Twenty-six local contractors must pay “double fees” for working on Haverhill properties without first obtaining building permits.
Haverhill Mayor James J. Fiorentini announced the crackdown on illegal building activity Thursday afternoon. City building and health inspectors will monitor neighborhoods for illegal activity, he said. Anyone caught making repairs without proper permits will be required to pay a double permit fee and possibly fined. Contractors who are repeat offenders will be reported to the state and their professional license could be at stake.
“I drove around town a couple of Saturdays ago and found a number of people doing work without building permits. This is completely unacceptable and is unfair to the vast majority of our residents and contractors who pull all of the necessary permits. Everyone needs to pay their fair share,” the mayor said.
Most of the 26 people are professional contractors, he said.
“It is simply not fair to our honest hard-working homeowners who pay their taxes, pay all of their fees and pull all of their permits that some people are not playing by the rules.
He said he has asked Health and Inspectional Services Director Richard MacDonald to also create a quick permit system for small projects. “I want people to be able to quickly log on to our system and obtain the permit quickly. I also want to look at reducing fees for people with small permits,” he said.
City ordinances require all structural work in excess of $1,000 value requires a building permit. If a building permit is required, the permit must be displayed. Those who witness illegal building may call (978) 374-2325.
In this case I agree with The Mayor. Homeowners who don’t apply for and who don’t have building permits make some quite bizarre and illegal changes to their property. Some of which are ugly, ugly, ugly, and affect the values and safety of surrounding properties.
Maybe if The Mayor wasn’t chasing after every penny from The People they would be more inclined to follow the law in an already lawless state.
Funny that the Mayor was “driving around” and found these people doing illegal things. The police Dept has had an “ILLEGAL ” sprinkler system for 14 years and he never did anything about it until now. Mold is growing in various city buildings and nothing is done. Isn’t that considered “illegal” by health standards ?? Let’s not even get into how he allowed part-time building inspectors on the payroll who were not state certified do inspections while the head guy took a leave of absence !!! Isn’t THAT “illegal” ? I just find it funny how he can buffalo so many people. He is the master, gotta give him credit..