Village of Monroe without full-time building inspector since June

Since the resignation of Robert Wallner in June, the Village of Monroe has been without a full-time building inspector.

“We advertised for full-time building inspector and assistant building inspector, went through civil service and received a list with eight people for full-time building inspector in July,” said Monroe Mayor Alex Melchiorre. “Three people on the list declined the job due to salary, two declined for location and three were interested but failed to reply for interviews. For the assistant building inspector, there was only one person on the list and no action was taken because that same person was on the building inspector list.”

In addition to the resignation of Wallner – who is now the building inspector at the Village of Cornwall-on-Hudson – the department was down an assistant building inspector after Bryan Berberena moved upstate, the mayor said.

Last month, the village added Christopher Fratto as a part-time assistant building inspector at $33 an hour up to 20 hours a week and Christopher Murray, who though he is listed as a part-time building inspector in the village’s Sept. 1 meeting agenda, Melchiorre says Murray is code enforcement. Murray is paid $25 an hour.

Juan Zuniga, a part-time assistant building inspector, makes $30 an hour. In addition, there are two part-time building department clerks and another code enforcement officer.

“Christopher Fratto has full building inspector credentials but has a full-time job, so he can only give us part-time hours,” Melchiorre said. “An issue I am hoping to correct with the trustees is our salaries. For full-time building inspector, we are at $80,000 to $90,000, and for full-time assistant building inspector, we are at $60,000 to $70,000. We are not going to attract who we need at those salaries and hopefully we correct it.”

Melchiorre said he does not know why Wallner resigned after being on the job in Monroe for about six months. Prior to Monroe, he was building inspector in the Village of Walden and prior to that the Town of Shawangunk.

A voicemail left for Wallner was not returned.

Quality of life issues

Melchiorre said he would like the restructured building department to become more active in cracking down on violations affecting quality of life in the village.

“Let’s say you own a rental property and you go weeks without cutting your grass,” Melchiorre said. “The building department puts a note on your door informing you that you have seven days to cut your grass. In seven days, you cut your grass but then you go another three weeks without cutting it, and the building inspector puts another note on your door we continue the same routine because there is no bite. We want to address that. I hope we pass a resolution or more than one resolution to update and upgrade issues surrounding our quality of life.”

The mayor also cited the need to crack down on things such as rental property code violations, unregistered cars parked on lawns and inordinate numbers of cars in front of properties.