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DBI reports stronger revenues, permit-tracking progress and rising major-project pipeline
Summary
DBI reported improved revenues and ongoing work to roll out a permit-tracking system; staff said they expect to end the fiscal year ahead of budget, are hiring inspectors, and will begin user testing of the new permit portal in April while field tests of mobile devices are starting.
Department of Building Inspection leadership delivered updates on finances, permit-tracking rollout and the major-project pipeline during the commission meeting.
Deputy Director Pamela Levin said DBI continues to see rising revenue and expected to finish the fiscal year with increased revenues and expenditure savings: "We expect to finish the year with about $13,000,000 in revenue and expense savings of that," and staff characterized the result as roughly $11 million more in charges for services over the budget with $2 million in expenditure savings. Levin also described recent hires (10 filled positions) and upcoming hires for housing and electrical inspector classifications with some new inspectors expected to start around April and additional recruitment steps scheduled through the summer.
On technology, DBI's IS Project Director said the permit and project-tracking rollout is moving into user-acceptance testing (UAT) preparations scheduled for April and that a public stakeholder web-portal demonstration was set for the afternoon. The project lead said DBI is enabling a limited number of mobile devices for field staff to use with the existing inspection scheduling system and will provide further demonstrations and stakeholder meetings quarterly.
Staff also briefed commissioners on the mayor's proposed mandatory soft-story retrofit legislation: DBI said a substitute measure introduced by the mayor's office refines outreach and may expand the inventory to include some two-story buildings in certain hillside conditions; DBI expects to receive a notification database and to coordinate implementation steps with the mayor's earthquake-safety office.
Finally, acting director remarks noted the major-project valuation in the pipeline had increased substantially and that staff observed a growing number of tower cranes in the city. The acting director described the rough valuation and unit count of major projects as on the order of billions of dollars and thousands of units (speaker described roughly $3.8 billion and about 5,000 units), noting the department is monitoring staffing and space needs to support increased workload.
Commissioners asked for additional supporting materials (documents and meeting attendance lists) for the permit-tracking demonstrations and asked DBI to report back with test results and implementation timelines.
