Corruption at DoB?
I would like to open an honest debate about Brooklyn Borough Office of the Department of Buildings. Last year I had to deal with them and it was very painful. But I am glad it’s all over. I would strongly recommend to anybody who owns a house in Brooklyn to stop at least once at…
I would like to open an honest debate about Brooklyn Borough Office of the Department of Buildings. Last year I had to deal with them and it was very painful. But I am glad it’s all over.
I would strongly recommend to anybody who owns a house in Brooklyn to stop at least once at 210 Joralemon Street and they will get an idea of what may people comment on forums like this one.
Do you think the fact that the expeditors exist in NYC is already a sign of a problem? I think expeditors are a very vague figure. According to the dictionary is someone who ensures efficient movement of goods or supplies in a business. When reputable architects recognize that expeditors ‘know how to grease’ the right people I think there is a problem. Why a NYC public employee needs to be greased to do his or her job? One answer is obvious, because the DoB has the authority to delay a project without any reason or consequence for them. Is there any institution above them? No, they don’t have to respond to anybody, not even to the mayor, who hasn’t done anything to modernize this Department and I am not talking about esthetics.
It seams that the Brooklyn DoB doesn’t belong to the New York government. After more than eight years of Michael Bloomberg as a mayor, very few things have changed in the DoB. What it’s supposed to be an organization that actually cares about safety and enforcing code, instead is a bureaucratic greed machine.
Do you have any records of cases of clear corruption on the DoB? I am not talking about the known and publicized cases of 2009, when three rounds of court-authorized search warrants, totaling 54 search warrants of physical locations, including offices and workplaces of DoB employees. I am talking about real ‘small’ cases that many of the homeowners suffer every day.
Anybody remembers if a homeowner has ever sued the DoB?
Many questions… I hope we can all put together some experiences and help to make a better, more honest and more democratic municipal government.
After all this brouhaha I will add a few points.
1. Expeditors are NOT greasing any palms they are the punching bags between the DOB and their clients which are a lot of times the architects or engineers as well.
2. Unfortunately the system is very very time consuming and can get really comlicated and therefore as much as the DOB will try to get only the professionals with all their corrupt policies they only give more work for expediters.
3. The core of the problem is that the seior level management has closed their eyes and ears to the private sector and is blaming everything on them instead of taking a fraction of responsibility on themselves.
4. Due to the above most architects or engineers feel (and rightfully so) that it is impossible to deal with the dob at all levels. Li Mandri and his cohorts are not even trying to meet with the AIA or other recognized professional parental organizations except from time to time when there can be a photo-op.
A good example is the urban shed competition which involed multiple levels of government for some cute nonsense.
The condition is consistently deteriorating that is the most I can say.
and how about we all take the blame also for voting in Bloomberg again( and his 311), Quinn, and the rest of the council…
Obama is not far behind…
And Architect66 gues…what..? more Plan Examiners from Brooklyn and The Bronx are leaving…Worse has yet to come.
It’s not the Expediters nor the people who work there,
its Limandri who created now a fracture between Architects and Engineers , and let me tell you this, this war is only going to get worse.
And Marvin…The DOBIG….and the DA….are nothing but crap, I have plenty of corrupted names I’ve been dealing with and have performed nothing at all regarding all these new regulations for the TR1 and Tr2 and Tr3….Its just business as usual…..ninety percent of the buildings in New York are in full danger due to false reports….So dear forum blame yourselves….
Well, Denton, I thought the crap frame houses in GH are magnificent! LOL Seriously! My dream home is a frame house on 18th between 5th and 6th. I’ll have to show it to you some day. Grab Mrs. D and we’ll get Montrose and do a walking tour of GH.
I guess this has been going on forever, snappy… how did we get thousands of crap frame houses in GH? lol…
Architect66, your last paragraph is very enlightening. It never occurred to me, and probably many others on this site that bash new developments, that this was a reason we get more of the same. You should bring up this point the next time a new development is discussed on the main pages of B’Stoner. Could make for a very interesting discussion.
In some ways, it really takes a butt of iron to get plans to move through the DOB. The building code is complex and detailed, and what’s worse, overlaid with decades of interpretations in the form of “policy and procedure notices.” It is a heavy duty bureaucracy with its own customs, and as Jock and Bob Marvin observed above, the value of a good expeditor is both in persistence and knowledge of procedure and customs.
There are other things that contribute to the general constipation of the approval and permitting process. First among these is the general inability of plan examiners to take responsibility for their own decisions and interpretation of code. This could be because they lack the knowledge or training to make the correct interpretation or don’t want to stick their neck out or perhaps wish to slow things down so that their work load seems to be heavy. In other cities, code officials meet with architects in the architect’s office at an early stage for a straightforward review of the code issues in a particular project. If you are laughing at the thought, it is probably because you have actually met some of the plan examiners at the NYC DOB.
Well, anyway, if you are wondering why so much architecture in Brooklyn consists of crappy, cookie-cutter “developer specials,” you need look no further than the DOB. Once you get something through and permitted, you can repeat it over and over again. If you try something new, inventive, or different, you are taking your chances. Discouraging.
I have had enough trouble with DOB to have learned my lesson as to sharing the details on line but in my case the DOB is trying to hold me responsible (at great cost) for a renovation that was done 12 years before I was born where in my house was subdivided into double duplex config. Not only that but I have already had an ECB judge decide that the I-card from 1955 that I presented was proof that the subdivision of the house was legal. Interestingly though, even though the ECB court is the only one where these cases are heard, apparently the DOB doesn’t care what the ECB judge decides and just acts on its own. So I have been repeatedly fined for things that occurred in the Eisenhower administration.
“most of the cases people don’t have the time and money that would require to bring the abuse cases to the District Attorney’s office”
It wouldn’t take all that much time and no money. Of course the complainant would have to forgo the advantage of what a [hypothetical) bribe would achieve,
As to non bribe-involving bureaucratic lethargy; While I have no experience with DOB,I have lots of inside experience with city gov’t, since I’m a retired (permanant, “civil service”) Admin.Staff Analyst. I’d like to think that whatever expediting an expediter actually achieves comes from knowing what DOB regs require, knowing how their employees think, plus lots of schmoozing over the years, combined with occasional ass licking.None of THAT is illegal, although in a perfect world it shouldn’t be needed.
The concept of the permit expediter is not to grease palms. Doing so will surely get you arrested. An expediter simply walks the papers through process. It takes time and it is cost effective for them to do it as they are processing many projects at the same time. I have no desire to spend hours walking the paper around. Keep in mind each city within NYC is different, so what goes in Manhattan may not fly in Brooklyn.