PORT CHARLOTTE, Fla. — As Charlotte County assesses the damage brought by Hurricane Helene, some residents might find inspection notices on their homes or other buildings.
Watch Fox 4's Alex Orenczuk's report on Charlotte County damage assessments after Hurricane Helene:
According to Building Official Shawn McNulty, the county has completed approximately 2,400 damage assessments. About 1,600 of those buildings were marked as ‘major damage’, 800 were marked ‘minor damage’ and 8 were marked as destroyed.
“It stems from the state organized damage assessment process, where municipalities go out and assess damage after events like this and assign them major, minor, destroyed or affected,” said McNulty.
Once a building’s inspection is completed, the property owner will receive a paper tag, or placard with the result, stating whether or not a building will need building permits to complete repairs. McNulty said having a tag from the county stating permits are required can help deter contractors from completing work without proper documentation.
“The primary function is to let the property owner know that likely the damage that has happened will require a building permit to correct or repair it,” said McNulty. “This helps them from getting improper information from out of town or out of state contractors that might think you don’t need a permit for repairs, well this gives the property owner a tool to say yes a permit is required.”
The colors of the inspection tags might vary from building to building, but McNulty said the colors are irrelevant, it's the message on the tag that is important.
“We ran out of our normal placard so we started using other colors,” said Mcnulty. “There was no way to anticipate the level and the number of affected houses.”
