- Elizabeth Larson
- Posted On
County continues addressing issues in Community Development Department
The Board of Supervisors first hosted a discussion last week on the situation, getting a followup report on Tuesday.
Last week, the county of Lake’s Human Resources provided Lake County News with information that showed that out of the Community Development Department’s 29 positions, 11 were open.
However, the process of filling those open jobs has been moving forward.
Community Development Director Bob Massarelli told the board that Brian Lee of the firm Bureau Veritas, the company the board voted to hire last week to take on some planning-related duties, is fulfilling the chief building official role on an interim basis. Lee began on Monday, and Massarelli said he’s already doing a great job in helping attack the backlog.
Mary Jane Montana, a former Community Development Department director, was hired on Tuesday to work part time as a plans examiner. In the meantime, Massarelli said his department has been sending plans to Bureau Veritas for two weeks.
He said he’s bringing on another former employee this week as a building inspector and has offered a building inspector position to a city of Indianapolis employee who should arrive in Lake County within a month.
Massarelli also met with the city of Lakeport on Monday to discuss the possibility of getting assistance from the city’s staff. He said the city is offering inspection services two half-days a week from Kelseyville around to the Northshore area.
He’s also worked with County Counsel Anita Grant to put together a mutual aid agreement with the city for those services.
Three volunteer applications were submitted to Massarelli, who said he’d interviewed two of them and was waiting to speak to the third. He’s also received a short list of building official candidates from Human Resources.
In another move that could save time, Massarelli and Grant have worked on a reroofing certification pilot program that would be rolled out over a three-month period. Massarelli said the county would retain the right to do checks, and homeowners can choose to have the county or their contractor do the inspections.
Board members said it was a great idea. But Supervisor Rob Brown cautioned, “It’s not done yet,” adding that he wanted to know how quickly that self-certification program could be rolled out.
Massarelli said that, if the board gave it approval, his department would begin putting out the word that it was available immediately.
Brown pointed out that the board wasn’t scheduled to take any action on Tuesday, but Grant pointed out that they could give staff direction to act.
She said that while a permanent ordinance is being worked on the county can put a pilot program in place that can be confirmed at the next board meeting.
“It doesn’t have the force of law. It’s an experiment, if you will,” she said, noting that from that experiment, the department and board will glean insights that they can put into a permanent ordinance.
Supervisor Moke Simon said he was in favor of the plan, but wanted to ensure that homeowners are protected and contractors are doing what they should.
County Administrative Officer Carol Huchingson said a truly “village approach” had been taken to finding solutions to the Community Development Department’s challenges, with many other departments offering assistance.
However, she cautioned, there is still a long way to go.
She also recognized Grant for her work on the roofing self-certification pilot program. “It started out as just a sketch,” said Huchingson, adding that Grant had made “a truly extraordinary effort” in working on the program.
She also pointed out that Brown himself was out in the field working on inspections.
Brown told Lake County News that for the seven-day period from Aug. 17 to Aug. 24, he had conducted 81 inspections.
Massarelli said he will be reporting to the board every Friday on the number of permits in for review as well as inspections and the status of the backlog.
On Tuesday evening, the county also held a job fair at the courthouse and hosted an information session with contractors.
As a result of the job fair, Brown told Lake County News that the county had received 13 applications for jobs in the Community Development Department plus a number of applications for other departments, including the Tax Collector’s Office.
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