Dialects of Code: Solving the Building Inspector and Plans Examiner Shortage David Basinger

Building codes may be printed in one language, but anyone who has spent time in a building department knows the profession speaks in several different dialects.

The architect says, “It meets the intent of the code.”

The plans examiner responds, “Please identify the applicable code section.”

The contractor says, “We have always built it this way.”

Then the inspector arrives and says, “That may be what the plans show, but that is not what you installed.”

Those different perspectives are part of what makes the building-safety profession interesting. They can also make it difficult to recruit, train and retain the next generation of building inspectors and plans examiners.

In this episode of Takis Talk, host David Basinger speaks with David Basinger, CEO of Shums Coda Associates, about the growing building inspector and plans examiner shortage, the importance of field experience, the role of private consultants, differences in code interpretation and the future of artificial intelligence in plan review.

With more than three decades of experience in architecture, code consulting, plan review and municipal building services, Basinger offers a perspective shaped by both sides of the permit counter.

Why Building Departments Are Struggling to Hire

Cities and counties across the country are competing for a limited number of experienced building inspectors, plans examiners and building officials.

The most difficult candidates to find are often the people every jurisdiction wants: experienced, customer-focused and fully certified combination inspectors who can confidently handle residential and commercial building, electrical, plumbing and mechanical inspections.

The problem is simple: many of those professionals have retired, are approaching retirement or are already committed to another jurisdiction or consulting firm.

At the same time, public agencies often need staffing flexibility. A building department may need additional help because of vacations, vacancies, development surges or a large project. However, a city may only need an inspector for a few days each week, while consulting firms need enough predictable work to keep qualified employees fully assigned.

This creates a difficult mismatch.

Cities want highly experienced professionals available on demand. Consultants need stable assignments. Meanwhile, the limited pool of certified professionals continues to shrink.

Stop Waiting for the Perfect Candidate

One of the most important lessons from the conversation is that building departments may need to reconsider how they define a qualified candidate.

Jurisdictions understandably want someone who can perform every type of inspection or review on the first day. In reality, the perfect combination-certified candidate may not exist—or may not be interested in the position.

A candidate with several residential certifications, strong judgment, a willingness to learn and a good approach to customer service may be able to handle most of a jurisdiction’s workload while continuing to develop.

That person may be a better long-term investment than leaving the position vacant while waiting for a candidate with every possible certification.

Technical knowledge matters, but Basinger emphasizes the importance of attitude, curiosity and self-awareness. A successful inspector must know the code while also recognizing when to research an issue, ask a question or seek assistance from someone with more specialized knowledge.

The best inspectors are not always the people who claim to know everything. They are often the people who care enough to keep looking until they understand the problem.

How to Recruit the Next Generation of Building Inspectors

Solving the building inspector shortage requires the profession to recruit beyond the traditional applicant pool.

Potential candidates may be found in:

• Community college building-safety programs
• Construction trades
• Architecture and engineering firms
• High school career and technical education programs
• Permit technician positions
• Military construction or facilities roles
• Property maintenance and code enforcement
• Related public works or facilities positions

The profession also needs to do a better job explaining what building inspectors and plans examiners actually do.

Many students and early-career professionals have never considered building safety because they do not know the career exists. They may understand construction, architecture or engineering, but they have never been shown how those skills translate into municipal service.

Building inspection can provide a strong career for someone who enjoys construction, problem-solving, public service and working outside an office. Plan review can appeal to professionals who enjoy technical analysis, building systems and helping projects move from design to construction.

Recruitment should not begin when a vacancy is posted. Building departments should be speaking at schools, offering internships, creating trainee positions and introducing employees in related classifications to building-safety careers.

Field Experience Matters for Plans Examiners

Plans examination is more than locating code sections and adding correction comments to a drawing.

A plans examiner must be able to look at a two-dimensional set of plans and understand how the building will actually be assembled. That includes recognizing load paths, identifying missing details and understanding how architectural, structural, mechanical, plumbing and electrical systems interact.

Construction experience helps reviewers visualize what the plans represent.

Architecture and engineering education can provide a strong technical foundation, but practical field exposure is equally valuable. A reviewer who has seen framing, foundations, structural connections, fire assemblies and mechanical systems installed is often better prepared to identify the details that matter.

This is one reason plans examiner development can be more difficult than inspector development. A new inspector can observe construction in real time. A new plans examiner must learn to visualize the completed structure from drawings, calculations and specifications.

Effective training programs should therefore combine classroom education, code study, field observation, mentoring and progressively more complex reviews.

Code Compliance Requires Judgment

The episode title, “Dialects of Code,” reflects a reality familiar to every building official: knowledgeable professionals can read the same code section and reach different conclusions.

Codes contain clear requirements, but they also contain exceptions, undefined conditions, local amendments and areas that require professional judgment.

Basinger explains that effective plan review is not simply about finding violations. It is about understanding minimum life-safety requirements and helping applicants find a compliant path forward.

A technically correct correction comment can still be unhelpful if it does not clearly identify the problem or explain what information is needed.

The strongest plans examiners understand the pressures facing architects, engineers, contractors and owners. That does not mean ignoring the code. It means communicating requirements clearly and avoiding unnecessary cycles of corrections and resubmittals.

Building departments should train employees to distinguish among:

• A specific code requirement
• A local amendment or adopted policy
• A preferred construction practice
• An individual reviewer’s personal preference

That distinction can improve consistency, reduce frustration and build trust with applicants.

Can Third-Party Plan Review Solve Permit Delays?

Third-party plan review and inspection services can help cities manage vacancies, workload increases and specialized projects. However, outsourcing does not automatically solve staffing or permit-delay problems.

A private reviewer still needs time to perform a thorough review. Expedited processing cannot mean skipping the analysis necessary to identify critical safety issues.

Jurisdictions must also establish standards for consultant qualifications, communication, quality control and authority.

The building official should remain responsible for the jurisdiction’s interpretations and enforcement policies. Consultants should operate as an extension of the public agency—not as a separate authority creating their own requirements.

A successful public-private partnership requires clear expectations regarding turnaround times, correction formats, escalation procedures, customer service and consistency with local interpretations.

Consultants can provide valuable flexibility, but they should supplement a jurisdiction’s capacity without causing the city to lose control of its institutional knowledge.

Will AI Replace Building Inspectors and Plans Examiners?

Artificial intelligence is increasingly promoted as a solution to plan-review delays. Basinger offers a more measured assessment.

AI may be useful for reviewing submittal completeness, checking whether required documents are present, organizing files and identifying basic information. These administrative applications could reduce the time permit technicians and reviewers spend processing incomplete applications.

Full automated plan review is much more difficult.

Building codes vary by state, city and county. Local officials

Connect at TakisTalk.com

Transcript

Why Codes Have Dialects

SPEAKER_02 0:00

For those of us that have been doing this for just a minute, know exactly what my next guest means when he says the dialect of codes. The building code may be printed in one language, but anyone who has worked in the profession knows it has a lot of different dialects. There's the architect's dialect. It means the intent of the code. The plan examiner's dialect, please identify the specific code section. The contractor's dialect. I love this one. We have always built it this way. Or I've been doing this for 30 years. I don't know why that's a magic number. And of course, the inspector's dialect, the most important one. That may be what the plans show, but it's not what you installed. Welcome to Tacus Talk. Today's episode is called, You Guessed It, Dialects of Code. And we are exploring why knowledge. Welcome to Tacus Talk. Today's episode, you guessed it, is called Dialects of Code. And we're exploring why knowledgeable professionals can read the same code section, study the same set of plans, and still arrive at completely different conclusions. My guest is David Batsenger, CEO of Shum's Dakota Associates. David brings more than 30 years of experience in architecture, building plan review, and municipal building services. He's a California licensed architect who has reviewed everything from residential construction to complex commercial, medical, industrial, and high-rise projects. He's also managed plan review and inspection services for communities including Mount View, Fremont, Danville. Today he leads an organization that has grown from a small consulting firm into a multi-state company providing plan review inspections, code consulting, staff augmentation, education, and other services to public agencies across the country. I enjoy talking to Dave. He's very down-to-earth, very approachable, and extremely knowledgeable. David has worked on both sides of the counter. He understands the pressures of facing architects and applicants, the responsibilities carried by building officials and reviewers, and the challenge of applying code language to buildings that rarely fit neatly into a textbook example. In this conversation, we discussed code interpretation, the difference between compliance and good judgment, the difference between compliance and good judgment, the relationship between architects and building departments, the appropriate role of private consultants, the growing shortage of qualified code professionals, and how technology, including artificial intelligence, may change the way plans are reviewed. We will also find out whether the code really we'll also find out whether the code has really different dialogues or whether we all just need to become better translators. David Bassinger, welcome to TACAS Talk. Let's get into it.

Housekeeping Before The Deep Dive

SPEAKER_00 3:06

Yes, I'm giving you 90 minutes. I'm sorry it was a little late. I got a call from our plans coordinator right before we jumped on, but I think everything's good now.

SPEAKER_02 3:15

Perfect. So just some housekeeping stuff. There's nothing gotcha about this. If there's something that you don't want on here, just tell me, edit that out, or whatever. We'll take it out. I want to be, I want this to be you're I'm looking at you as just a fountain of information. So I want to promote Shum's coda as much as I can. I don't want it to come off as an infomercial because I want it to be genuine.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Right.

SPEAKER_02 3:38

So all of that. Is there anything that you want me to steer away from?

SPEAKER_00 3:44

No, I mean I'm I'm perfectly good. I'm pretty much an open book. Whatever you want to talk about is fine. Can I take the show predominantly that let's go? I've got some work that we should talk about at my house in Livermore, but anyways, okay. That's all another thing.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

Not a problem. We'll swing back by on that. I'll send, you know, I'll send this guy Vince out there. He'll give you a hard time.

SPEAKER_00 4:12

Oh, he's heard of it. I I had a gas leak in the kitchen underneath my post-tension concrete slab. Oh. So I actually called Frank earlier in the week and said, I what's caused the problem is in the sleeved pipe, there's water, and there was a black iron pipe for the gas, and it's rotting away. That's what caused the leak. And I said, I I'm gonna try and fix it up, come in for a permit or whatever, we'll do it quick. But I go, I go, just be aware. I think you may have a problem a couple other places potentially in this neighborhood I'm in. So we'll see. Ooh. Hope that's not the case. I hope so too, because it was a pain to dig out and fix.

SPEAKER_02 4:57

All right.

From High School Intern To Architect

SPEAKER_02 4:58

So to get into this, Dave. So I'm looking at your background and a Cal Poly grad, right? Right? Yeah, I love that campus. And so you have your degree as in architecture, you're a licensed architect, and then you so you okay. I'm gonna back up just a little bit. You there's a lot in your history. So when you when you got your degree came out, did you were you working for an architect, or what was that transition from student to the workplace?

SPEAKER_00 5:30

Well, I actually I mean, the the reality of for architecture for me was when I was a sophomore in high school, I went to the one architectural firm that was in town that did architecture, structural engineering, civil engineering, surveying, all that sort of stuff. And I said, I I want to work here. And the owner at the time, friend of mine nowadays, he said, I don't have it, I don't I can't pay you. And I said, That's okay. I just want to volunteer to see if this is a field I'm really as interested as I think I am in it. And so I just started doing any errand, anything they had around the office just to be around and see what it was like. So the reality was, you know, two weeks later he was paying me and I was doing anything under the sun that they needed. So I was started in back in the day when they had blueprint rooms and uh dealing with the ammonia and running plans through the the printer. I'd run errands like getting permits for uh plans around the Bay Area. Occasionally, they let me do some drafting, but I I did that through high school. I worked every summer there, and then in college I was working there every summer or every you know holiday. For the I'd come in and work a few hours. It was a great way to make some money. And the the longer I was there, the more immersed I got into the architecture part. So I was working, like I say, from high school on in architecture, and I loved it. But that was also back in the day when everything was hand drafted, you know, pencil on paper, or we even did some on Mylar because it was a civil engineering firm that was doing a lot of subdivisions, so there's a lot of mapping. But yeah, when I got out of school, I went back there thinking, and just I said, before I put the final touches on you know, a resume that I really haven't needed up to now, I go back and see what they have. Maybe this is a good place to work. It's close to home. At the time, my father was on assignment with his work, so they needed someone to watch the house there in town. Uh so it was vacant, set up for just me at that point. And I went in and they they hemmed and hawed. I said, Let me let me see what you can do. And they wanted to hire me. And they they came back about a week later, and literally it was and this is 1989 for uh you know a degreed architect. It was seven dollars an hour, is what they could offer me. Oh yeah. And so I was like, I can't you do a little more? I know your whole system and everything like that. And and in the meantime, one of the engineers there had left to go work for another company, then had left there and started his own design firm there in town. And he was a structural engineer. And he heard when, I guess, to the grapevine at the office, I was looking like, hey, give me a call. So we I went over and talked to him, and he was willing to pay me, you know, more than double for the same amount of work. And he basically said, I I'm an engineer, I don't know anything about architecture. You can do everything that's related to architectural design, I don't care. He's like, I'm gonna teach you the rest of the structural engineering that I that they didn't teach you at Cal Poly because you were in the architecture department. So it was a great opportunity. So we did work there that I gotta do everything under the sun. We were doing concrete tilt-ups, I was doing new custom homes or addition remodels, we did some multifamily work. Did actually that was right after the Loma Creatus, we did some unreinforced masonry report studies and fix the drawings. So it was great experience. And I did that for oh, I don't know, probably three, four years. Yeah, probably three years. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:35

I'm getting a lot of wow, I'm getting a lot of static on this end.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 9:40

So I'm gonna close this out and then I'm gonna open another window. I'm gonna keep everything we recorded, and I'm gonna see if that helps. Do you have anything on in the background there?

SPEAKER_00 9:50

Just the the I have the computer screens gone. The laptop's close to the mic. Why don't we move the mic a little bit?

SPEAKER_02 9:59

Maybe. Try that. It almost sounds like a fan or something fades in and out. It's probably the fan from the laptop. Ah. Is that a better? No, it's still there. It might be the recording. So I'm going to end this and I'm going to open another one. And let's see. I have your email somewhere. What is that email?

SPEAKER_00 10:19

It's David.massinger at shumscoda.com.

SPEAKER_02 10:24

Massenger at Shumsdakota.com. Okay, I'm going to close this out and I'm going to send you another invite. Okay. Thank you, sir. It happens.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

Okay. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 10:42

So you're a young man. You're you're you're it sounds like you're the architectural department in this firm, right? Right out of the get-go?

SPEAKER_00 10:51

Yeah, yeah. No, I I mean, yeah, I did everything design-wise. I don't know if it was a good plan for the business, but it worked.

SPEAKER_02 11:01

I mean, so I'm figuring you're in your early 20s, a lot of responsibility. It almost becomes a sink or swim kind of approach. Obviously, you did well. What was the transition from there? Were you there for a while?

SPEAKER_00 11:15

I was there for, like I say, three or so years. The owner had a really good friend he knew from high school that uh was also working at an engineering firm and trying to start this niche business that we're in in code consulting for jurisdictions. Oh. Problem was that that engineer, they were doing design work, and it was a huge conflict of interest because you know you could potentially plan check or inspect the work that your firm did. So he was having a hard time getting it started. So he was went to my boss and said, Hey, we're high school buddies, let's start a business. If we do just this consulting, we'll get the work. He was quite a marketing guy, he was a sales guy. He said, Well, I'll get us the work. And so my boss, knowing him, said, Yeah, I'll give it a shot. And and then he said, But I don't know anything about plan checking. And he said, That's okay. I have one other guy. So they pulled another engineer who had worked at the city of Fremont for a while, and then he had worked as a consultant for Will Dan. He was their, I guess, manager for Northern California. Fantastic plan checker. And the three of them started the firm, and they pulled me aside. My boss pulled me aside and said, Well, what do you think? And I said, I'll give it six months. Let me see what it's like. Because I had no idea. And been here ever since. It's uh so yeah, it was quite quite the thing. The firm, the firm, I don't know if it matters. The firm was Linhart Peterson Powers Associates. My original boss was Frank Linhart. The his buddy from high school is Ken Peterson, and the plan check engineer that was just phenomenal and still a great friend is uh Kevin Powers. And it was just the four of us starting out, although I think Frank's wife came and helped with a lot of the accounting stuff and the invoicing. But yeah, it was it was interesting, it was very fun, and it took off very quickly. A different world back then for consulting, not the crowded field we have today in the business.

SPEAKER_02 13:34

What year are we talking about, roughly?

SPEAKER_00 13:36

Probably about 91. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

So again, a question. So you did design work, then you went into the uh the plant check side of it.

Design Mindset Versus Plan Review

SPEAKER_02 13:46

So is there a different approach or mindset when you're doing the design as opposed to reviewing something for compliance?

SPEAKER_00 13:54

Oh, yeah. I think you know, in terms of different masters in terms of the when you're doing design work, you're working for that client. So whatever the desires the client has for the project, as far as you know, space utilization or looks or things like that, you're trying, you're striving, trying to get to that point where you're you're putting a set of plans together that can get built. And there's a lot more construction detailing and things like that that you just have to think about how do things come together. When you're doing the consulting side, you're working on behalf of the jurisdiction. So minimum life safety is becomes the forefront. I I don't get a comment on, you know, I don't think that's really all that attractive, right? I don't think that's a good layout of the space. I I that's just not part of the the job. The job is, you know, does that work for the code language? And and really the nuance is getting to the intent of the code. I mean, I think a lot of people were really great at the black and white. Nope, the code says this, or the code says that, and that's all you can do. And and that's just not the world we live in. There's a lot of gray area in the code. So for me, it was kind of a nice transition because I could, knowing the design side, knowing what that world was about, what people were trying to get with their projects, and I could, you know, through my plan checks, help lead them to easier ways to, you know, put the plans together to achieve what they wanted. So there's more of I I always feel it's better to just be very interactive and talk things through. And you know, I I it always surprises, I think, the architects, the engineers, where you know, I I have some empathy for the shoes they're in. They probably underbid this job, they probably have a much shorter timeline than they wanted to to put the plans together, or they, you know, they have an owner that's going to be overbearing on something that they really can't, you know, get behind, but they have to put in the plans. And so that conversation's uh, you know, how do we get this done the way you have to do it, but do it relatively quickly so you're not in here forever and wasting time through recheck after recheck or you know, revision after revision. So that was exciting to me.

SPEAKER_02 16:28

You said some things that uh really resonate with me. You talked about the gray in the code and the intent and so forth. A million years ago, when I was studying for my CASP, I took a course and the the guy up there half the class were CASPs, half of us were studying to be a CASP, and he says, watch this. So he asks a question, and it you know, was is it option A or B? And the code was so gray that he got half the CASPs to go with A and half the CASP to go with B. So even when you talk about a person that's that specialized, you still have grays. And I I have a problem with plans examiners and inspectors that get so deep into the letter of what they're reading and uh in some instances almost trying to find fault, trying to find some way to be an obstacle rather than trying to be a partner and how do we move this thing forward.

SPEAKER_00 17:22

Yeah, there are definitely people in this industry who are like that, that they they just read the black and white. And it's I mean, on the consulting side, we always it's we do a lot of education teaching for the code across the country. We always kind of talk about half jokingly but half serious as you know, someone comes and takes our class on, you know, mechanical engineering or you know, mechanical design and plan check or inspections, and then we know the next week in that jurisdiction or that region, there's gonna be a lot of calls about this thing we talked about or that thing we talked about. And it was just to kind of point out that you know, kind of the intent of the code, but they're gonna take it you know to heart for at least two weeks until someone says, you know, it's okay to back off a little.

SPEAKER_02 18:09

Yeah, take it back a nuts. Yeah, I get that. You so you're private sector, you're doing design work, you're going, you start up, you're in part of this firm, now you're doing plan reviews. I think I saw somewhere in your bio that you also worked for a couple of jurisdictions. Was that as a as an accountant? I mean, sort of as a consultant, or were you actually working for those jurisdictions? Like

Consulting As Part Of The Team

SPEAKER_02 18:31

I think Mountain View was one of them.

SPEAKER_00 18:33

No, I it was all always as a consultant, but I I think again, back in the day when we started, completely different sort of consultant sort of jurisdiction relationship. And and unfortunately, I think my old firm kind of contributed to messing that up. But way back when I started, it was there was a need, no one had enough staff. It really was a partnership with the jurisdiction. So they would call, they would interview you, they they felt like it was a good fit, you'd come in and you'd really be immersed in terms of their team. You'd become almost like a staff member. I mean, you just weren't on the pension plan, but you would be there, you know, often every day, full time, and you would do everything that they wanted for hiring a person. It's just there's a less expensive in terms of their long-term cost for pensions and things like that, and you know, benefits. So so yeah, we were very immersed in it. And that's and very quickly, I mean, there was a need. Uh back when we started, there was a small town here in town of Danville that had a small staff, and for whatever reason, there was just uh a series of events that just basically had everyone at the town that was working in the building department, they they had to leave. They were let go, they retired. It was it was just kind of kind of a tsunami of things that happened there. So they had no one. And at the same time, back in the early 90s, they probably had about 12 to 14 subdivisions going. They were remodeling their downtown area. They had a lot of work. And and they only had at the time, they had one senior inspector that was left. The only guy that stayed in the building. Great guy, really great to work with, but he had problems in terms of, I mean, he suffered from a little dyslexia, so he was also kind of tough from a code perspective because sometimes you you'd have to get him to read it. Well, let's read it again because I think you're missing the words here. So, yeah, I started up there. It was myself and one of the other consultants, and at the time they just wanted plan review and inspection services. They we put in probably at our height, we were probably 12 inspectors we were providing to the town of Danville. And we had a lead inspector there. Then he and I kind of co-managed the work there with the staff, and then I did the over-the-counter, and then the stuff that came back in. We'd have to spend longer, and I did a lot of those reviews. And it started off as one day a week, and then they started to notice that the other consultants' day, no one was coming in to see that consultant because he was more of that black and white sort of, nope, I need this, I need that, and it just wasn't working with them. Where I would sit and talk with them at the counter, and I'd be happy to red line things onto their paper plans to get them approved because they were really close. Okay, let's put this note on. Can we do this? Are you okay with me adding this? And we just get things approved. And so my one day a week there turned to two days, turned to not long. We were doing five days a week there. We were the kind of the acting building department. They had some permit techs that were processing the fees and the everything else, but everything technical after that was pretty much our our staff there at Leonard Peterson Powers. And it was it was a good gig for a while. So and I was kind of they made the planning manager the the acting building official. But I mean he would always joke that you know myself and the senior inspector would come back and explain to him you know whatever issue we were having with an applicant in terms of they wanted to do this, but the code said this and we'd explain the code to him and he he had no understanding of some of the code stuff but we'd just try and explain it to him as simple as possible and he would make a decision and and he always said you know uh they had me as billing official but you guys were basically by the time he got it back to me I I mean it was a pretty easy decision more often than not. And so that's what he did. He kind of just managed some of the politics of the situation. But then after that I went you know that that got to be good to a point but you know I got for my career on the plan checking and the inspection side I I needed to have something a little more challenging.

Acting Building Official In Mountain View

SPEAKER_00 23:16

So that was mostly residential. I'd done kind of their shopping center for their grocery store and some of their historic building re remodels but they put me down at Mountain View. And so I started working down there and doing the same sort of thing. It was coming a couple days a week working again this is back when they had paper plans and people come at the counters and we'd have meetings and things like that in person and started doing light commercial and that grew to larger commercial and next thing you know the building official who'd been there for almost 30 years retired and eventually it kind of worked its way into they need a building official so I was acting building official there which is a dynamic in a different way I mean it's a lot more at the time Google had just started and that's where their headquarters were so I did their first TI. They also had Microsoft campus down there into it a lot of biotech and the like kind of tail end of chip manufacturing so there's a lot of hazmat. So it was a great place to be I mean I learned so much about the codes and and the application of the codes and I I I tell you I saw just about everything under the sun down there. So did two stints as kind of acting building official and then a stint as deputy building official went worked through probably four or five building officials but it's yeah it's always been involved with down there. I just I like the work down there it's uh it's amazing what you get to see down in Silica Valley.

SPEAKER_02 24:54

Yeah I I also have a small business we do internet marketing for small businesses and I had taken a training down at Google and what was funny is the campus is you're walking on campus and first of all it's it's very unique but you see all these people walking around with their laptops open and just oblivious to the world and just you know droning along so that was that was just peculiar for me. But you mentioned Mountain View and the diversity and so that's one of the things that I love about Livermore and so I'm going to assume that in Mountain View you you got exposed to a lot of different things. Is there a particular type of construction a particular project that kind of sticks with you something that I don't know I mean we're both not kids.

SPEAKER_00 25:43

We've seen some stuff so what what is that project that you're like wow I was really impressed or I was happy to be a part of that well there's a lot I mean I'm sure and and the way the the Silicon Valley is it's nothing lasts for long. So there's a couple projects that you know the first pass through like they did the Microsoft campus we did all the plan review on that five big buildings huge site you think well that's really cool I was involved with that and there were so many different things going on with that and it came around you know 10-15 years later they're tearing the whole thing down pretty pretty much and re revamping it and now it's you know a really changed sort of green sort of building product it becomes five buildings becomes kind of one with the brand new parking structure you got to have a lot more amenities for exercise and working out and a theater and things like that. So a lot of them like that but I mean in terms of projects that's what I really like about the consulting side it's not like when you do design a lot of the in architecture engineering firms get kind of pigeonholed into I do schools or I do commercial properties or I do single family residence. And that's pretty much all you see but the consultant side and particularly a place like Mountain View or Livermore or something like this you see everything under the sun and even the consulting side I'm now across so many states doing reviews and we get to see everything. But I mean you know the the bigger sort of you know ones that people see kind of once in their career are really the big ones like the big multi multi-block sort of renovation remodels. So I've done a couple of those one in Sunnyvale that kind of got stopped by the recession another one in Mountain View that they redid a mall and made it into you know just everything under the sun theaters, hotels, parking, office, multifamily retail stores, restaurants. So that was really kind of neat but I I think the ones that more unusual that stick with you are like the Google buildings and some of the tech things where they've really pushed the design envelope and and we did the one that really sticks out to me in the Mountain areas we did Google's Mountain View campus building and they did the same design over at the Moffitt NASA airfield. They had a landlease deal there where they did three buildings of the same sort of architectural style just a bigger scale. And we did those simultaneously and it was just amazing in terms of one it's basically a two-story build building with basically about 175 feet in height and the second story has no ceilings on it. So that's just unusual to begin with but what was really even more interesting this is more code nerdy sort of thing I guess that's my world different different engineers for different buildings. I had one in Mountain View that argued in terms of I'm going to use the ASCE 41 and LA basin tall building sort of design so this is for exit there's fine existing building engineering requirements on it. And he got the building official to agree with that. The same sort of buildings being built in Mount in Mountain View is now being built in Moffat Field and they did a non-dynamic linear analysis of the building so they did it from right for the code but that also then entails now I've got structural peer review. So I had to manage a peer review of that project and hire a peer review engineer and and Deganculp engineering we did it was just a whole different process. I mean it just same looking building two different ways of plan checking it and it was it was great.

SPEAKER_02 29:54

I mean you you just have to remember which side of the city property line you're on I think I saw your name attached to Tesla also when you were over there in Fremont I would imagine that that's manufacturing especially when you get into high-tech manufacturing there are a lot of demands a lot of variables there that you don't see every day yeah that one is more I think we're doing also another electric car manufacturing down in Arizona for Lucid.

SPEAKER_00 30:23

And we've done through we're in the third phase of kind of expansion of that plant I mean what you find with those it's the big pressure there is to get the product to market. You know there's so much cost to you put these machines and and put the assembly lines together and get all the products in the right place. So the pressure there is a timing thing and and literally sometimes like in Fremont when I took over kind of acting building official duties there and had to deal with them we had a weekly meeting with them where we're trying to review everything in a about a 90 minute meeting and go through everything as a group they bring their whole design team in and we just issue permits because they just couldn't wait but then you find out that you know of the 250 permits they have well you know there's a hundred and twenty five that have not been final or even called for inspection and it's like yeah well we we pulled that permit but then we decided that we're gonna switch the assembly line for instead of the Model S, we're gonna do the X. And so that just didn't make sense and so we brought in another permit and they never let the city know that they they just moved so fast they just changed directions and yeah that permit was paid for but never called for a single inspection maybe one inspection and as you know on the city side that's a nightmare because you've got just open files you're trying to whatever happened with this one did we change this or not? But but that's how fast a lot of the manufacturing works and it moves and so you really have to be on your toes because there's just a tremendous amount of money involved and pressure they they have to get those cars out at a certain time and start selling them. And particularly like you look at Tesla a lot of times they were taking money in as you know deposits and people have been waiting you know years or more for that first car to run off BS7. So a lot of pressure.

SPEAKER_02 32:24

Yeah I get that uh we have the Gillig bus plant there in Livermore and I remember when we were building that the uh young man that was the CEO of the company at the time I could see him aging daily those timelines everything you discussed. And then as that project has evolved you know you started with the traditional fueled type of buses now they're very heavy into batteries and electric and now we've gone to hazmat storage for all the battery packs and everything else and it's a constantly evolving facility and they're not the quite the high retail facility that Lucid is so I can only imagine the pressure there well and it it's more I think the the money streams get really convoluted like so Lucid's the money streams coming from Saudi Arabia essentially and so it's been very interesting the last few months with the the war starting kind of in the Middle East because they were shifting to move some of their operations to Saudi Arabia and then the war broke out and so they're kind of stuck.

SPEAKER_00 33:24

They don't really know what to do with some of the spaces which is an odd thing after all that push push push they're like well now what do we do?

SPEAKER_02 33:32

Wow huh so one of the things that I envy is uh so I had uh Mike Savage on and he had he's been in a lot of different places Florida to New Mexico to New England very diversified in the way that they look at their building what's important there things of that nature and you have a similar kind of a situation going on you're in a lot of different places and I love Livermore what we what we do is so diversified there in in relation to any other jurisdiction I've worked at but nothing like what you're doing. You're bouncing around from state to state and it's uh so I'm I'm sure that every state every jurisdiction I mean just in California has their own little thing right there the the things that are very important to them but you have a good infrastructure so you have you have offices in other states and so you're you're tied into that pipeline.

State By State Code Differences

SPEAKER_02 34:25

So it's it it is it easier is it harder is it how is it functioning in multi-jurisdictions especially in different states?

SPEAKER_00 34:33

Well it certainly helps to have people on the ground in all these states and all these locations because you know you you talk about like dialects you have across the United States there's definitely kind of dialects in the code people view things differently in Utah or Arizona than we do here in California. And you know you'll get into conversations with people in Colorado or Texas and they all think we're crazy out in California. So yeah you need to have that that local presence and that that knowledge base because it is different in terms of even just the state amendment process the laws which code you're actually applying I mean we we go across so many different codes and so many different amendments it's amazing like you know the state of Utah has been heavily inundated with their state legislature with home builders so the the code has been amended greatly for single family homes in Utah just the way it's gone there is you know a lot a lot of flexibility and a lot less you have to actually review or enforce in some of those homes and it's we have plan checkers that are remote in all these places and you know the workloads fluctuate so we have to get them up to speed so we have to have a system in terms of they need to understand you're reviewing something in Utah or Colorado you can't make the same comments you have in California it's just different. They don't they don't so that's kind of the the the difficulty about you know being across all these things but uh you know having a system in place where if there's an access point everyone can talk you know the the technology's gotten so much better with texting and emails and Zoom calls and whatnot. I mean even even this morning I was reviewing one out in Utah and I called our Utah manager and I said hey I got this can we take a look at it and we got on a quick you know Zoom meeting and walked through the plans and he agreed that's a problem and you know I just want to make sure that's how they viewed it in Utah as far as this Xing item. So that's more what you have to manage I think but there there are a lot of differences even more differences on the inspection side it's it's even shocking to me because back in the early 2000s it was mandated by the federal government to have one code across the entire country because there was so much variations the builders the developers the owners were complaining about you know I build the same plant in North Carolina I can't build it in you know Illinois because the the laws the codes are different and they want to make it one code but uh with some of the inspection stuff they've changed I mean you those certifications that you get nationally don't necessarily cross the borders sometimes to get you the work if you wanted to say I'm gonna move from you know Nevada to Idaho because I can afford something better there, you know, with my family well you may have to get me certified on something or you may have to not enforce something because that's going to be a state enforced sort of portion of the code. So it's it's really odd.

Remote Inspections And Expedited Reviews

SPEAKER_02 38:00

I I'm gonna bounce around a little bit because you mentioned a word we have a lot of legislature going through California right now that's going after all sorts of things remote inspections, expedited reviews all sorts of things. And so I guess from what I'm hearing it's not exclusive to California. It seems like other states are experiencing this.

SPEAKER_00 38:20

I just kind of want to get your opinion on I think you were at the uh ABM there in Santa Cruz and John Lotora talked about this a little bit so let me run through a few of these what's your feeling on remote inspections it can be done on smaller inspections more standardized inspections I mean I think the ones most people throw out is you know water heaters replacements re-roofing's great because I think it actually with some of the that it takes a lot of the safety issue out for the inspectors. They don't have to be up on a roof sometimes in you know not the best weather maybe without the ladder tied off. But you get uh you know kind of your four-way inspections or the bigger you know more critical parts of inspection I I I don't know that it really works as well. Yeah we've had we've done it we've been asked to do it in places it it just is tougher go to to see what you're supposed to see from a minimum life safety standpoint and you know sign off on something that someone will eventually own and their their surety is that you you know they got a permit or they got inspected it was done correctly. And yeah some of those remote ones I you just need to be on site and put your eyes and even sometimes your hands on some things to see how it's actually put together.

SPEAKER_02 39:43

Yeah I I agree there are sometimes experienced inspectors you just get a vibe you get a sense and sometimes it pays off just being on site. The other one that I've looked at is expedited reviews from the private sector. And one thing I haven't seen in that bill is any kind of criteria any kind of standard for those private agencies. So a jurisdiction can't keep up they're required to now the the contractor whomever has the option to get a private company to do the review but I haven't seen anything in there that says that it has to be a licensed architect it has to be a licensed engineer. What's your feeling on that?

SPEAKER_00 40:21

I mean there are a lot of great companies like yours but there's nothing that mandates that they have to come to somebody like Shumscoda no I I think that's the shortfall in a lot of these particularly this one when it talks third party it's come up over the years time and time again and I often get calls from you know building officials in the state going hey this is good for you right you you'll get a lot more work and it's like actually no it's not and they're kind of surprised I think that because I mean really the reason these laws are being enacted is because there's places and you know jurisdictions usually more remote jurisdictions a lot often county jurisdictions where there's a lot of land to cover so there's just not a lot of time to spend on plan checking that's what's slowing it down. And the kind of knee jerk thing is pass this law and any third party person can do it and they don't really think about the certification process and it they leave it up to the city or county to make sure they've got you know certified people licensed people but it's not you're right it's not in the language and it it really is just a matter of I think the the people that are building want to have some assurety that if they submit it it doesn't there there are places where the submittal goes in and it's four six eight twelve weeks just to get the first review comments back. So I mean that's a problem and that's what's causing the legislation but switching all third party I mean it doesn't necessarily solve the problem. I I think we still have the same issues in terms of manpower and and literally I mean you can expedite expedite but you still have to spend some time looking at plans for plan review. It's not like you can just take a look you know grab the calculation package and say oh it's you know 100 pages that's good. I'm I'm not gonna look at that you have to look you have to dig down because you know no matter how automated it gets how much AI gets involved with this it's there's still humans involved and there's still mistakes made and that's what you're just trying to catch is those you know critical errors.

SPEAKER_02 42:37

Yeah I agree with that I was talking with a pool contractor that we have in town that does a lot of work he's a great guy former cop and he was telling me so he submitted to Livermore and to another jurisdiction that will be nameless at the same time for two pools. We issued the permit he did the project we filed it and then he was just getting his permit approved from the other jurisdiction I think those are the problems and I don't know that that's acceptable but you know and I even Robert Gray was on recently we were discussing this we do Livermore does next day inspections regardless. So does Les Gatos. So we don't understand what what the lag is I I worked for one jurisdiction and down there in Silicon Valley and at one point we were 14 business days out and what would happen is that contractors would just call in and shot gun requests and they put them on the schedule because they didn't know when they would get the next you know appointment. And so you had a lot of inspections scheduled that weren't real and there are just so many things that snowball into this and it's how do you throttle this thing how do you you know control it and I I I feel that companies like yours are a great resource because you're always going to have that delta right you have the ebbs and flows and there's got to be some way to be able to throttle in additional help. So Dave we need your help then

SPEAKER_00 44:00

Well, no, I that's what we're here for, but I I also think it's it's shifted a little in the industry. I mean, I think we want to be that help, but the requests are different these days, and that makes it more challenging for us because you know, a lot of times, like you say, there you want there's that desire to do, you know, same-day inspections. And so do you can you give me an inspector? And it's like, well, how long do you need an inspector? Oh, just you know, a couple days here, a couple days there. It's difficult with as short as we are as an industry with the certified inspectors to be able to pull them off of something where they're working, you know, five days a week to just do a couple hours here over there. And and and used to be we'd share inspectors through like, you know, the Livermore Valley here. We'd have an inspector that run, maybe spend the morning in Pleasanton, the afternoon in Livermore, and then maybe on the way home catch something in Dubwood or Sander Moe, you know. Just doesn't work. People want them there all day, but they don't want, you know, they don't want us commit to five days a week. And then the other problem we have is that they're the jurisdictions are looking for that expertise from us, and so they're looking for fully combination certified, experienced inspectors, and that is that is the rarest of rarest gems these days in our industry. A lot of those folks have retired and they're just not around. So, you know, I may have someone that has you know four residential certs and a you know, a few years' experience. It's sometimes negotiation to convince the the city that, yeah, they've got the wherewithal, they've got the passion, the knowledge, they'll look it up. They're they've got a good head on their shoulders, they're just not that combination certified, but they can probably get you there, you know, 80% of the way. Is that better than not having anyone? And and sometimes the jurisdictions say, No, I want I want 100%. And it's like, well, that's gonna be tougher to find. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:09

Yeah, I I can sense that because we sometimes we're pretty well staffed, but we have some holes here and there. And and I understand, you know, if I call in for a day, how do you fill that? You know, I mean, you you you gotta have somebody that's just floating around all the time. And then but okay, so it I want to take a minute to spend on inspectors.

Training Inspectors During A Shortage

SPEAKER_02 46:27

So my vent used to be your vent, correct? Yes, that's okay. So Vint is amazing. And so Vint, if you listen to this, I don't want to take this the wrong way. I think I read one it was the Australian Taddle Dog that they have to bring these dogs in at the end of the night, otherwise they work themselves to death. Vint is like that. You'll you'll attach to something, and if he's not sure of what's going on, all of I all of a sudden I just see him buried behind all these code books, and he's just he attaches and he just won't let it go until he comes to a conclusion. I don't know how you train your inspectors, but at this point is how you train your inspectors, you do an amazing job. And so do you have a process? I I'm sure that a lot of this is Vince just has a great work ethic. But what is your process for training your inspectors? Because Vince is pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_00 47:19

Well, I mean, the the process is when we can get someone that has the right attitude, that passion for the codes, we really look for that. I mean, it it is first and foremost. I mean, you can know everything under the codes, but you have to have that wherewithal, you know, self-awareness of where you're at, interacting with people to be a good fit. So we really strive for that first and foremost. And that's sometimes tough to find. I mean, there's people that want to get into this business, they think they want to get into this business, but they really don't know what this business is about, and so they struggle. Not to say that they don't get there eventually, it just it takes a little while for them to kind of get it get that rhythm. Someone like Vince, you could just see that he he had a passion for code, he likes knowing how things work, he likes to read and get the language down and understand what the intent is, and so it's good. So, but we take someone like that who didn't have really any any certs. We try and get them to get at least one building cert because then I could at least sell them to a city that, yes, they've got a residential, you know, B1 cert. That's great. And then we try and find places that are really heavy on residential construction. Great if we could find places that are doing subdivisions. There's not as many being done in California, so it's tougher to train here in California. But that was Vince. He we sent him down to Arizona where they were building a lot of subdivisions. So he day in, day out got to see things from the ground all the way to finish, but they were also, you know, the same track. So he was seeing the same things being built, you know, maybe one track here, one track there, but he's running between two or three tracks, and then maybe occasional remodel. You get to see a lot very quickly, and you get to see it at different stages. So the learning curve goes up considerably with that. You know, he he got to also go with we knew the the team there at the city, they had a really good senior inspector who was really good at training as well, would was willing to work with them and train with him. And so that was an opportunity where, like, you know, he was away from home, on his own, had a lot of downtime that he could really get into the code, pass a couple more certs. But ultimately, you know, we knew that that wasn't going to be the place he's gonna live. His his now wife is back in California at the time. They were just dating. And so he moved back here. And and so then that was a lot easier all of a sudden because now he's got six, eight months of residential background, he's got more certs. I can sell them at places that now have a diversity in terms of the types of projects going on. So that's where we I was able to put him into Mountain View, which has a lot of diversity, and he started with some small commercial, and now you're into some different codes, different code sections. So the learning continues. And so he worked there for about a year and a half, almost two years. And I think you know, ultimately the commute kind of was the deciding factor for him. It was the long drive down there, and rightfully so. And so then he he found the opportunity to to live and work in Livermore, which is great. And you know, for us, that's a great success story. I mean, we we know there's a shortage in the industry, we want to train people, and if they work for me or they work for you at the city, as long as they're in this industry, we're it's a net positive. We've got more good people in the industry, and and that's really what we need. Love to keep you know people like Vince because he's great. But you know, it's the reality of we're in a at-will sort of uh job market in most of the country. And so if someone's got a better opportunity, you can't fault them if it's a something that you know they think is a better opportunity. You might as well just let them go do it and see what works out. It's a small industry too. We we run into everyone all the time. So it's great because you know, those success stories, you're gonna continue to hear how people are growing and you know, moving up the ranks in a city. It's it's fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 51:43

Yes, it's it's a very small community, and I'm just gonna throw it out there. I I'm not gonna apologize for taking him. He's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 51:53

But uh No, no, I I I wish we we didn't lose guys like that, but I mean, in some ways we are the the I don't know what you call the job finders for so many people. Yeah, I mean, we just it it's it's great. It's it's not a bad thing. We've actually even worked with some of our jurisdictional partners knowing, you know, they uh it's not uncommon they do interviews for a position, but no one's quite qualified, but they like someone. They think maybe you know, with some time they could they could maybe be that person. And so we can figure out sometimes when they come back after the interviews and say, maybe you could reach out to this person, maybe you can train them for six months and bring them back here because we really think you know this would be a good fit for us, and and we'll figure stuff out like that. And that's also a benefit of being a consultant. I mean, we have a little more flexibility in terms of just we we want to have that communication about, you know, what are you really after? I mean, if you're after filling a position, let us bring someone on, we can train them, we'll keep you know they're them at a rate that it's not, you know detriment for them to apply for the job later on. We don't want to have you know someone paid so much, you know, doing the consulting work. There's some places like we could at places hire, you know, pay them for more, but then they wouldn't want to switch back to the jurisdiction we're talking about that probably makes more sense for them to be at.

SPEAKER_02 53:27

Having said that, we know that we've got some shortages going on. Personal opinions, maybe I don't know, advice. Where's a good place to start recruiting, trying to bring some young blood into the industry?

SPEAKER_00 53:41

Well, I mean, I think we have a lot of people that are looking for work right now. I mean, the job market isn't great for some of these things. So if they've got some inkling in terms of uh liking to know the mechanics of how things go together, how things work, that's always a great starting point. There's a lot of junior colleges that have some building safety programs. They're often a good place to pull some people in from. Also, just a lot of people like at the high school level, it's great to talk to them because they a lot of them get to the point where they college isn't really for me, or you know, particularly on the inspection side, being behind a desk is not for me. And maybe they've worked a couple jobs and just hasn't been a good fit for them. With a little training and a little kind of coaching, they can get to there where they start getting those certs and start getting those opportunities. So that's been always big. On the plan review side, it's tougher because I think you have to have a construction background or an architecture or engineering sort of background because you are looking at the plans in two dimensions and looking at calculations and understanding some things that you know, if you're in the field, you can really relate to this. I'm sorry, in the field, you clearly can see where the load paths go. You can see, you know, the roof rests on this beam, rests on this column, rests on this foundation. And you get that. And so if you're doing plan checking, that's a huge part of plan checking, understanding how things come together and where the concerns are going to be as far as you know, critical points for the load. If you've never done construction or you've never gone to school and learned some engineering or architecture, try to do plan checking and pick out those critical things in a language that's also very different on the plans. You know, what is a joist, what is a hanger, all these things. It really is a struggle. So I we really recommend for that side, you know, at least have a few years, a couple years of working construction, or, you know, if you're an engineer coming out of school to do some design for a couple years. It makes a world of difference for picking up the plan checking things. The the problem is, you know, on the plan checking side, people get into those other industries and they enjoy it. And they don't really want to transition back to checking plans and having those conversations with the engineers, architects, contractors, homeowners.

SPEAKER_02 56:34

Yeah, I I like that approach because we see it so often. You see an architect or an engineer will draw something, you'll see you know, a post will be missing or something like that, where in the field you just get a feel for it. You you'll look at something and you automatically know how things go together. So I think field experience is invaluable, obviously for inspections. I I think you but for doing the plan review, you've got to have an idea of what that two-dimensional drawing really means.

In Person Learning Versus Remote Work

SPEAKER_02 57:04

I read something somewhere that said that you're an in-person networking person. I I think maybe that's in in relation to training, and like I think you guys are very big into educode. I think you prefer being in person rather than doing remote or that sort of thing. Am I right or am I reading that wrong?

SPEAKER_00 57:26

No, I mean, I think I mean I'm probably showing my age, but I mean I grew up, like I said, uh, we did paper drafting when I did architectural design and and when I started out, it was everything at the counter and meetings and things like that. It was it's an important thing to do, and I really really appreciate. I think I can get so much more done in a in a face-to-face meeting with the you know, some plans or out in the field where you're just kind of pointing out things and saying, Yeah, you're missing the strap here, or do you see this? And I I enjoy that. And and our teaching is the same way. I think you know, we we get a lot more interaction with the in-person courses than we do with the virtual. There's a lot more back and forth of, you know, one question leads to another question, leads to someone else got asking a question. And it really makes the training much more diverse and and and really immersive. I mean, I think you get into areas that, you know, I may have a slide that I want to show on a class, but the couple questions get it into some other topics that you weren't really planning on talking about. It's really important to understand those concepts and in different portions of the code. So, yes, I prefer all that, but I also am a realist that the industry's changing. I mean, I I cannot, for the life of me, it's probably been well, since the pandemic at least, I I don't think I can hire anyone that's going to come to an office and do plan check anymore. Everyone's working remote on the plan checking side, which uh causes a lot of other issues in terms of making sure our plan reviews are consistent, making sure they understand how to, you know, throw up that flare when they have a question or a problem with something they don't understand. And it's the same thing with our teaching. I think we're really seeing that the the newer folks coming in, they grew up through the pandemic and they did a lot of remote learning. So a lot of them don't want to fly into you know EduCode or CalBow Edweek or something like that. They just don't want to go in person, they want to be able to do it at home on their own schedule. So we're shifting a lot of our education offerings to also be webinars and working towards uh, you know, pay as you go sort of asynchronous training. Uh not maybe the best way to learn because there's not that always that interaction. So we always still keep with everything, you know. My card has my cell phone on it, call me anytime, day or night. If you want to talk about code stuff. I mean, that's really what it's about. We're here as a resource, and and anyone that wants to get in this business or anyone that's doing a project. I mean, even if I'm I I often go to the interviews with the jurisdictions trying to, you know, take contracts to help them out with their services. And I often tell them, you know, at the end of the interview, I said, look, you know, whether you choose us or not, keep our cards because we are a resource. We have, you know, 100 people working, and I have specialists in every single code out there, probably you know, more than one specialist. And and they've seen these sort of things. So even if you're we're not under contract, but you got a code question, we're happy to talk code. If it just makes things go smoother, that that's what this is about.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:55

Yep. The the whole tech thing. So I I manage our team. When we're short, whatever, sometimes I'll have to go out and do inspections. And I gotta tell you, when they cut me loose and I get to go out in the field, boy, I'm happy. So that you know, being in the office all the time, not great. I could only imagine just solely working from home. Perhaps that's better. You know, you're in your own environment. I talked to some of our engineers and one young lady one morning, she looked kind of disheveled. I'm like, hey, Christina, what's going on? And she's well, I thought I was working from home today, but it was my in-office day. And it's when I work from home, uh, you know, I wake up five minutes before I'm supposed to be online. I just kind of roll over and turn on my computer. I guess there's a benefit to that. There's no commute, there's no anything else. You get a little extra sleep, but you know, get me outside, get me talking to people. Uh I don't know. Maybe it's I think what you said, maybe I'm just dating myself. Maybe I'm just an old caveman that needs that. I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:54

Um there is a little of that. I mean, I think I grew up in the age where you did all the face-to-face meetings and you were probably the same. I mean, it's just I don't know. I I enjoy that part of it. I and I can tell you from past experience, even now with the virtual things, if we can talk through stuff over a set of plans or over, you know, out of the field looking at something, gosh, the conversation goes to places that you no one was thinking of, but some great solutions come out of that.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:26

Yep. So having said that, what is

AI Plan Review Hype Versus Reality

SPEAKER_02 1:02:30

your feeling? I'm going to say the dirty word, the AI thing. How how much of that have you folks incorporated into what you're doing? Is there anything that you find that has promise early on?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:41

Well, as a consulting firm across the country, I've gotten calls from uh numerous people that are trying to get into the AI world to do plan review. And so I have seen many a system in the works in terms of what they're trying to solve and whatnot. I think I've narrowed it down to one firm that I think is just head and shoulders above everyone else in the the space was I don't know if I could say it, Build Check AI. They were three graduate students at the time from Stanford's grad program, and they they put some stuff together that was pretty impressive. But they were asking me a lot of questions. They all want to ask questions oh, how do you do plan check? What do you do this? How do you do this? And so we were going through those sort of things, and I think the even with them, the AI is probably 10 to 15 years away from being able to do kind of your basic plan check. I mean, they they were impressive, you know, we'd meet every few weeks, and their program got considerably better each time. But with that said, it still was not formatted the way the jurisdictions wanted to see the comments. And really, they were trying to do the AI, and they all start, I'm not sure why they do this, they all start with trying to do multifamily construction. And I guess they're just saying that you know the big push for housing, and that's been the the marketplace. But you and I both know being in this field for as long as we have, that is the toughest thing to plan check, the toughest thing to inspect. I mean, it's in a lot of ways much worse than a high-rise or something like that. There's just so much going on in some of these projects. So I was trying to steer them away from it, but really probably there is a model at some point you could maybe do residential because it's much simpler. But the big thing I keep the conversations always gravitate back to two things is a lot of these AI people, it's a tech, you know, they want to think tech startup, and they want to think like, oh, I'm gonna be like, you know, Hewlett-Packard or Apple or, you know, something like that. They're just gonna make millions upon millions. And it's this is still an industry that's tied to the government, you know, finances, and it's a slower to change sort of industry, and it's just it's not it's not that uh scalability as far as what you can earn from what you're creating. So I think a lot of them kind of get to the point that, yeah, it takes too long to get through to an RFP, get the contract, and then the volume isn't really there, and we can't price it at the point that it makes sense for plan checking. The other part is, and I I think AI is always going to be short on this is that there are local interpretations, local officials that you have to deal with that have stuff that you know, on their gray area of the code, it's not written in the code. It's it's sometimes even you know outside of maybe what the intent. Of the code is, but that's how they view it. And the AI models are never going to be able to capture that in terms of like a fire marshal that says, no, I insist you do sprinklers here, or I insist that the you know connection point is here, and it's not specified in the code. And so you can't really that's more a feel thing for the local staff, the people that are dealing with things locally. Like, you know, here in California, you know the PGD green book's gonna change every so many years, and all of a sudden their approach to where the the drop drop into the system, you know, for your power is gonna be at it. What is acceptable? Is that to be at the front side? Is it near the window or not? Those sort of things change, and you just can't the AI models just can't adapt to that quick enough. And and there's still that human element. So I'm not sure it's really gonna go there. What I have seen is those guys that are doing the AI, they've shifted to a model where they're actually working with the developers, the architects, the engineers, the the owners, and they're doing a lot more in terms of completeness checks. And the AI model, we did that for a while. We sold that through the build check folks in terms of some of our jurisdictions who are struggling with here's a huge volume coming in, and I've only one permit tech. How do I deal with this? It's great for that. It really is. It does a great job of assessing, you know, is this all the stuff that I need? Is it in the right order? You know, fantastic for that. But again, the the infrastructure, the the revenue stream for them for what they develop on the AI. On that is it's not going to be on the government side. It would it just they can't charge enough for what they've put in in time to put the AI model together. So it's great for them to find the developers, the the c engineers, because then that they get a set now that you know they're pretty confident when they come to submit it into the city. So they come to see Livermore, they've got everything on your checklist. It's a complete set, so it can actually be reviewed completely the first time, and that saves them money. And the developers have more money, they're willing to spend that to make sure that it goes through. You know, first time there's not a call two weeks into the review saying, Hey, I'm missing this piece.

SPEAKER_02 1:08:31

So that's that's so accurate with uh the bills coming through and wanting jurisdictions to expedite things and so forth. So many times we get something that's so incomplete, and then it's that back and forth, right? And at the end of the day, somebody's always got to be blamed, and most of the time it's a jurisdiction. So something like that I can see working very well. And I agree with you in terms of AI, it's the buzzword right now. I don't see it as quite as effective as most people. So you've probably seen we have this goofy little cartoon thing that we do we do with the podcast. Have this young lady that that does this, and sometimes we're all goofy, and you know, what can we make him do? But you know, you think AI and everybody makes it sound like it's automated. You just put in a prompt and boom, you're done. And it's so not true. There's so many elements to it, and there's an AI, and there are multiple agents that do different things: the voice, the color, the this, the speed. And we're still and that's just a goofy cartoon. I could only imagine when you have to get down into the tech and the detail of a complex building, that it's not going to be an easy, an easy path. So yeah, I agree with you. I don't think we're going anywhere soon. I think we our jobs are still secure for a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:42

The part that worries me is back to the design side from my background, is that there's a lot more architects and engineers using AI to design simple things like retaining walls or masonry fences for enclosing the trash enclosure and things like that. And they're doing the calcs that way. That's I mean, it can do that, but I I think back to Harkining when you know calcs used to be by hand, and all of a sudden we started doing spreadsheets. And there was always that problem of like, it's good as long as you put the right information in to begin with, it'll spit out the right answer. But you've, I'm sure, dealt with AI and everyone else has.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:36

Yes. Speaking of the the so I have a friend that's a programmer, and it's always been programmers is garbage in, garbage out. So your programming has to be good. I was working with AI, I'm trying to work on some topics, and it spits out a potential topic, telling me that there's a new change to path of travel, 11B202, and it's taking effect, and it completely caught me off guard. So I thought, wow, this will be a great topic. So it starts putting together all sorts of uh information for me, um, outlines and so forth. And so I'm not finding any code section that's referencing what it's talking about. So I go back to it and I said, Hey, give me the actual code section, because I'm not able to verify this. And it comes back to me and says, Oh, you know what, made a mistake. There was an article that I saw in an e-magazine, and when I checked it, it wasn't real. Oh, gee, thanks. You know?

SPEAKER_01 1:11:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:11:27

Uh so yeah, AI.

ICC Golf And Final Reflections

SPEAKER_02 1:11:31

Hey, before I let you go, I know you're a golfer and I know ICC is coming up. Are you golfing?

SPEAKER_00 1:11:37

Uh yeah. Yeah, we usually go out there. It's a good sort of networking event, and we like sponsoring taking, you know, people that are headed out there that we know, or you know, just in the industry that we like being with and hanging out for the day. So it's fun. Yeah. Are you gonna go and play?

SPEAKER_02 1:11:54

I'm going. I'm not playing. I was going to originally, and then I thought to myself, I don't know that I want to start lugging the bags and everything over there. And then I I don't know that I want to use rentals on that guy, so probably not. I'll come, I'll come support you guys.

SPEAKER_00 1:12:09

Well, if you if you want to play, let me know. We'll we usually put a couple forces together and it's fun. But yeah, I mean the bags carrying them back and forth is the problem. The problem is always with ICC is the time of year and where they have the event. Because it can get very cold at some of these places where you just have some rain and things like that. And so over the years I've played many places, and and sometimes it's just downright miserable to play golf. I mean, I remember there it reminds me that coming up, I think the next not this year, but next year it's gonna be in Reno again. We played in Reno last time it was there, and it was probably 34 degrees, 33 degrees when we teed off. A little frost everywhere. Just oh, it was that's not the weather you want to play golf in all the time.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:59

No, I'm calling it quits at that point. I'm back at the uh country club, whatever it is, and having something warm.

SPEAKER_01 1:13:06

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_02 1:13:08

Dave, I've enjoyed this. I really appreciate your time. A lot of great information here, and I'm trying to push this out to a lot of jurisdictions, but also to a lot of young folks, trying to inspire them and get them following this path. I think it's a great career. And uh yours is a great story. You know, you you started one place, ended up somewhere else, extremely successful. So I don't know. I don't I I I I I think I think if I get it on enough ears, you're gonna inspire the right people. And I appreciate that. I want to thank you for that. Thank you for taking the time.

SPEAKER_00 1:13:41

No, no, thanks for having me and having the conversation. And like we talked about, if there's anyone else in my organization they think would be an interesting uh kind of spin through their career, just their sub, you know, feelings on some of these subjects. Let me know. We have them all over the country. They're teaching codes, they know a lot of stuff, so it'd be great to bring them into this as well.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:03

I'm gonna take you up on that.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:05

Yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:07

All right, thank you, sir. So, having said that, I'm going to end this because otherwise it just keeps recording. Just give it a second until your end says 100%, and then go ahead and close it out.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:19

Okay, sounds good.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:21

Take care, Dave. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:23

You too. Have a good weekend. You too, bye.

SPEAKER_02 1:14:28

David, thank you for joining me on Tagas Talk. Your career provides a perspective that very few people in our profession can offer. You began with an education and perspective as an architect, developed decades of experience in plan review and code interpretation, manage municipal building services for several California communities, and now lead a company serving public agencies across multiple states. That's an impressive professional journey. But what stood out that's an impressive professional journey. But what stood out during our conversation was not simply the number of years offices or projects behind it. It was that's an impression. That's an impressive professional journey. But what stood out during our conversation was not simply the number of years offices or projects behind it. It was your understanding that successful code administration requires more than technical knowledge. It requires judgment, it requires consistency, it requires communication, a fair amount of golf, and sometimes it requires translating between an architect who says it meets the intent, a plan examiner who wants another detail, and a contractor who is already standing on the job site waiting for an answer. David, I appreciate your willingness to share what you've learned from working on both sides of the permit counter and your perspective on where the building safety profession may be headed next. To everyone listening, thank you for spending part of your day with us.

Closing Thanks And How To Support

SPEAKER_02 1:16:00

If you enjoyed the conversation, please follow Tacus Talk on LinkedIn and subscribe to the podcast on your favorite podcast platform. Sharing the episode with a colleague is one of the best ways you can support the show and help us continue bringing conversations with the people shaping local government and building safety profession. Sharing the episode with a colleague is one of the best ways you can support the show and help us continue bringing you conversations with the people shaking, with the people shaping local government and the building safety profession. You can find additional episodes and information at tachistalk.com. Until the next time, keep learning, keep leading, keep making your community a better place to live, work until the next time. I wish you the best, continued success. Take care. This is Tacus Talk.