Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Building Inspections topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Cibolo’s building department says outsourced inspections cleared backlog, sped permits and tightened foundation standards
Summary
Building official Matt Hansen told the City Council that the BB Inspections Services partnership has eliminated a multi-month plan-review backlog, moved inspections to next-day turnaround, shifted to fully digital permits and advanced stronger foundation standards adopted after Charleston Park problems.
Matt Hansen, Cibolo’s building official, told the City Council on April 28 that the city’s contract with BB Inspections Services has transformed permitting and inspections operations since going live in October 2022. "Within the first six weeks, the backlog was eliminated," Hansen said, adding the department moved from two-week inspection waits to next-day inspections and now processes permits digitally.
City officials said the contract covers full-service building department duties through September 30, 2027, and is managed as a partnership rather than a traditional vendor relationship. Hansen laid out key performance indicators the department uses daily, including a "three-time fail" tracker that flags repeated trade inspection failures so contractors and the city can reduce delays.
The presentation detailed how BB Inspections closed a backlog that once included more than 120 residential plan reviews and multiple multifamily projects, modernized the software platform, and took over city health inspections in October 2025. Hansen said the arrangement improved turnaround times and customer service while enabling the city to adopt more rigorous code enforcement tools such as digital permitting and real-time permit tracking.
Hansen also reviewed the evolution of local foundation standards. He traced the timeline from Ordinance 1037 (2013), which required deeper exterior foundation beams and lot-specific geotechnical reports, to later ordinances (1409 and 1410) increasing minimum foundation depths, adding damp-proofing standards and requiring post-pour elevation measurements. He said those rules were adopted in response to Charleston Park foundation issues and have corresponded with a drop in foundation repair permits for homes built after the 2013 ordinance.
Council members asked technical questions about sewer trenching, slab-elevation monitoring and whether additional measures should be placed in the Unified Development Code. Hansen said foundation and drainage requirements are enforced through the building code and by plan review, and he described the post-pour elevation measurement as a tool for future comparison rather than a preventative cure.
On finances, Hansen said the BB Inspections partnership uses a 60/40 split of building-permit fees (city/contractor model), with revenue returned to the city’s development services fund; that structure scales with growth and reduces general-fund burden. "We view this as a true partnership," Hansen said. "Protecting lives, health and property through consistent professional code enforcement is our mission."
The council received the presentation and had no formal objection; staff said metrics and performance reports are reviewed monthly with the city manager.
The next procedural step is continued oversight via monthly KPI reports to council and continued evaluation of code translation into broader development rules if council so directs.
