I saw a similar post on a different list serve and thought it was worthy of a repost:
Over my 30 or so years in the code enforcement industry I had the opportunity to hire literally dozens of inspectors and plans examiners. A couple of insights I gained over the years is that you can train just about anyone to be a competent plans examiner but you cannot fix a bad attitude. You can drive a bad attitude under the table for a while but it eventually always comes back up.
Another issue is that some people tend to weaponize the codes. They look at the codes as a finite, inflexible bible rather than an outcome based set of documents.
I’ve always felt that the job of the plans examiner is to help make the job of the inspector easier. You get what you need on the plans so the inspector doesn’t end up looking like the bad guy after things are already built. What you need on the plans is going to differ with each jurisdiction. As example, if your inspectors are not having issues with handrail heights, why bother having it detailed on the plans? If you want total code compliance on the plans, you need to attach all of the codes to every set of plans that you issue a permit for.
Items I’d look for in a plans examiner include:
Problem solving skills rather than a propensity for throwing up unneeded road blocks.
- A strong sense that every permit applicant is a customer rather than a potential victim.
- A basic understanding with how things are built in your jurisdiction.
- Basic mathematical skills but not advanced calculus.
- An understanding that each day a permit is held up means someone is having money taken from their purse or wallet.
- Willingness to solve concerns with a phone call (more personal than email) rather than a correction letter.
- Willingness to take projects out of chronological order to get small projects out the door quickly rather than wait in line behind larger, more complex projects.
I wanted to include a basic understanding of static and dynamic loads but decided against it as you as the building official can always teach those things to a plans examiner. Attitude always overcomes ineptitude. I’ll take a happy, customer service oriented employee that knows next to nothing about the codes over a miserable sot any day.
Construction background is extremely helpful but not completely necessary. Inspection background is also very helpful. I’ve hired several people that are graduates of Butte College in California (and therefore have a lot of certifications) as well as Chemeketa College in Oregon with very mixed results. Attitude is king. Place attitude over qualifications every time. As stated, a bad attitude is poison and there is no antidote. Hire a person with all the qualifications in the world and if they have a bad attitude you are going to make your workplace and your customers miserable.
So….. how much effort are you as a building official willing to put in to training a great person that doesn’t yet possess the skill sets that you’re looking for? Washington State Supreme Court ruling in Taylor v. Stevens County (1988) was very clear that code compliance is the duty of the person doing the work and not that of the jurisdiction. Accordingly, I’d recommend tailoring (pun intended) your job description around a customer service, friendly and helpful employee above technical expertise. You can teach technical expertise but you will never cure a bad attitude.
Given the rural nature of your jurisdiction I would recommend test questions relative to the sorts of buildings you normally encounter. In my rural experience the most common failures we saw were post framed building (pole barns) collapsing due to snow, manufactured homes having car ports supported by the home rather than being self-supporting, ice dam damage on roofs and concrete flat work being destroyed because of frost heave.
I’d recommend keeping testing questions mostly related to customer service skills. You can wash out a lot of really great candidates asking technical questions however, a few technical questions can help you assess the order of your candidates.. Perhaps things such as:
- What is the minimum assumed compressive strength of soil assumed in the IRC?
- What is expansive soil?
- What is liquefaction?
- What is air entrainment for?
- What is advanced framing and what is intermediate framing?
- How many exits are required from a manufactured home?
- What is the difference between a modular home and a manufactured home?
I remember years ago I was asked to apply for a building official position in an unnamed jurisdiction on an island in Lake Washington. I wasn’t really interested in the job but the City Manager was a good friend and he didn’t have a large enough applicant pool to hold interviews so I agreed as a favor and threw my hat in the ring. The oral interviews went really well (I knew everyone on the panel) but when it came to the test questions it was clear that they were really looking for an engineer, not a code expert. One of the questions was regarding calculating the sliding interface for a retaining wall with a certain surcharge with a given coefficient of friction to the supporting soil. I’d had enough training over the years that I could perform the calculation but why would anyone expect a building department employee to do so?
The point I’m trying to make is to not require a great deal of technical expertise but rather focus on happy people that can be trained.
