, they tear the tires off — that’s just general stuff that happens.”
The mower that had been completely submerged into the Sells Park pond by a city employee was only 80-hours-old, Nichols remarked.
“It’s always the brand new ones,” he said. “It’s always super expensive, it always goes into everyone’s wallet.”
In between “seasonal” repairs to the trucks that carry road salt, lawn mowers and leaf blowers, they schedule routine check-ups for police and fire vehicles, often making slight changes to suit each officer.
The police cruisers, ranging from Ford Crown Victorias, Chevrolet Impalas and more, often arrive with broken odometers. Some have seen well over 100,000 miles in their day, Athens Police Captain Ralph Harvey said. When funds are allocated toward purchasing a new cruiser, it often comes close to $23,000, not including the detailing and mounting that must occur before it hits the road with an officer.
“Once you do all that stuff and start racking up all your fees and charges, most of the work is done in-house by our mechanics at city garage,” Harvey said. “They’re amazing.
“I can’t think of anything in the past few years that we couldn’t do in-house.”
Police vehicles come in whenever they have to, Nichols said, and because their cruiser vehicles are working three shifts a day — it’s not uncommon to see them often. Firetrucks, which are repaired by Parsens, have roughly two months of the year devoted to their maintenance.
The hard part is filling the repairs in between on smaller vehicles or motorized items, such as trash pumps, street cleaners and more. The department is now down a mechanic, who recently retired. The position will not be filled, Nichols said.
“I think we’re keeping up,” Nichols said. “Some stuff slides by, but I blame that on the supervisors of the departments, they’re not getting them down here.”
Some of the city’s vehicles determine when they need repairing based on their mileage — others have to rely on the driver’s foresight. Oftentimes, vehicles like leaf blowers and road marking vehicles will see such little road time that no one will be aware that they’re falling apart.
That’s the condition they arrive to the garage in.
“Usually when you do a service, you can’t just get the oil changed,” said Parsens, who has been a city mechanic for 22 years. “As soon as you start checking, the brakes are worn out and the filter’s broken.”
Because of this, Parsens meticulously replaces every filter on each vehicle, changes the oil, checks all of the brakes, tires and suspension before he gets to any major repairs — which can take up half of his day alone.
Still, it’s a job you can do in jeans and boots while the radio plays anything from Amy Winehouse to Maroon 5. It’s a job you can do with someone else who shares the exact same interest and passion for repair.
Service calls also help break up the monotony.
“In the winter time, the salt trucks will get stuck in a ditch, and who do you think they’re going to call?” Nichols said. “We’re the go-to guys.”
Though Parsens said it can all get a bit annoying.
“It’s uncanny how when we get those calls to go get something that’s broke down, we’re rolling out of the gate to go to lunch. When we get there, they’re gone because they went to lunch,” Parsens added.
But the city is grateful for its go-to guys, City Engineer and Publics Work Director Andy Stone said. They wouldn’t be on the road without them.
“They’re very good, we’re very fortunate to have them,” Stone said. “There are mechanics out there that can work on a Honda Civic, but that’s all they work on. They can work on anything.”
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