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Building and Neighborhood Services proposes position reclassifications, requests small capital additions and cites code-update costs
Summary
The department outlined a largely stable personnel budget with reclassifications in permitting, a proposed floater vehicle, ongoing STVR software maintenance, training and floodplain outreach costs, and program enhancements tied to development services career paths.
Tom Marsh, director of Building and Neighborhood Services, presented the department’s FY26 base budget and program enhancement requests to the Budget & Finance Committee, describing the work as focused on safety, quality of life and facilitating private investment in Franklin.
Marsh said the department helped facilitate substantial private development activity in 2024 and reported collections of $2.4 million in permit-related fees. “Our budget request does not change much from year to year. The vast majority of the budget is personnel,” Marsh said.
The department proposed several position reclassifications in the development services/permitting area: reclassifying the permitting operations supervisor to development services manager; renaming permit technicians to development services technicians and adding a development services technician 2 step; and reclassifying the technical support specialist to development services IT specialist. Marsh said these changes reflect broader responsibilities in permit review, coordination across departments and retention goals for experienced staff.
Operations and small capital notes included: - A request for one additional department vehicle to serve as a dedicated floater (departmental pool vehicle) to maintain operations when assigned vehicles are out of service. - Annual maintenance costs of $26,000 for the Avenue STVR (short-term vacation rental) software, which the department used to track 66 STVR permits in 2024 and reported an average nightly rate of $143. - Training and continuing education costs to maintain more than 200 professional certifications held by department staff and anticipated updates for adopting the 2024 International Codes. - A $9,000 public outreach line item for ongoing floodplain outreach following new FEMA maps and a mailing campaign to property owners in flood-prone areas.
Marsh estimated program enhancement reclassifications would raise the annual budget by approximately $40,000 if approved. He said the department requests no net new full-time positions beyond reclassifications in the submission under review.
On housing and neighborhood work, Housing Development Coordinator Kathleen Salceda joined the presentation and later discussed Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) projects (see separate article). Committee members asked for detail on vehicle take-home policy and staffing counts; Marsh said roughly 15 vehicles are assigned as take-home and five to six vehicles are parked daily.
The committee did not vote on these program enhancements at the presentation; staff said these items will be part of the ongoing budget prioritization process.
