Emergency help needed

[cdocon]

I am in Natchitoches, Louisiana. Outside of the city limits. In Natchitoches Parish. I started digging my IG pool Monday. On 3/5/12, I obtained a building permit from our parish zoning office. I had to write on my application all sorts of stuff including the estimated cost of construction ($26,000). Today, as we are about to complete the excavation and start the smoothing out process, the parish inspector came out and told us we had to stop progress because our friend (who offered to help since he has experience with Bobcats) didn't have a DIY permit!!!!! I asked the inspector why did he need that, he isn't being paid, just lending a hand. He told us any improvements from $0-$7500 were not a problem. Improvements from $7,500-$75,000 require a DIY permit from the state. Improvements above $75,000 require a General Contractor's license. What the heck???? He didn't tell me that when I was applying for the permit!!!! He says it is a simple on-line form to fill out and costs $75. As soon as we get notification of the permit, we could start up again. Great.

We go on line to do this "simple form". It looks very simple except for at the bottom, it says that you must have Workers' Comp insurance for projects above $7,500 and you must have a license. We are simple homeowners trying to improve our backyard with a swimming pool. ***I will tell you that a PB that gave us an outrageous quote was seen 3-4 times in our neighborhood, and he is not working on any pools here right now*******

Now, what do I do? I have an 18 x 36 foot, 6 foot deep hole in my backyard. I can't leave it there for weeks, while I straighten this out. What are my options.

I'm very upset, as I went to the planning and zoning department like I was supposed to and he gave me the go ahead!!! He said as long as I was using a licensed plumber and electrician, I would be OK.

[PoolDoc]

Louisiana, right?

Did you overlook somebody's outstretched hand (behind their back) by chance? It happens quite a lot.

I'll never forget spending an entire half day, on 3 separate days, with the Parks and Rec director of a small town in NW Georgia, who kept saying really encouraging stuff about how good the service I was offering looked, and then adding, "and I know everybody on the board here. They'll support whatever I ask for." But, when it came to the dotted line, he'd put me off for another day. I finally gave up, but was puzzled as heck about what had happened. If finally dawned on me that he was fishing for a bribe.

I'm not saying that's your situation, but it may be.

What I can tell you is, you can fight inspectors and win . . . and then lose. Been there. Done that. Got the scars.

I had a North Carolina state pool inspector acknowledge that I was correct in what the code allowed, but that he didn't like it, and would shut me down if I did it. He said I could take it to court, but that he'd be able to keep the pool shut till after July 4th. And, if I got it re-opened, he'd find a reason to shut it down the NEXT season.

Here are some nasty facts:

1. Politics is always politics. When the Democrats control, they get arrogant and corrupt. When the Republicans control, they get arrogant and corrupt. If the Libertarians or Socialists every get control, THEY will become arrogant and corrupt.

2. Regardless of who is right, a pissed off inspector can ALWAYS screw you up, no matter what the court says, UNLESS you have your own full time legal pit bull on site.

3. By definition, some places are politically corrupt. Chicago. New Orleans. The Atlanta Board of Education. Etc. Other places are often corrupt, like small towns in Georgia . . . and towns generally in Louisiana and Illinois.

4. But, even apart from corruption, governments act in stupid ways.

I've installed "No Lifeguard On Duty" signs, ON my customer's lifeguard stands as required by the Tennessee Pool Code! I eventually dug out the whole back story about that little code addition, and it was all about stupidity and career officer CYA (not cyanuric acid, here). It had nothing to do with partisan politics.

I've got a news article on my desktop about how Obama's DOE has subsidized wind farms in the NorthWest, and now is paying them bonuses for NOT generating power, since the grid can't use the spiky intermittent power they are producing. Just today, I discovered that the DOJ has issued a civil rights ruling that mandates that ALL "public access swimming pools" have powered wheel chair lifts . . . as of today! This affects 300,000 pools, but annual production of such lifts is probably less than 10,000. (This is all Obama stuff -- but it's not political -- I could go on for hours about the stupidities in the No Child Left Behind act that Bush did.)

Political stupidity is universal, not partisan.

================================================== ===================

But you are in a mess. Here's what I'd do -- not that it's right, but it's what I'd do:

1. Go spend $400 on a decent electrical sump pump, and on silver (long life) tarps to cover your pool on all sides and the bottom. 'Shingle' the tarps so they all drain onto the bottom most tarp, in the hopper (deep end). Put the sump pump there. Use wire tent stakes -- maybe 100 of them -- to thoroughly stake down the tarps. That will take care of the rain. If you need to do so, cover the dirt pile with more tarps. AND, if water will run off into the pool, use some of the dirt to make a dike around the pool, that will guide the water away. This is expensive and time consuming, but it's cheaper than losing the hole.

2. Find a friend, or a friend of friend, who is an active contractor in your area, and find out if the inspectors are corrupt and want a bribe, or are stupid, or just like jerking people around, or if they are megalomaniacs who believe they are single handedly going to save the world by their efforts.

+ If it's a bribe, that may be the cheapest solution.
+ If they are stupid, or just messing around, an attorney can possibly help.
+ If they are megalomaniacs (like my NC state inspector), well, you are hurting.

3. Do not -- for your sake, for your family's sake, for God's sake -- do NOT throw attitude at an inspector. They are peons of the business world, and often have a chip on their shoulder and an inferiority complex going on. Humiliate them, and you will die. (Usually. I won a couple of times, but they were special cases.) Ask them humbly to help -- some inspectors are stupid jerks, but only because that's all they know how to be. Being nice to them can sometimes work wonders. The last 15 years I've been in the local pool business, the inspectors have LIKED me. And most of them (in Chattanooga) are actually nice guys: it's not THEIR fault that they have to enforce stupid laws. They did not have ANY say about them.

4. Again, for everybody's sake, do NOT say to an inspector, "But you HAVE to xyz". By training, and almost by contract, those are fighting words to them. They are SUPPOSED to enforce the law / code / their whims against resistant contractors. Even if you are about to lose your first born son, do NOT say to an inspector, "you HAVE to let me this or that".

5. On the other hand, crawling on your hands and knees, weeping about the impending loss of your first born son, may help.

6. READ THE CODE. Find out if they are right. I won many, many battles by knowing the codes better than the inspectors, and by asking them, "Well gosh darn. You are so smart. I am just amazed you can figure all that out. I'm so confused. Can you explain to me how this (code section) fits in with what you said?"

7. If they are megalomaniacal a$$openings -- your contractor friend will know -- you're in trouble. Talk to an attorney with CONSTRUCTION experience, and see if you have any options.

Sorry, to be so discouraging. But it is the inspector's JOB to gum up the works - that is LITERALLY what he's supposed to do all day long. They can get into trouble if they don't find things wrong.

Good luck.

[cdocon]

Thanks Ben. I think what happened was this: one of the Pool Builders that I had come to my house for a quote drove past the other day and saw that we had indeed started digging. He called the inspector and threw some $ or something his way, so the inspector came and shut us down saying we had a man contracting and he was not a licensed contractor. He is a friend who did his own IG unite pool and was for 27 years an employee of one of the largest gunite/concrete contractors in California. Needless to say, he is a wealth of info.
Well, the pool builder got a little intimidated and wanted to stop us. So my husband calls the State Board of Contractors in Baton Rouge and talked to a very knowledgeable person there who gave us all the correct info. As a matter of fact, told us the inspector should have gotten an “affidavit of no workers’ comp” insurance and a form saying that we are acting as our own GC before even issuing the building permit!!
So after a few miles and a couple of hours of stress getting papers signed and notarized, we were back in business. We even continued to work until about 10pm that night digging and smoothing out our hole. We overnighted the appropriate form and the fee $75 to the State Board of Contractors and continued with our work.
So, the next day, we got in our steel subs and plumbing subs. Five days after we started our digging, we were able to shoot our gunite!!! We picked up tile/coping today and hope to get that done as well as our decks and completion of our electrical. Hopefully, from start to finish, our IG pool will take less than 4 weeks.
Thank you Ben for your words of wisdom!!
Looking forward to more conversations/advice from the experts here on Pool Forum for a long time to come.
David

[PoolDoc]

So my husband calls the State Board of Contractors in Baton Rouge and talked to a very knowledgeable person there who gave us all the correct info.

It's always nice when you can find those people!

Several years ago, when we were trying to get my older son's driver's license, we were being sent in circles -- you know, the "you can't get there from here" circle! -- trying to find out what we had to do. The fact that my son had been home schooled since kindergarten was flummoxing them. But when I finally got the name and number of the right lady in Atlanta, it was just like your experience: do this, pay that, do this . . . and you're done!

[aylad]

Louisiana politics at its finest, at work yet again!!