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Interview with
Executive
Director Richard Rodriguez
On February 6,
2006, Mayor Daley named Richard Rodriguez as
Executive Director of the Department of
Construction and Permits. Rodriguez brings a
legal, private and public sector, and real
estate background to his daily responsibilities
and to meet his goals for the Department.
Those goals are significant and will
improve the entire permit process for all city
departments and their
clients.
[Below are excerpts
from our interview. Click
here to read the full
interview]
What are some
of your prior jobs and how have they prepared
you for this job? After law school I
moved directly into management where I learned a
lot from my and other managers' mistakes. I
learned how to work with the federal government
during disaster recovery while serving for the
Attorney General's Office in Guam. I also worked
for FEMA as a field attorney continuing my
involvement in disaster recovery,
construction and debris removal. This was my
initial involvement in real estate and
construction.
With the City of
Chicago I served as Managing
Deputy Commissioner of Real Estate,
Planning & Development in the Department of
Aviation, then Managing Director of Operations
of the CHA, and Procurement Policy Manager for
the Chicago Public Schools.
What drew you
to this position?
My past jobs with the
City have all been opportunities to improve
services, and I believe I have improved those
services during my tenure at the Board of
Education, CHA and the Department of Aviation.
DCAP had some challenges a few years back.
Neither customers, city council members, nor the
Mayor was satisfied with how DCAP
was issuing permits, the amount of
time to issue permits and whether that
amount of time was reasonable given the
resources in place.
I grew up with
a sense of civic duty to be part of making
something better for everyone. I was asked if I
wanted to join the City executive team and was
given several options. I like to accept
challenges. The Mayor told me that DCAP was
the most broken, so that was my
choice. DCAP's bad image was a matter of
perception. Even staff had low moral. In fact,
statistics showed progress in the
permit processing times.
What is
the nature and scope of your job? Part
of my job is making sure that everyone
understands what my authority is. We need to
re-educate everyone what authority the Executive
Director of DCAP has. My responsibility under
the Chicago Municipal Code is to review plans,
issue permits, provide advice and guidance to
the Mayor, city council members and sister
agencies in terms of how we can improve our
building code.
What
are your goals for the Department? Our
primary goal is to continue to be as efficient
as we can issuing permits without sacrificing
any life safety issues. We need to manage
customer expectations. When customers come to
the office for a permit we should be able to
anticipate how long it will take to issue a
permit and tell the customer.
Technology is another
huge initiative. We are working on plans to use
technology to reduce the time to appointment
below two weeks. We currently have a
significant problem with customers putting in
placeholder appointments and then not showing
up. Our goal for next year is to have an online
scheduling system where the customer can place
their deposit and schedule their own
appointments. This should reduce the fourteen
day scheduling period to perhaps half that
time.
Another goal is to
solidify our auditing process. As fast as we
issue permits we need to ensure that we are
calculating fees appropriately and reviewing
appropriately.
As we partner with
the Department of the Envrionment, another goal
is to encourage building as green as possible.
Energy efficient building for the City of
Chicago is going to benefit everyone. Our green
permitting program allows us to provide a permit
in a shorter period of time and perhaps reduce
fees so that individuals are encouraged to build
greener.
What
challenges is DCAP
facing? Overcoming the
Department's negative perception is the biggest
challenge. We need to get the word out that it
no longer takes forever to build in Chicago. We
see the numbers of permits issued increasing
without an increase in staff. We need to educate
everyone about why you need to get a permit and
the value of getting one. Residents often don't
understand that a permit is required. We need to
better educate everyone that the permit process
involves significant hours of DCAP staff
expertise to ensure that what gets built will be
quality.
Best
advice for people submitting and managing
permits through your department?
Given our efficiencies and that we market our
average times, if your experience is less than
the average times from DCAP, let us know. Make
an investment in the City of Chicago, because
the City of Chicago is making an investment in
you.
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page for other stories covering
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