Lake City taking building inspections back from county

LAKE CITY — Lake City City Council has taken the first step toward re-establishing the city’s building inspections department and creating a Board of Building Code Appeals.

Florence County had been providing building inspections for Lake City until two or three weeks ago, City Administrator Marion Lowder said.

Council voted 6-1 on Nov. 10 to approve first readings of two ordinances that would create the department and the board and set fees for building permits.

Councilman Jason Springs cast the dissenting votes.

“I really don’t agree with the way this thing has gone down, and I realize the decision has already been made,” Springs said before the first vote.

He said the city sent the county a letter dated Sept. 21 stating that in 30 days, the city would no longer have the county providing its building inspections.

Council voted in September 2007 to approve a one-year agreement for the county to provide inspections while the city had a 30-day option to discontinue the services.

City attorney James Epps said his understanding was that the agreement had expired. Mayor Lovith Anderson Jr. said it expired a year ago.

Councilwoman Gloria Tisdale voted in favor of the ordinances, but said she agreed with Springs that council should have had the opportunity to vote to cancel the agreement.

Anderson said the change has not created any additional expenses so far because Lake City Fire Chief Tony Singletary has taken on the duties with no additional compensation. Next year’s city budget will include training costs for Singletary, the mayor said.

Springs said the county has provided building inspections at no cost to the city, but the county does collect building permit fees from within the city.

Springs said those fees totaled $35,000 last year. He added, however, that the “bottom line” was closer to $10,000 after considering several major permits that won’t be recurring. He said those included the new CVS Pharmacy and Live Oak Medical Center as well as Lake City Housing Authority work funded by federal stimulus money.

Anderson said Lake City can’t be “allowing money to leave the city” during tough economic times.

He also said the city decided to re-establish its building inspections department after receiving complaints from contractors.

City officials met with nine contractors who work in the Lake City area, Anderson said. The group of officials and contractors later met with Billy Ramsey, owner of Columbia-based Contractors Seminars Inc., which provides preparation courses for contractor exams, to determine guidelines for a city department, Anderson said.

Springs said contractors might not like the way the county interprets codes, but “if the code says what it says, there’s not much to be interpreted.”

“The purpose is not to make the contractor’s job any easier; it’s to protect the homeowner from substandard workmanship,” he said.

“I’m not saying we’ve got bad contractors in town,” but contractors outsource plumbing and other work and inspectors have to ensure that subcontractors do their jobs properly, Springs said.

He said Singletary, the fire chief, faces enough extra duties and is “stretched thin” already. Springs also said he’s concerned with the liability of an uncertified person doing inspections.

Singletary said he would be “grandfathered in” for at least a year because of his 12 years’ experience with building inspections for the city.

“I think that my judgment on building inspections is sufficient,” he told council.

Singletary took over as Lake City's building inspector for three years after Ronnie McKnight, who trained him, died in 1998, he said after the meeting.

Singletary also said the liability for structures would rest on the architect and contractor. The 2006 International Building Code states that the building official wouldn’t be held personally liable for any damage if acting “in good faith and without malice” in performing duties required by the code.

During their most recent meeting, council members also heard from Debbie Dickinson of Sylvan Cities in Florence, which handles urban forestry and horticulture. She was hired by the Lake City Community Foundation to create a Main Street landscaping plan to be implemented during the winter.

Trees can create a “destination” for visitors and shoppers, Dickinson said. Lake City, however, has several trees that have wounds from being pruned too closely. The trees also have several branches growing above the wounds, and those could break off, she said.

“So we’ve got problems that are waiting to happen,” she said.

The plan is to replace several oaks on public sites downtown with a variety of species including bald cypress; Nuttall oaks; Chinese pistache (or pistachio); and Zhuzhou fuschsia or Oklahoma redbuds, which have purplish magenta blooms in the spring.

She’s also working on an inventory of trees on street rights-of-way and other public property to keep track of trees that are in good shape and those that are potentially dangerous, she said.

Plans also include applying for a grant to remove and replace hazardous trees, and she encouraged city officials to consider becoming a Tree City USA, like Florence, Hartsville, Georgetown and Johnsonville.

Council members also said farewell to Lake City Police Sgt. Skee McAllister, who will become a polygraph examiner with the Berkeley County Sheriff’s Office after nearly six years with Lake City. His last day with the city police department will be Nov. 22, he said.

Lake City Police Chief Billy Brown also introduced patrolman Timothy Brand, who started with the Lake City Police Department about two months ago. Brand said he grew up in New Hope and previously worked with the Hartsville Police Department.

Council members also thanked city Parks and Recreation Director Cynthia Mallette for holding a recent fall event for Halloween. Mallette said 763 people signed in for the event, which included face painting, ping pong, pin-the-nose-on-the-pumpkin, snow cones, popcorn and other attractions.

Council also held an executive session to receive legal advice on pending litigation, but took no votes after returning to open session.

In other business, council voted unanimously to:

• Annex four acres of land owned by Charles C. Smith, trustee for the Karl G. Smith Trust, and Charles W. Smith on the east side of Matthews Road.
  
• Submit a joint application with Florence County for $452,912 in Community Development Block Grant funds to add water lines and fire protection in the Glendale School Road community, near S.C. 341 and Glendale School Road, an area served by wells.
  
• Submit a joint application with Williamsburg County for a $500,000 grant to extend sewer lines into the Beulah Road community, south of Lake City. The grant would come from the South Carolina Commerce Department’s Division of Community Grant Programs.

PROPOSED LAKE CITY BUILDING PERMIT FEES
Based on project’s total cost valuation by owner or contractor

• One cent to $1,000 — $15
  
• $1,001 to $50,000 — $15 for the first $1,000, plus $5 for each additional $1,000 up to and including $50,000
  
• $50,001 to $100,000 — $260 for the first $50,000, plus $4 for each additional $1,000 up to and including $100,000
  
• $100,001 to $500,000 — $460 for the first $100,000, plus $3 for each additional $1,000 up to and including $500,000
  
• $500,001 and above — $1,660 for the first $500,000, plus $2 for each additional $1,000

OTHER FEES

• House moving — $100
  
• Appeal for code-related issue to Board of Building Code Appeals — $100 with documentation of issue
  
• Building permit re-inspection — $25

PROPOSED BOARD OF BUILDING CODE APPEALS

• Would consist of three to nine members appointed by Lake City City Council to staggered terms of three years
  
• Would elect a chairperson and vice-chairperson to serve one-year terms
  
• Would appoint a secretary who is a member of Lake City staff and who will serve a one-year term

— SOURCE: City of Lake City