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| Hints to maneuver through the permit process |
admin writes, "Hints to maneuver through the permit process
BY JUDITH CAPEN
Q. I'm writing to ask if you know of anyone or a company who will act as an agent to get a D.C. building permit for a small renovation job? I haven't seen this advertised anywhere and wondered if you might have any contacts.
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A. I know of a couple of permit services but wouldn’t attempt to use one again for a residential project. The problem is that permit runners’ primary skill is standing in lines. They often know the building code and the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs requirements just well enough to apply them broadly. If your project is either specific in some way, not one-size-fits-all, or if you care about it, you are not likely to get what you want from a permit runner, even if he or she brings back a permit.
For example, the permit runner doubtless knows that each bedroom needs a smoke detector and is quite capable of showing them on your drawings. But you might care where the smoke detector goes on your brand new ceiling. It might bother you to have that particular pimple located randomly relative to the air diffuser, the light with its plaster medallion and all the ceiling moldings.
My advice is to tackle it yourself. No question, much as I love our city for its richness, its history, its diversity, its density, getting a building permit is an experience not to be undertaken lightly. Getting a building permit is without a doubt the most challenging endurance exercise of any of the city functions we deal with and, notwithstanding all the P.R. about the newly-re-organized-for-efficiency-Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, the same people are at the desks … we haven’t seen a difference yet, especially with a permit we have that is now in the eighth month of processing.
People who go incandescent with rage about the Department of Motor Vehicles should try to get a building permit to experience bureaucratic torment as fine art. I have long described the process to clients as a total crapshoot.
However, I still recommend tackling it yourself if you are a calm sort or can get your hands on some Valium.
After being unable to resist bad-mouthing the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs and the permitting process, shooting fish in a barrel, there I go again, here are some specific recommendations:
• Filling out the paperwork. Go to dcra.dc.gov and click on “permits.” Read everything on the page and download the applicable permit application forms — probably for “building” unless you’re attempting to get a permit for a boiler, lead abatement, raze or other activity requiring a permit.
Fill out the application honestly. Lying on the form is a bad idea. Fees are assessed by building volume, so lying about the cost of construction won’t do you any good. Secure the plat — a drawing, without building, of your house lot, available from the Office of the Surveyor, which takes $50 and about five working days — for your property if you are changing the footprint
Draw your house and any changes and make sure to get the requisite number of copies of all the documents. Don’t forget to gird your loins or spare tire or anything else you feel able to gird and head to 941 North Capitol St., NE, by bicycle or Metro, please. You may want to take provisions.
• Know your project. Be familiar with the drawings for your project and resign yourself to patient standing in lines and directing gentle questions to harassed public employees who are most comfortable delivering brusque negatives to tax payers. You need huge reserves of tenacity but it is not rocket science.
• Timing is key. Some people swear by Friday for the building department, maintaining if you begin the process immediately after lunch your chance of getting a permit are improved.
Others elaborate on this approach, recommending Friday before a long weekend. One of my clients, eight months pregnant, got her permit in one day. I’ve heard people suggest being pregnant and having a 2 year old in tow works even better.
Another client took her elderly mother, heart bypass scar just visible at her open collar blouse, and was successful. One client, a lawyer, sailed through; others, also lawyers, were stalled for weeks. And these were all renovations and additions on residential buildings under relatively straightforward building codes.
• It pays to be nice. Whenever you go, however, think grovel for your attitude. Remember, you have little to offer the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs folks and they have much you want. Do the math and suck up.
• Be flexible to changes. As you move through the process, desk by desk, zoning to structural to electrical to whomever, I recommend having a red pen with you.
If a reviewer says, “You need to swing this door the other way” take out your red pen and mark it, on all the copies, asking deferentially, “Like this?”
You do not want to go home, make tiny changes, and come back only to be directed to make tiny changes by the next reviewer. One very long visit to the department is preferable to many short ones.
• Don’t drop off documents. While at the permitting office, though, don’t take any of the reviewers up on the offer of dropping off documents after which “they will get back to you.” Unbeknownst to astrophysicists, black holes can be found at 941 North Capitol St. Hang in there.
And remember: you are required by law to get a building permit for almost any construction work you might want to do to your house and those big STOP WORK signs are really embarrassing.
Good luck and remember: you are doing the right thing.
Preservation architect Judith Capen can be reached at capen.judith@verizon.net.
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Posted on Aug 25, 2007 10:00am.
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