Photo by KELLY FARRELL, Staff
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A public appeal for support is made in May 2009 by Regina Dayton of Marco, who said challenges she experienced with her now-bankrupt custom home builder could have been thwarted if city building officials took due diligence when inspecting her home. She says she'll picket for as long as it takes to get action.
Photo by KELLY FARRELL, Staff
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Regina Dayton, of Spinnaker Drive, Marco Island, holds a picket sign in May 2009, upset at what she believes city building inspectors should have caught in 2006 before issuing a certificate of occupancy in her $1 million, custom-built, water view home.
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MARCO ISLAND — A Marco Island couple has sued their city, accusing it of negligence in hiring building inspectors not licensed to do their jobs.
Timothy and Regina Dayton recently filed the lawsuit in Collier Circuit Court, alleging the city of Marco Island was negligent in the hiring, training and supervision of building officials, inspectors and plans examiners.
The negligence resulted in a house that wasn’t built up to city code and significantly deviated from the plans submitted, the suit contends.
“The city of Marco Island failed to adequately, competently and professionally administer state and local building codes,” John Clough, the couple’s attorney, wrote in the lawsuit.
“The Dayton home not only was not built in accordance with state and local codes, it was not built in accordance with the permitted plans on file with the city of Marco Island and upon which its building officials were to rely in their inspections of the home,” the suit contends.
The Daytons purchased a less than half-acre lot at 524 Spinnaker Drive in 1998, and in January 2002 hired Kimball Hill Homes of Florida Inc. to build a house on the property.
The company got the official go-ahead to begin construction on the home in September 2003, according to the lawsuit.
Three years later, on April 14, 2006, the city issued the Daytons a certificate of occupancy and gave them the go-ahead to move in.
But the couple says the house wasn’t properly inspected, because, according to the lawsuit, Marco Island’s building official and at least one building inspector and plan reviewer weren’t fully licensed for the jobs.
Bill Moss, who was city manager on Marco Island at the time and now holds the same position in the city of Naples, said he couldn’t comment on the lawsuit.
Moss said the city of Marco Island was issuing about 300 residential building permits a year during that time period.
As for Marco Island’s building inspectors, Moss said every one of them employed by the city was “qualified and licensed.”
Most were licensed in multiple specialties, he said.
That isn’t the case, according to the suit, which includes the following allegations:
** Building official Robert Mahar didn’t possess the “requisite licensure from the state of Florida” when he was appointed to the position in December 2000. The suit goes on to say Mahar received his provisional building code license in April 2001, and he received his full license in February 2004.
• The city of Marco Island hired Michael Smithem as a building inspector and plan reviewer before Smithem received his provisional license. The suit also contends Smithem was allowed to work 141 days before he received his provisional license in August 2003. According to the suit, “Smithem reviewed the plans submitted for the Dayton home for construction” before he received his provisional license.
• The city of Marco Island failed to perform slab or foundation inspections, but allowed a general contractor to continue further construction on the home.
• The city of Marco Island didn’t note, question or challenge significant departures from the permitted plans. Those deviations, according to the suit, include “no-impact glass where the permitted plans depict their use; failure to install shower pans in the home; (and) relocation of the air conditioning condensing pad.”
“The city of Marco Island knowingly permitted its building officials to practice beyond the scope of their then-license or accepted and performed professional responsibilities that its building inspections and building offices weren’t then competent to perform,” Clough said in the suit.
Neither Mahar nor Smithem were named as defendants in the suit. Both men now have licenses valid through 2011, according to the Department of Business and Professional Regulation’s Web site.
The Daytons also have taken legal action against the now-defunct builders, Kimball Hill Homes. The couple sued the company, accusing it of fraud, in August 2006.
Regina Dayton told the Marco Eagle in May that the couple initially didn’t plan on pursuing legal action against the city. However, the fact that inspections indicated the building was up to code and the certificate of occupancy was granted made the case against Kimball Hill Homes difficult, they said.
The couple, according to the suit, is asking that Marco Island pay for damages in excess of $15,000, plus the cost of attorneys fees and other associated costs.
* * * * *
Staff Writer Kate Albers contributed to this report.
Connect with Naples reporter Jenna Buzzacco-Foerster at www.naplesnews.com/staff/jenna_buzzacco
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Comments » 12
max1313 writes:
You would think with the thousands it cost for a permit, the building inspector, and official would be stopping by the job often. I wonder how much per hour they spent for the inspectors time. They could contract the inspection services to a private company, they would be insured, and the city could still may 65% on the deal. Lets operate this city like a company, contract stuff out, and make a profit, not go with lets hire more staff to hold shovels, be responsible for lawsuits, bad decisions, pensions, wasted driving on the island, insurance, and the city council comandos, holding meetings to make more rules. Take a year or two off, vote no changes, collect your salary, the locals won't complain.
shadow writes:
max...the inspectors go to the site when they are called by the contractor...just like every other city....IT IS the contractors responsibility to ensure building standards are adhered to....to inspector is to verify that code is followed....not discern the quality of construction....it can be shotty but up to code...they did their job.
go to obama-land (chicago)...for 5 crispy's you can get anything approved via the inspectors.
my experience has been we have good inspectors on marco...we still have alot of peop,le that want to use ubnlicensed contractors...this falls to the county...niot the city for licensing.
Smeg writes:
The number of city vehicles cruising your main streets is truly impressive. How many vehicles and employees do you have?
expatinasia writes:
"go to obama-land (chicago)...for 5 crispy's you can get anything approved via the inspectors."
It doesn't take much to get a racist to spew his hatred.
shadow writes:
RACIST? you're nuts...what did i say that was racist? please help me here.
MrBreeze writes:
It must be the color "green" shadow.
max1313 writes:
smeg more employees than this town and less waste
tarquin writes:
yea, what max said............
tarquin writes:
I watched a sea and dock company replace two sea walls about a month ago. A week after completion a Marco inspector finally comes up to an empty lot several houses down from the one replaced, gets out of his car, scratches his head and nods. He was two houses away from the replaced sea walls in either direction. Two weeks later he comes to the same empty lot and is looking up and down the canal looking for the wall to inspect. He finally found one of the sea wall 2 houses down, nods "yep that's a sea wall" and gets back in his truck. I'm sure that he signed off on both walls by now....the wall he never found was 2 lots up on the same side.
And theys are just a few things that are wrong with Marco like our roads that they have not fixed yet. They were quick to tear up and charge us for it $$$$$! Where are the road crews? Is this how they are going to leave things? My ailment and shocks of my Corvette got torn up because my street is half finished and has been that way for months. The road crew has packed up and left. What gives? Do I charge Marco for the damages I have incured? Due to their neglangence, turn about is far play...? They did it to us, why can't we do it to them, the responsible party?
fondulus writes:
From reading the whole lawsuit, if even half of it is true, COMI will take it in the neck. Sounds like the lawyer and his experts have done their job. Wish COMI had done theirs. Kudo's to the couple for standing up and fighting City Hall.
fondulus writes:
If COMI hired and used inspectors and plan examiners that were provisionally licensed while the Building Official was also provisionally licensed, COMI is in deep trouble, and not just because of this lawsuit. If the time periods in the suit are correct, hundreds of home owners and condo owners and business owners who had structures built then will all chime in and pile on, and rightly so. Every plan reviewed and building inspected by those provisionally licensed people is suspect.
If Chief Building Official Mahar had known what he was doing, he would have prevented all of this. Ditto for the then City Manager who should have known that this cannot be done. If current COMI Manager Thompson knows what he is doing, he will steer this suit to the settlement table quickly and then file suit on the state of Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation for issuing provisional licenses to people being supervised by a provisional building official. They know that cannot be done.
fondulus writes:
Actually, according to the lawsuit, the Marco inspectors did not do their job and the house is not built to code. That's why COMI is being sued. If the inspectors had done their jobs, had been properly trained, etc, the contractor wouldn't have gotten away with so much inferior construction. These folks have structural issues that may lead to tearing down the house and starting over. Other houses may also have similar problems because these same inspectors should have never been hired or placed on the job.
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