# Does Napa need six building departments?



## mark handler (May 28, 2011)

Does Napa need six building departments?

http://napavalleyregister.com/lifestyles/home-and-garden/columnists/architects-charette/article_ac471f56-88bd-11e0-af84-001cc4c002e0.html

Earlier this month, the Napa City Council and the Napa County Board of Supervisors held a rare joint session to discuss the possible consolidation and co-locating of various departments. Many city and county have apparently overlapping services that seem redundant but are often necessary to provide unique services. For example, the sheriff and police department’s have different missions and provide dissimilar services. Consolidated may not reduce staff, costs or increase efficiency. However sharing call centers might be effective.

Napa city and county have several overlapping responsibilities that could benefit by combining services. There are six building departments in the county, each using the same California Building Code, Green Building Code, Federal ADA and a host of other common regulations. Even the plan check and permit fees are regulated by the state. School fees, special local ordinances and utility connection fees are distinct to the local jurisdiction and are added to the basic permit fee. Why not combine all of the building departments under one roof? At the very least, sharing of county wide personnel would make sense.

Recently, it was noted that there is not one structural engineering plan checker in any of the six Napa County towns, thus requiring sub-contracting with an outside consultant. While the fees are 100 percent recoverable, it would still be more effective to have a structural engineer within one of the county towns that could be shared rather than send money to a Pleasanton firm.

This is not intended to weaken our local building departments but rather strengthen response time when the economy improves and permits are requested. By consolidating or sharing services they would be able to apply more universal interpretations of the codes. Currently, Napa city and St. Helena are discussing such a venture.

The toughest obstacle to overcome may well be diverse the individual department cultures or styles that could be reluctant to consider change. Municipal department interactions and procedures can often be impediments. This could be a lesson in how future county and city departments merge or co-mingle.

Welcome to the real world of corporate downsizing.


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## fatboy (May 28, 2011)

Yeah, makes sense to consolodate, reality check, good luck with that! Six different management styles, attitudes, just the overall way of doing things, interpretations? Best have a one he!! of a take charge person if you tackle this project. Good luck!


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## mark handler (May 28, 2011)

BY THE WAY Napa County, California  IS 753.73 square miles


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## David Henderson (Jun 15, 2011)

5 Cities + County = 6


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## conarb (Jun 15, 2011)

My former foreman of many years builds spec homes in Napa county, most areas there do not allow paved driveways anymore, they must be a "permeable" surface.  If people can't pave their driveways I have to wonder why the County can pave streets?  Maybe we should go back to gravel roads, and while we are at it get rid of those pesky automobiles that are destroying our planet and go back to riding horses.


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## pwood (Jun 15, 2011)

ca,

  i'll take the hummer! i need a new wood truck :mrgreen:


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## Alias (Jun 16, 2011)

mark handler said:
			
		

> BY THE WAY Napa County, California IS 753.73 square miles


I wish them luck in their endeavor. I'm sure it will be more of a mess than anyone has envisioned.  

Here in Modoc we have two inspectors for 4,203.37 square miles but the population is a lot less than Napa, only 9,449 as of 2000. County guy and I have both experienced being 'downsized'. I am now going to be doing ALL my own admin including collection of permit fees starting in a couple of weeks. In addition to the building code enforcement, I also do some planning admin, nuisance abatement, code enforcement, etc. The City and County are all downsizing and looking to share some services. Wish us luck, we're gonna need it!  We are only two entities with no firm agreement yet.  Six boggles my mind!


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## mtlogcabin (Jun 16, 2011)

6 different political bodies made up of various egos and personalties and all of them trying to please voters and lobbyist and campaign contributors will not be willing to releinquish whatever clout and power they believe they may have. Good idea will be very hard to get all the players to agree.


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