by Bradley Parsons
Staff Writer
By issuing over 40 percent of its permits electronically last month, the City’s Building Inspection Division says it is saving time and resources while easing the permitting process for contractors.
Building Inspection chief Tom Goldsbury said his division issued 3,326 permits last month, largely to private contractors for mechanical, electrical and plumbing projects. In addition to making the process more accessible to contractors, the online applications have freed Goldsbury’s staff from piles of paperwork resulting from hundreds of permit requests processed each day.
The division received nearly 8,000 permit applications last month, a figure Goldsbury said was buffeted by a year-long surge in new home sales. The City issued more new housing permits last month than any month in the previous three years. For the year, new home permits are up 25 percent.
Goldsbury said the City receives at least four permit requests — building, electrical, plumbing and mechanical — for every new home built. Without the online permits, Goldsbury said, five or six division clerks would be required to sift through and format more than 200 permits per day. Applications turned in by hand are typically handwritten, requiring clerks to type the one- to two-page, legal-sized forms themselves.
“Before we took the applications online, we had clerks that that’s all they did all day — type applications,” said Goldsbury. “Taking them online has allowed us to reallocate our resources.”
Electronic filing allowed the division to staff its code enforcement section with a full-time clerk for the first time. Before the online process, which started in 2001, 15 inspectors did their own paperwork.
The applications, accessible on the Building Inspection Division’s page of the City’s website, have caught on with contractors as a way to save time and money.
Rather than run downtown to file a single permit, Goldsbury said, contractors would typically collect several applications to file as a group, costing the builders hours, even days.
“Now they can apply for the permit any time of the day or night,” said Goldsbury, adding his division would usually process the applications within a day.
The contractors may pay their fees electronically by establishing escrow accounts with the City. The Building Inspection Division then subtracts permitting and inspection fees from the accounts.