In the boroughs of New York, where spectacle often overshadows structure, the quiet hum of public infrastructure goes largely unnoticed — until something fails. Behind the city’s courthouses, correctional facilities, hospitals, and schools, there exists a complex network of electrical systems that everyone takes for granted, but few know the hard work that goes in.
For nearly six decades, Sajiun Electric Inc. has been one of the companies steadily wiring the city’s most essential institutions. At the center of it all is Richard Sajiun, a man whose legacy was never designed for headlines, but whose influence runs, quite literally, through the walls of public life.
Building Systems That Cannot Go Dark
Sajiun Electric Inc. was founded in 1965 by Richard’s father, Manuel Sajiun, a master electrician who started it with little more than his tools and reputation. The company back then was a local operation, servicing retail spaces, homes, and small commercial buildings.
Richard began learning the trade early, during his teenage years, working weekends and summers with his father before earning an electrical engineering degree from Suny State University and a master electrician’s license. When he returned to the company in the late 1990s, he did more than just step into a role, he reimagined the company’s future. He decided to steer away the firm’s focus from the saturated, profit-driven private market and reoriented it toward the world of government contracting.
The Shift to Public Work
Public work was not for the impatient. In fact, it was a decision that many considered to be counterintuitive. Public contracts are not only high-stakes and competitive but dense with regulatory complexity. They demand legal literacy, financial discipline, and an ability to manage risk with surgical precision. Yet for Richard, this landscape offered something the private sector could not: a framework where integrity mattered as much as execution.
Sajiun Electric began to specialize in rehabilitation and retrofitting, bringing aging infrastructure up to modern code, reinforcing robust systems in environments that could not afford a moment of failure. Hospitals with no room for downtime, prisons where security systems are mission-critical, schools that cannot close their doors — institutions that make up the foundations of society became the company’s domain.
The Ethics of Compliance
As exciting government contracts may have been for Richard Sajiun, these aren’t jobs for companies chasing fast profits. Government work in the U.S. comes with thousands of pages of documentation and layers of bureaucratic procedures. There are prevailing wage laws that mandate electricians be paid much more than the private sector. There are legally binding requirements to subcontract to minority-, women-, and veteran-owned businesses. There are audits, inspections, delays, and months-long payment cycles. Only, unlike private clients, the government doesn’t forgive mistakes. If you miss a line item or a legal clause, you simply don’t get paid.
“You can’t wing this,” Richard says. “This isn’t a ‘figure it out as you go’ industry. You either know how to navigate it, or you’re done before you begin.”
Richard understood early on that if the company was going to survive here, he had to master the administrative side of the trade as thoroughly as the technical. So he did. Richard made sure to put compliance so deeply into the company ethos that every member looked at it not just as a formal requirement but as ethical infrastructure.
Advice for Those Who Dare Enter the Field
It’s telling that so few firms remain in the government contracting space long term. The barriers to entry are steep, the overhead high, the patience required immense. For younger or less experienced contractors, the system can be particularly unforgiving.
Surely not every contractor is suited for government work. However, that is not to say, no one is. For those who can navigate its rigor, the rewards are also substantial: structure, fairness, and a certainty often absent in the private sector that work, when done right, will never go unpaid.
For those looking to start out in the public sector of the industry, Richard’s advice are:
- Hire Experience Early: Invest in a consultant or estimator who has successfully navigated government contracts before, don’t try it by yourself the first time.
- Read Everything: Government bid documents can run over a thousand pages, but every line is important. Skimming is not an option here.
- Plan for Delayed Payments: Be financially prepared to wait 60-90 days or longer to receive funds.
- Secure Bonding Insurance: This is non-negotiable. Without it, you won’t even qualify to bid.
- Start with Mentor Programs: Government agencies offer pathways for smaller, newer firms. They’re a good way to gain experience without being overwhelmed on the job.
- Respect the Law: Prevailing wages and diversity requirements aren’t optional. Violations can lead to lawsuits or blacklisting.
For over three decades, Richard Sajiun’s leadership has held the backbone of public life together, dependable and invisible, like he will certainly keep doing for many more years to come. There will probably never be a branding refresh or a viral campaign for Sajiun Electric. But in the quiet pulse of backup generators during a blackout, in the flickerless hum of a school hallway, in the consistent beep of hospital instruments keeping patients alive — in the subtle comfort of knowing a public infrastructure will simply work, Richard’s work will endure.
