Building Code Complaints Go Unchecked : Government: Long Beach audit blames inefficiency and poor records-keeping in the planning department for backlog.

The 23 inspectors in the Department of Planning and Building are so overwhelmed with complaints of code violations that they are unable to respond to many of them, according to a report issued by City Auditor Robert Fronke.

The inspectors examine the city’s aging stock of 70,000 residential units for building code violations ranging from holes in apartment walls to rats. The report did not audit the city Health Department, whose inspectors investigate health-related hazards in buildings.

In his report, scheduled to be reviewed Tuesday by the City Council, Fronke found that the number of code enforcement cases in Long Beach increased 57% during the last fiscal year. During that period, the section recorded a total of 6,662 complaints, with 2,699 still pending. The audit blames the backlog on the need for increased efficiency and better record-keeping. “It’s fairly clear that they don’t keep up with the number of complaints,” Fronke said. “We think part of the process ought to be to place some priorities and controls and allocate the manpower in the most effective way.”

The audit found that data was incomplete or missing from the office’s computerized record-keeping system that stores information about violations. There are few records of the disposition of some of those complaints, according to the report. Sometimes citizens’ complaints were not recorded completely, the report stated.

Inspectors would have more time in the field if clerical staff assumed some of their bookkeeping duties, the report suggested. It listed administrative problems such as the failure of employees to fill out overtime reports and a general lack of written policies and procedures for staff.

Code Enforcement Operations Manager David Evans said the audit is fair. “We’ve taken steps to correct some of those inefficiencies,” he said.

Others in the office argue that the backlog is not caused by inefficiency, but by a lack of funding from the city. “We can’t catch up,” said Clark Searle, chief building inspector. Searle said that the number of complaints from city officials, tenants, and health and fire department officers is growing. Increasing numbers of people are moving into the city’s old apartment houses, he said. “We’ve got a lot more people living in areas of the city that have been neglected for a long time,” Searle said.

Searle, who is retiring this month, said that in his 15 years with the office he has never seen the inspectors more swamped. “We’re not getting our promised help,” he said.

Searle said that two of the six inspectors charged with looking into substandard housing violations have left but that there is no money to replace them.

Not only does his office not get enough money, Searle said, but lately there has been a push by management to take his people and use them in other offices for work that generates money for the city.

Recently three inspectors, charged with investigating property maintenance problems such as weeds, abandoned vehicles and run-down buildings were reassigned to jobs that are supposed to put money into the general fund, Searle said. For example, one inspector with the property maintenance unit was assigned to hand out tickets for parking violations.

“If management thinks getting general revenues are more important than eliminating substandard and blighted buildings, that’s their view,” Searle said.

Robert Paternoster, director of the Department of Planning and Building, said that funding for code enforcement is up to the City Council. “It’s no secret that we have more complaints than we can inspect. The demand for code enforcement is greater than the resources we have,” Paternoster said.

Fronke argued that until the code enforcement section gets better organized, it is impossible to tell how much, if any, of the backlog is due to staffing and funding shortages.

“I don’t think we’re prepared to say that until we see what can be done with the current resources,” Fronke said. “They need to have better controls and ways to measure their data and performance.”

But, inspectors ask, where will the money come from to make Fronke’s recommended changes to the computer system? Evans said that the office has been unable to proceed with scheduled improvements to the system because of budget problems.

Housing activists have long complained that the city does not adequately enforce building code violations and that many apartment tenants live in filthy and unsafe conditions.

“This city is in the Dark Ages when it comes to housing enforcement,” said Kate McClatchy of the Long Beach Housing Action Assn. “The real issue here is that the city just doesn’t make it a priority, because a lot of the people who live in the worst housing are poor, and they can’t speak out.”