MARLBORO — Resident Syed Husain did not consider working on his partially finished basement without the proper permit from the Marlboro building department, but much to his dismay, the limited availability of building inspectors resulted in staggered appointments that prolonged the process.
Husain said he called Town Hall on Oct. 15 to schedule an inspection and was informed that no one from the building department could complete the task until Oct. 24. A series of subsequent appointments followed that trend, and the final inspection could not be completed until Nov. 27, he said.
“Believe me, this whole project probably should not have taken more than two weeks to finish, if I wanted to go on my own without getting permits,” Husain said during the Nov. 14 meeting of the Township Council. “… I believe the building department needs help.”
Mayor Jonathan Hornik partially attributed the delay in getting inspections completed to the poor economy, which he said “dramatically” shrunk the need for a beefed-up building department.
Now, with new businesses coming to Marlboro, the number of building inspections is rising, he said.
“We have definitely seen an uptick in activity and we are hiring now,” Hornik said. “It’s a product of our own success. We try to keep the municipality’s (work force) lean, and it is financially prudent to do so, and everybody demands it.”
Marlboro saw a shortage of electrical inspectors for a while, but township officials recently hired an individual to bolster the ranks in that specialty, Hornik said.
The homes destroyed by superstorm Sandy and the subsequent restoration blitz along the Jersey Shore further strained municipal building departments in the state, he said. Marlboro has hired inspectors, only to see them leave for jobs along the beach, Hornik said.
“To get the inspectors, with all the work that is going on up and down the shore, it’s hard to keep people here,” he said.
The mayor said his administration will analyze the building department and “attempt to staff up.”
Business Administrator Jonathan Capp said he planned to speak with department employees to see if Husain’s final inspection could be moved to an earlier date.