Fire safety compliance in a New York apartment building splits into two very different categories.

One is expensive and visible: sprinklers, standpipes, alarm systems, inspections. The other costs almost nothing, involves paper and signage, and is unmet in a large share of buildings — because no filing is due, no fee is charged, and nobody comes to check until something has gone wrong.

This page is about the second category.

What has to be posted

Local Law 115 directed the Fire Department to require owners of multiple dwellings to post notices, in conspicuous locations, telling anyone escaping a fire to close the doors behind them. In practice these go on the hallway side of every stairwell door.

It looks trivial. It is not. A closed door between a fire and a stairwell slows the spread and keeps the stairwell survivable for the people still coming down. The notices exist because open doors during evacuations have killed people.

The practical failure is mundane: notices come down during a hallway repaint, a door replacement, or a change of managing agent, and nobody puts them back. Walk your own stairwells and look. That is the whole compliance check.

What has to be distributed

The FDNY Code requires fire and emergency preparedness material to reach residents and staff. The document set has been revised over time and currently includes:

  • The NYC Apartment Building Emergency Preparedness Guide
  • The Fire and Emergency Preparedness Annual Bulletin
  • The Emergency Preparedness and Evacuation Planning Checklist

Local Law 114 is the origin of that last one. It directed the Fire Department to develop a checklist for apartment building residents — explicitly including people with limited mobility, disabilities, or other special needs — to help them build an individual evacuation plan.

That is the part worth taking seriously rather than treating as a leaflet. A resident who cannot use stairs unaided needs a plan made in advance, with the building knowing who and where they are. In a walk-up with an elderly long-term tenant on the fourth floor, this is not paperwork; it is the difference between a plan and an improvisation.

Confirm the current required document set and distribution frequency with FDNY. These materials have been revised, and the required set has changed more than once.

The e-bike bulletin belongs here too

FDNY also requires residential buildings to display a Fire and Emergency Preparedness Bulletin covering e-bike storage and charging, which sits alongside the other posted material.

Of everything on this page, that is the one most worth getting right this year, for reasons covered in full in e-bike and lithium-ion battery rules. Lithium-ion battery fires develop faster and burn hotter than most residents expect, and the posted guidance is the cheapest intervention available.

Do you also need a formal Fire Safety Plan?

Possibly, and it depends on the building.

Formal fire safety and emergency preparedness plans are required for certain building classes and occupancies rather than for every multiple dwelling, and the requirements are different again for high-rise residential buildings. A small Brooklyn walk-up and a twenty-story building do not have the same obligation.

Do not assume that posting notices completes the picture. Confirm your specific building's requirements with FDNY.

The five-minute audit

Because none of this is filed, the only way to know is to look:

  • Walk every stairwell. Close-the-door notices on the hallway side of each door, present and legible.
  • Check the e-bike bulletin is posted where residents will see it.
  • Confirm the preparedness materials were actually distributed, and that you can say when.
  • Ask who in the building needs an evacuation plan — and whether anyone has one.
  • Note the date you did all this, so the next person can tell.

That last point matters more than it sounds. These obligations recur, and the most common reason a building fails them is that nobody knows whether they were ever met.

Where this sits in management

Obligations with no filing and no fee are the ones a self-managed building loses first — there is no invoice to prompt a memory and no portal to show a gap. Keeping the posted material in place through repaints and vendor changes, distributing what has to be distributed, and knowing which residents need an evacuation plan is part of how we run apartment building management and the wider legal and regulatory compliance calendar.

If you cannot say whether your stairwell notices are up, schedule a consultation or call 718-568-9278.

This article is general information, not legal or fire-safety advice, and reflects requirements as of August 2026. FDNY document sets and building-class requirements change. Confirm your building's obligations with the Fire Department.