Orange County approves new engineers and technicians to speed health plan reviews to 30 days

Orange County’s Health and Mental Health Committee approved the creation of three public health engineer positions, two public health technician positions and one principal clerk to help the county reach a target 30-day turnaround for engineering plan reviews.

County health staff told the committee the backlog rose sharply after 2020, and the county received nearly 500 plan-review submissions in 2022 and expects more than 600 this year. Steve, a health department staff member, said the department has operated at 50 hours of overtime per week to keep up and that adding positions is one part of a larger plan to shorten review time. “That 30 days would be not from the time we get the first submission to the time it gets approved,” Steve said. “It’s the time of submission to this time we get our comments back out.”

The committee heard a presentation that analyzed past volumes: 341 plans were…