MODEL 98-11
EXPEDITED PLAN PROCESSING
ENGINEERS AND SURVEYORS INSTITUTE - FAIRFAX, VA

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Jurisdiction Statistics (FY '97):

• Size of Jurisdiction: 399 square miles
• Population: 899,650
• Dollar Amount of Construction Per Year: $924 million
• % Construction:

• Commercial- 16.3%; Residential- 83.7%; Rehab- 74.8% (res. & comm.)
• Permits Issued Per Year:

• Building- 25,150; Electrical- 20,528; Mechanical- 18,167;

Plumbing/Gas- 24,986

Regulatory Areas:

• Administration & Enforcement
• Education & Certification

PROBLEM:

Building Approval Process - Inefficiencies

Fairfax County had problems with their land development approval process. The entire procedure took too long, plans were seldom approved on the first or second submission, and the slowness caused high plan financial carrying charges and hampered development.

SOLUTION:

Privatized Plan Review Component - Peer Reviews

The Engineers and Surveyors Institute (ESI), a non-profit organization of public and private sector PEs and land surveyors committed to improving Fairfax County's permitting process, was established.

DESCRIPTION:

In order to improve the quality of site-related designs submitted to the County and to expedite site plan reviews, the County entered into a partnership with private sector design professionals and created the Engineers and Surveyors Institute (ESI). The purpose of ESI is to increase the level of knowledge of civil engineers of the local land development regulations. The completion of the ESI educations program enables the private sector licensed engineers to become Fairfax County Designated Plan Examiners (DPEs). Site plans submitted by DPEs are peer-reviewed by ESI reviewers prior to their acceptance by the County, and once accepted, the plans are reviewed on a priority basis by the County.

The mechanics of the program are simple. Prior to the county's acceptance of a plan for review, plans are first submitted to ESI peer reviewers. Within one day, the plans are given a peer review for compliance with a standard check list of county requirements. If the plan is acceptable, it is entered into the normal county plan review system. If the plan is not acceptable, it is returned to the submittor for revision. Post submission conferences are held for those plans which have egregious errors or omissions. The peer review team is comprised of one permanent supervisory engineer from ESI and two other engineers which serve one or two days each away from their regular jobs. One of the two engineers is employed by industry and the other is employed by government.

The quality and completeness of subdivision and site plans improves significantly when a professional peer review is performed before plans are submitted to the approving agency. Plans below standard can be corrected and then submitted. An ESI peer review team usually consists of an ESI staff engineer, a design engineer from a member firm, and a review engineer from the approving agency. Peer review comments, which are held in the strictest confidence, are furnished to the submitting engineer within 24 hours. The peer review team also examines approving agency comments for consistency, code requirements, and completeness. A peer review evaluation is used by the approving agency in its quality improvement program.

The benefits of peer reviewing are as follows:

• Grossly defective plans are discovered quickly. They are returned within one day and do not languish with the county for up to 60 days waiting for comments.
• Submittors are motivated to submit higher quality plans, so they may be received for review.
• The rotating peer review engineers from industry and government are given an opportunity to see regulatory concerns first hand. Participants become better acquainted with each other, more appreciative of the others' strengths, and more tolerant of their limitations.

A major part of the success of this program may be attributed to the DPE program. Prior to this program, plans required a long time to be reviewed. Industry complained that it took too long to get a plan reviewed. Government would respond that if adequate plans were submitted, they could be reviewed in a shorter period of time. This resulted in circuitous finger pointing and long plan reviews. As a result of this energy sapping eternal conflict, industry and government declared a truce and decided to work together to resolve the issues. It was recognized that the average industry or government engineer, while technically competent for engineering work, lacked an adequate understanding of the County's laws, rules, regulations, and procedures. ESI was established as an institution to provide continuing education and a forum for industry and government to air their views and to agree to solutions. ESI is a non-profit corporation created to improve civil engineering plan design and review. ESI member firms submit 98% of the plans in Northern Virginia. Since its founding in 1988, the time required for plan review has dramatically reduced. A public/private partnership, its Board of Directors has representatives from both design firms and review agencies in Fairfax County and other Northern Virginia jurisdictions, as well as the Virginia Department of Transportation.

RESULTS:

Prior to the implementation of this program, the county's review agency was described in the newspapers as the "Agency from Hell." This was prompted by the frustration of industry in not being able to obtain prompt reviews. Now that there is a continuous, cooperative, comprehensive venture to improve the policy, adverse publicity has subsided and positive relationships between industry and government have been established. Some firms, however, do not want to participate and do not want competition looking at their plans. The program's establishment has resulted in earlier identification and resolution of issues in the development process, and increased the emphasis on a solution-oriented approach to problem solving. Moreover, while it is difficult to isolate the effect of individual initiatives recently implemented simultaneously in the site plan review arena, taken together, the results of these initiatives over the last several years are impressive. For example, for those plans that the developer opted to expedite through the review process by submitting the plan as a DPE plan, the average time from initial submission to plan approval was 170 days. For those plans that used the standard process, the average time was 330 days. Saving 160 days in the project approval process can translate into savings of almost ten million dollars in interest costs paid by developers to finance projects during development. These savings, of course, trickle down to the future owners of homes and buildings constructed in Fairfax County.

EVALUATION BY STREAMLINING COMMITTEES:

Advantages

• Allows the entire community to benefit through the educational and cooperative effort;
• Uses a comprehensive and well-thought public/private partnership plan to solve its problems;
• Gives all involved sectors responsibility and accountability.

Drawbacks

• The program could be protectionist and a barrier to entry;
• Could become resource-driven.

The Streamlining Committees designated this program as a streamlined model without modifications.

IMPLEMENTATION:

The program was implemented by administrative action of Fairfax County following legislative approval by the Commonwealth of Virginia. The program's annual cost is $430,000 ($375,000 for ESI and $55,000 for one county peer review employee).

FOR MORE INFORMATION OR ASSISTANCE IN CONSIDERING THE USE OF THIS MODEL, PLEASE CONTACT:

Terry Ryan
Executive Director
Engineers and Surveyors Institute
8401 Arlington Blvd.
Fairfax, VA 22031
Phone: (703) 207-0688
FAX: (703) 204-9023
Email: esinova@erols.com
Website: http://www.erols.com/esinova

Or NCSBCS STAFF:

Carolyn Fitch
National Conference of States on Building Codes and Standards
505 Huntmar Park Drive, Suite 210
Herndon, VA 20170
Phone: (703) 437-0100
FAX: (703) 481-3596
Email: cfitch@ncsbcs.org