SLT to resume commercial fire inspections
South Lake Tahoe is getting back into the fire inspection business.
In 2011, the fire marshal position was eliminated. For a time Lake Valley Fire Protection District took on the responsibilities, but fire codes in the jurisdictions were not the same at the time so that was not a good fit.
“Inspections have not occurred as they should have,” Fire Chief Jeff Meston told the City Council on Feb. 17.
The staff report said, “Some businesses have neglected to maintain basic safety items such as working fire extinguishers, working smoke detectors, fire sprinkler maintenance and fire extinguisher systems over cooking appliances, creating unsafe conditions for the public.”
Because no one in the department is qualified to do this job the city will be looking to hire someone from the outside. But what will be unique is that the person will also be a building inspector and will work in that department. The person will have to have the necessary certifications to do both.
The theory is one person can do both inspections at the 960 commercial establishments. The goal is to have the fees pay for the position. Businesses with less than 10,000 square feet will be charged $234 for the fire inspection.
— Lake Tahoe News staff report
Let,s see; 960 X $234.00= $224,640.00 per?
$234 for a job that ought to cost $50? And for that matter, shouldn’t it be up to the companies who insure those businesses to make sure they meet the fire codes?
Scams everywhere… I think the business have to meet the fire codes by law, Dogula. And if it was up to the insurance companies, they probably require businesses to have the inspection.
$234 to make sure the fire extinguisher is in place…
This is becoming like an episode of the Three Stooges. Are they really saying that no one in the Fire Department is qualified to do fire inspections? Words do not suffice…
Does the city really need to hire someone for this job? Why not give the opportunity to someone at the Fire Department to gain the certification to meet the job requirements??
The latest episode with a Captain at the Fire Department discloses he had enough time on his hands to download and view thousands of pictures of child pornography. I think someone with other things on his mind could find the time to perform this task.
?!?, Scams everywhere? Yep! All those vacation homes around town that are rarely used? They still gotta pay STPUD and STR a bill even if they are not even here to use their services. Your not using water and you have no trash. But you gotta pay for it anyway.
Property taxes go up for an expansion of the college so our cost of living here goes up even if you are a out of town home owner or permanent resident,who does’nt go to LTCC or are a part time resident who rarely visits their Tahoe home…. you gotta pay… or else they put you into a position where the county takes your property, puts it up for auction, and then you lose everything.
Some might call this extortion. Nah, I just call it local agencies, businesses and some govt. officials, learning from organized crime how to pressure the average joe to hand over their hard earned dough.
Outta your pocket and into theirs. OLS
OMG!!! Are you kidding????? What irresponsibility to have let this lapse. The elimination of the Fire Marshal may have been great optics and a slight benefit to the bottom line in the short term, but the unintended consequence shows a lack of foresight to see this coming.
I’m as uncomfortable under the yoke of agency oversight as anyone. However, I work in hi-tech but my work is in the Fire/Life Safety area. Businesses without this oversight will through no ill will on their part take short cuts, defer maintenance and other essentials in order to keep their businesses afloat and minimize expense.
I know of a fire department that keeps a bucket of rocks in their training room to illustrate what not adequately maintaining your fire sprinkler system will do. Sediment and rock creep into the sprinkler lines and over time will come to rest in the low spots (the sprinkler heads) preventing water from flowing during a fire. Or use of daisy-chained extension cords that spark causing fires. Or “temporarily” deactivating that smoke detector because it is a nuisance.
Now the relationship between the agency and the business can be cooperative or adversarial but it takes two to tango….a seasoned inspection professional will know how to apply the codes and the savvy business owner will actually benefit from their help.
I am getting a bit tired of everyone wanting top shelf services at no cost …. we live in a society and their are costs that must be paid.
I’m not sure why the fire department still exists in SLT. Hiring an outsider to do what is their job under the fire code? Really? No doubt it will be a contract arrangement so the City can claim they never “hired” anybody. As for fire inspections, those were a joke even in the past. If a business thumbed it nose at the inspectors & fire marshal by refusing to comply with needed corrections, the City refused to proceed to any sort of prosecution or shutting the business down. So what was the point? Unsafe conditions were known by the City but nothing was done to correct them. Not only was the business liable if some bad happened, so was the City.
Anyone wanting to be fully informed about this matter should watch and listen to the New Business Item (a) presentation at the February 17th City Council meeting at the following link:
http://slt.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=6&clip_id=728
I made some statements here regarding scams by STPUD, STR and LTCC in charging people for services not being used by people that do’nt live here full time.
My eyes have been opened by a friend who explained that we ALL have to share in the cost of improvements to water lines at STPUD, additions to LTCC and expansion costs to STR.
I apologize. Thank you JoAnne. OLS
Yeah, why bother becoming informed about anything when it’s just so much easier and apparently so much more fun to criticize and make unfounded accusations.
I support the idea the agencies become self sufficient and not wait around for a turn at the government teat.