PORT TOWNSEND — Hearing support from building industry representatives and seeing a seasonal upswing in Jefferson County building permits, the county’s drastically cut back Department of Community Development will return to a 40-hour workweek to help county staff expedite the permit process.
County Administrator Philip Morley announced the change, effective Aug.1, which will bring the Community Development staff of 11.38 full-time equivalents back to full workweeks — an increase of four hours a week per employee.
The staffers are now working four nine-hour days and will be brought back to five eight-hour days.
For the balance of the year, Morley said, the move will cost the county about $40,000 and $90,000 in 2011, he said.
“Presently, permits are running higher than projected a year ago,” Morley said.
“Now, permit revenue volumes year to date are running 38 percent above what we budgeted.”
The remaining department staff — cut after residential permits plunged from 209 in 2007 to 74 in 2009 and 32 through June this year — compares to a 2007 staff of nearly 26 full-time equivalent positions.
For single-family homes, the median number of days to secure a county building permit has increased from 49 days in 2007 to 79 this year, county statistics show.
When the commissioners adopted the county’s $48 million 2009 budget, 13 job cuts — six of them layoffs — were limited to the county Department of Community Development to help offset revenues lost in a weakened economy.
The department was granted a $1.2 million budget for 2010, approved by the county commissioners in late December.
That department’s remaining staffers were cut to 36-hour work weeks at the beginning of this year, including Al Scalf, community development director.
The hour reductions amounted to two full-time positions.
Morley said until an Environmental Protection Administration grant comes through, the Community Development permit office will not be open to office hours on Fridays, but staff would be focusing on pushing permits through.
Morley said recent meetings with the Jefferson County building industry representatives, including bankers, engineers, developers and builders, eventually led to the decision.
Kevin Coker, vice president of the Jefferson County Home Builders Association and one of those who shared his thoughts with Morley, Scalf and other county officials on speeding and simplifying the permit process, said the group’s members were taking a “wait-and-see” stance on the move.
“We think it’s constructive that they are meeting with the industry,” Coker said, adding his main concern was that permits were not always handled on a first-come, first-serve basis.
Instead, he said, “they should concentrate on the permits that are going to bring in the business.”
County Commissioner David Sullivan, D-Cape George, said Monday that he hoped the new system would improve permit processing. He said representatives of the county’s building industry often share their concerns about the permit system.
“I think mostly they are feeling the pain of the recession and want to do what they can,” Sullivan said.
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Port Townsend-Jefferson County Editor Jeff Chew can be reached at 360-385-2335 or at jeff.chew@peninsuladailynews.com.
