Anchorage warned a private plan reviewer who missed 'egregious' safety risks

One of the private reviewers Anchorage approves to check building plans was responsible for "multiple egregious life-safety risks" that should have been caught, according to a city report on the Assembly's agenda Tuesday. City officials met with the reviewer and reminded them their approval could be revoked.

The problems in the plans included missing fire-resistive construction and "discontinuous lateral systems," meaning the structure's path for carrying sideways forces from earthquakes and wind down to the foundation was interrupted, according to the report from Building Official Greg Soule and Engineering Services Manager Daniel King. They wrote that they expect the meeting to improve the reviewer's performance and "hopefully increase safety in the designs they review."

As of May, the city had approved 15 private reviewers to check plans in place of city staff. To act against one who underperforms, the building official now relies on a code provision about "fraudulent acts." Soule and King wrote that they would consider missing egregious life-safety problems gross negligence, and a reviewer's required letter saying the plans had no issues a fraudulent act. But they want the Assembly to add "incompetence or lack of knowledge," which they say aligns with the language for revoking a contractor's license, so the city would not have to prove bad intent. Reviewers could still appeal.

Most private reviews are for homes. Residential designers don't need a professional license, so reviewers of home plans play "a crucial role," the report says.

The city audited 16 private reviews of residential plans in the year ending June 1. Nine passed structural review, five needed corrections and two failed, meaning they had substantial or life-safety problems, according to the report. One of the eight audits that included fire and life-safety review also failed. Alaska News first reported the audit results Oct. 14.

The report does not identify the reviewer or the projects, or say whether any of that reviewer's projects had been permitted or built. The department says it picks permits for audit that have not yet been issued, puts a hold on any permit where it finds substantive issues and audits permits already under construction only when building inspectors bring them to its attention.

City code expects project owners to hire the reviewers, but project managers or contractors typically recommend or choose them on the owner's behalf, the report says, based on how quickly they can finish and whether they agree with the comments. "It behooves the third-party reviewer to limit the number of comments to maintain relationships with their clients and not necessarily to meet the letter of the code," Soule and King wrote.

Because of staffing shortages, the department completed only two residential audits in the first six months of the audit period. It completed the other 14 in the last six months, after the section became fully staffed in December 2025. Developers and contractors have noticed the increase in audits, which has slowed them down, the report says.

The department wants the Assembly to keep the 2024 rules, which opened private review to commercial projects, created the approved-reviewer list and required audits, without an expiration date. Those rules expire at the end of 2026. The report calls itself the final required audit report and says that if the Assembly wants annual reports to continue, the new ordinance should include them.