[The Buckeyes]

Originally Posted by Villages Kahuna

From what I can tell, the entire Lake County Department of Growth Management has 29 employees. The department is responsible for building services, contractor licensing, development planning, zoning and something called "enterprise zone development".

Among the 29 employees there are:

• One (1) Building Services Manager

• Three (3) Permitting Technicians

• Three (3) Plans Examiners

• Two (2) Building Inspectors

It's kind of hard to get really current information. But in recent years, Lake County has issued residential building permits in the range of 300 to 600 per year. The Villages is building and selling 300-400 houses or villas a month, all in Sumter County.

I tried to compare Lake County to Sumter County's Department of Building Services. I couldn't get any information on staffing. But their process for plan review and permitting seemed very precise. In fact, their website says that building inspections can be requested and conducted twenty-four hours a day and that any inspection requested before midnight would be conducted the next day. It's kind of hard to imagine that the two Lake County inspectors could deal with inspecting 19 houses a week for all the various of stages of construction requiring inspection (structural, framing, electrical, plumbing, HVAC, final, certificate of occupancy, etc.).

While it's only anecdotal information, my neighbor is in the process of completing a really nice rental house on CR 468 in Fruitland Park. It took him almost two years to get the necessary permits to begin construction. At one point he became so frustrated with the slowness and inefficiency of the process that he almost put the property back up for sale. The house is almost done now, a dramatic improvement over the unoccupied, overgrown, windowless, unpainted structure that it replaced. But my neighbor said that he would NEVER do it again in Fruitland Park.

Kahuna is correct about the situation. When our home was being built I asked our sales rep why they could build so quick down here and up north, even in good weather it takes 6 months. His answer was that a lot had to do with inspections and permits and not waiting days to obtain them. I assume (hate to use that term) that inspectors are on site throughout areas being built and permits are issued immediately when needed.