Quote from @Chris Brall:
I went through the entire very variance process of meetings, legal ads, and everything else required for a variance. There were 20 requests at the meeting. I was the only one denied a variance that meeting at which time my son said, and I quote that manager has it out for you dad during the meeting when my variance was brought up someone in the highway department stated they do not pay for a porch addition , which I was applying for also stated that the house would now be an egress because of the road expansion as the house sits. The manager replied to them does not matter. He does not get a variance and needs a survey to move the process forward. I found out how much a survey would cost and time that it would take at which point I went to the building department and told them I would not like to continue with the variance and just construct the home in the same footprint that it’s currently on. two permits were issued at that time one for the home and one for the garage. I completed the permit process for the home and was given a certificate of occupancy for the home permit. I also had a green tag on the garage permit and thought that the certificate of occupancy was for the entire project. at which point I put the home for sale, only to learn that the permit for the garage portion did not have a final stamp of approval when contacting the building department, I was told by the manager he would not allow an inspection on the garage permit that I had not completed the variance process and would need to revisit the entire process in order to receive a final inspection on the garage permit . there is a lot more to the story than I would like to put here but I feel I am being wronged by the manager of the building department for some reason unknown to me. Please help if anyone has been in a similar situation, how to move forward to obtain the necessary completion of permit thank you again
Man, I’m sorry for your troubles. I’ve experienced a wide variety of permitting/City planning tar pits in my construction career. Unfortunately my municipal apples may be oranges to yours, I’ve navigated major urban municipal departments which simply might not match up to your local bureaucracy, but here’s my 2 penny opinion.
- I stand by a pretty universal Bldg dept practice- a permit never gets released if zoning forbids it. You stated 2 fully paid for permits were released to begin construction. I would be getting an answer from senior department officials regarding that contradictory fact in the face of this variance process demand, AFTER THE FACT.
- most everywhere I’ve worked there is a job site inspection card. Your locale use those? Did you have one specifically for the garage and what is the status of every required inspection on that card only? Not the house, just garage.
- Does the garage permit scope of work match exactly the construction performed on the job site? I understand how easily it was to assume the C of O might have been for both permits, but why wasn’t the garage final inspection scheduled? The house permit got one, so why not the garage? I don’t know this “green tag” reference, not a thing in my universe.
- if the garage inspection card has legitimate progress approvals, I would argue with someone other than this manager, and I would find someone eventually above them or at their level, to objectively intervene. The issued permit and progress inspection approvals on the garage demonstrate preexisting municipal approval without any variance, and demand inspections continue where they left off. You paid for it, it’s your right to make the effort to comply.
I understand smaller departments may only have 3 or 4 people manning the whole process. If that’s the case, and you have an enemy in that small a group, your path of least resistance may be to reset and try to get some empathy flowing your way. It’s not your responsibility to issue and release the permits, it’s theirs, and they did. So why wouldn’t they simply let you finish the inspections? I would ask someone other than this manger why would an existing approved permit that did not need a variance now require a variance approval process?
Anyway, if it’s murkier than that, and there are circumstances that trigger some sort of non-compliance zoning/code issues, then you’re at whatever the hell process they say, and you better follow it through, cuz they have the law on their side if that’s the case.
