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Youngstown council approves new fire inspection fees, but they won’t go into effect until 2020
Chief wants to implement changes effective Jan. 1, 2020
YOUNGSTOWN
City council approved a plan to increase fees for various fire safety and prevention inspections, but the fire chief said they won’t go into effect until next year.
Council voted 7-0 Wednesday in favor of the legislation.
“It expands the charges we do for inspections and adds charges for various items,” said Fire Chief Barry Finley.
For example, the inspection of a foster home, daycare facility and group home would be $100 while tests for sprinkler systems would range from $50 to $150 depending on the number of sprinkler heads.
“A sprinkler system needs to be tested if there’s a reason it was activated,” Finley said. “Before it’s put back in service it needs to be inspected.”
A mobile food unit inspection would be $75, an inspection of a hospital would be $300, and $150 for a nonpublic school building – a public school building isn’t charged.
Also, a first safety and prevention re-inspection would still be $50, but each re-inspection after that would cost $75 each.
“There are some businesses you have to come back three or four times because something isn’t up to code,” Finley said.
He initially spoke about possible fees about a year ago to take effect this past Jan. 1. But Finley said Wednesday that it “took a long time to gather the information causing a delay.”
Finley said he wants to implement the fees effective Jan. 1, 2020, to give people time to prepare for the changes.
The chief also said he doesn’t know how much money the increased fees would generate for the city.