Marlborough District Council building control innovation recognised as best in New Zealand

Marlborough District Council’s building control team and the lead it has taken in using information technology has won it national recognition for innovation.

A this week’s Building Officials Institute of New Zealand awards in Auckland, the Council received the CARTER HOLT HARVEY INNOVATOR OF THE YEAR AWARD, presented by Jim Malone, Technical Support Manager of Carter Holt Harvey Woodproducts NZ.

This award recognises a building control professional or team working in building control activities who has demonstrated commitment to innovation in engineering.

The Council’s success in developing and successfully using new technology to increase efficiency clinched the award.

Council has created a new mobile building inspection solution which allows its building inspectors to complete digital building consent inspections. All the necessary information from the relevant building consent can be downloaded to a building inspector’s device so there is no need to take physical files out in the field and inspectors no longer need to spend time writing up field notes after inspections because automated updates can be fed into the Council systems.

It has enabled the Council to speed up the turnaround time for customers needing a building inspection and it means all inspection data and photographs can be made available immediately to customers.

MDC Building Control Group Leader Bill East says the system has been well accepted by the local construction industry and building owners and was working very smoothly with Council’s new on-line applications system introduced at the beginning of this month.

The advances in on-line services have been possible because of this Council’s long-term decision to digitise all its property files, the first local authority in the country to do so.

The mobile building inspection solution was recognised within local government last year, winning the Association of Local Government Information Management Web and Digital Project of the Year Award.

Council chief executive Andrew Besley said this latest award confirms that, inside local government, the Marlborough District Council has led the way in the use of technology to benefit the region and it is very satisfying to see this recognised by a national body like BOINZ.

ends

© Scoop Media