I recently had the pleasure of meeting our new Development Services Director, Tom Hosey, as well as our new Permit Manager, Donald Irwin, and Chief Building Inspector, Bryan Robinson. They are all excited to be here and have already gotten off to a great start! Here is a brief introduction.

Mr. Hosey joined our team earlier this month. He’s been engaged in the building and safety profession for over 27 years, most recently serving as the Chief Building Official for the fourth largest City in the country, Houston. There he administered a staff of over 430 and a budget of $49 million. And prior to that, he served as Chief Building Official for three other jurisdictions in California and Oregon, as well as holding positions as Senior Plans Examiner and Senior Inspector.

Thanks to everyone that participated in our "After the Storm" quiz last week. Can you guess which question stumped the most people? If you said the question about generators, then you'd be right. So this week I'd like to follow-up with an article written by our own Development Services director, Tom Hosey, on the subject of portable generator safety.

Some time ago, while Tom was in Houston and serving on the board of directors for the Building Officials Association  of Texas (BOAT), he wrote the following article for the BOAT newsletter. It has been modified just a little so that it is applicable to our state. While the article is longer than our typical blog post, it is full of great information and worth the read. Enjoy!