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Pros and Cons of creating a Building Inspection Department or remain with County

Submitted by burkett43220 on 14 July 2008 - 7:39am.

Right now, we are not a full service city though we have 40,000+ residents. We are floating the idea of creating our own building inspection department. Right now, the county does it, they collect the fees, and we don't have to employ anyone. I was wonding if anyone has any experinces they could share, good or bad, about their building departments or lack thereof. Do you recommend we get a building inspection (ie. pros of such a department) or do you recommend we don't create one (i.e cons of such a deparment).

Thanks for the help.

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ups and downs in economy

Submitted by ahempton on 23 October 2008 - 7:16am.

Something to be aware of when taking on additional services are the ups and downs of the economy as it relates to the building industry. You may have difficulties handling times that are busy and then adjusting to slow periods. At least work the ups and downs into your fee schedule as much as possible and then have other work prepared for the inspectors when there's nothing to inspect.

When I took on the my new

Submitted by rhlentz on 2 September 2008 - 5:51am.

When I took on the my new role as planning director in Wilson, NC 18 months ago I was skeptical about having the inspecitons functions in my department. My position since is I wouldn't want it to change. I have direct control over our customer service delivery and on what we do with minimum housing inspections for our neighborhood revitalization efforts and the implementation and encouagement for the use of North Carolina's building rehab code for our downtown revitalization efforts. It is also a good revenue generator in the sense that the inspecitons divisions pays for itself which has helped us with departmental wide (inspections and planning) technology enhancements.

Concur 100 percent. Any

Submitted by Howard Kutzler on 6 October 2008 - 6:58am.

Concur 100 percent. Any Planning operation that does not have control over the zoning and building permit as well as property maintenance complaing functions of its community is behind the so called "8 ball" when it comes to implementing the vision of the community.