Building Dept Creates New Inspection Fees

By Andrew Gorosko

The town Building Department announced this week that it has added two new fees to its fee schedule to make the building inspection process function more smoothly.

The new fees are now in effect.

A new $25 fee will be charged for a reinspection that is required after a building inspector arrives at a work site and the work  there is not ready for inspection.

Such a $25 reinspection fee also would be charged after a building inspector arrives at a work site and a contractor or a homeowner is not available there to let the inspector enter the premises for an inspection.

The $25 fee would need to be paid to the town before a reinspection of the project would be scheduled, according to Chief Building Official John Poeltl.

Mr Poeltl explained that building inspectors’ visits to work sites are scheduled in advance, but that sometimes, the work there is either not ready for inspection or no one is available to provide the inspector with access to the building to be inspected.

The new $25 fee is intended to deter such situations from occurring.

Contractors who schedule building inspections for their work should know better than to allow such situations to occur, Mr Poeltl said. Such problems have cropped up during the past six months, he noted.

Also, a new $100 fee will be charged in cases in which a required building permit was not obtained for work  that was done in the past, Mr Poeltl said. That $100 fee would be added to the final cost of the building permit.

Such situations may arise when a homeowner is seeking to sell his or her home and it is discovered that certain improvements were made to the home in the past without a town building permit having been obtained, he said. Such improvements might include features such as a finished basement or a swimming pool.

In such cases, it makes it difficult for building inspectors to check work that was done in the past because the work has been completed and is not easily inspected, he said.

Also, such work must be inspected based on the building codes that were in effect in the past when that unauthorized work was done, Mr Poeltl said.

It is common for people to seek building permits for improvements which were made in the past, he noted. 

Also, Mr Poeltl said that following the October snowstorm that knocked out electric power across town for extended periods, many residents have been having emergency generators installed at their homes.

He estimated that the Building Department inspects the installation of between five and ten residential generators each week. Most of those devices use propane as the fuel source for providing electricity, he said.