|
Website changes – You may have noticed that as of this week, our Plumbing and Gas Piping webpages look a little different! This is part of King County's website redesign. All the same content is there, and you'll be able to access the webpages using the same links as usual: www.kingcounty.gov/plumbing. If you had any pages bookmarked, you should be automatically redirected to the new pages. Please reach out if you have any questions.
Plumbing plan review timelines – Plumbing plan review times have dropped from 18-20 weeks to approximately 10-12 weeks. This is due to a combination of increased staffing, policy and procedural updates, and a general slowdown in plumbing permit submittals. We expect this trend to continue into the fall. Our goal is a 4- to 6-week turnaround from submittal to first round review comments for all projects.
Onsite Nonpotable Water Systems draft rule update – Washington State Department of Health has posted an updated draft rule for Onsite Nonpotable Water Systems. The new draft rule is available for download online. You can submit comments until July 28, 2023.
Plan review design guidance updates – We circulated our revised commercial plumbing design guidance draft to Public Health's Policy Advisory Group on May 24, 2023. We are now evaluating comments and expect to send out an updated draft toward the end of July.
Potable water system disinfection policy – After consulting with WA DOH and other water system treatment professionals, we updated our jurisdictional water system disinfection policy. The required chlorination concentration for new systems is now 20 ppm, down from 50 ppm (as prescribed by UPC 609.9). Additionally, we added a new alternate procedure specifically to address re-pipes in occupied buildings. You can view the latest policy update, posted July 13, 2023, online.
August 3 Inspection and Plan Review Interruption– King County is hosting an all-staff meeting on the morning of Aug. 3, 2023. As such, there will be limited inspection and plan review availability that day.
Steve Hart is presenting a no-cost training opportunity Saturday, July 29, from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., at Green River College in Auburn.
This training will cover updates to the 2021 UPC, specifically Chapter 9 venting systems (including Vertical Wet Vent, Horizontal Wet Vent, Circuit Vent, and Combination Waste and Vent). Attendees will learn when to use each DWV system type, how to size these four DWV systems, in-depth instruction to code compliance, and how to inspect these four DWV systems.
Who should attend? Engineers, Detailers, EIT’s, Licensed and Apprentice Plumbers, Plumbing Inspectors and Plans Examiners. Washington State Licensed and Trainee Plumbers will receive 8 plumbing CEUs.
This training will take place in Salish Hall, room 110, on the Green River College’s Auburn Campus (12401 SE 320th St, Auburn, WA 98092). Attendees are encouraged to park in parking areas P1, P2, or P3, but it is not required. It is a short walk from the parking area to Salish Hall. Bring your own lunch and beverages. This is a no-smoking, vaping- and tobacco-free campus (including chewing tobacco).
To reserve a seat, email Steve Hart at shartwashstate@gmail.com.
This is not a King County or Public Health sponsored event.
Have you ever had questions about how to obtain a plumbing permit? People often have questions about plan review – whether they need it, and how it works. Read on to learn more about plan review, and hopefully answer any questions you have.
Step 1 – Figure out if your project requires plan review – Once you have a defined scope of work for your project, reference our Occupancy and Use guidance document to find out if your project requires plan review. Please review this document carefully. All plumbing and gas work in a school, laboratory, daycare, brewery, distillery, or food production facility requires plan review, no matter how small the scope.
For other projects, there are plan review ‘triggers’ based on number of floors, number of fixtures, size of building, etc. If you have any doubt, please reach out to us at planreviewinfo@kingcounty.gov for an official determination. If you pull an over-the-counter permit for a project that requires plan review, your project will be put on hold after the first inspection. Your project will remain on hold until plans have been submitted and approved.
Step 2 – Submit your drawings through the permit portal – Using our Commercial Plumbing Design Guidance document as a reference, prepare your drawings for submittal. Drawings may be submitted by anyone, but they must be prepared by a licensed PL01 commercial plumber, ASPE CPD holder, or WA State registered PE.
After the drawings are Approved, the actual plumbing permit can only be paid for and downloaded by a licensed Plumbing Contractor (not a GC). When drawings are submitted, they undergo a Cursory Review to ensure you've provided all the design information required for plan review. If not, you'll be asked to revise and resubmit. When the drawings submitted meet the minimum plan review requirements, your project will be logged into our plan review queue and an SR number will be assigned.
Step 2.5 – The wait – Small projects (single story, small T.I.’s, etc.) are typically reviewed within 6-8 weeks. Large projects are currently being reviewed within 12 weeks. To find out where your project is in the queue, please send an inquiry to: planreviewstatus@kingcounty.gov.
Step 3 – Receiving and responding to correction comments – After your project is reviewed, you will receive a summary of correction comments. You'll also receive a flattened copy of your submitted plans with correction comments on them. If you have questions about any of the comments provided, you are welcome to contact the reviewer directly by phone or email.
Once a reviewer has been assigned to your project, they will review all corrections and revisions submitted under that SR number for the life of the project (pending vacations, work reassignments, etc.). When you resubmit your corrected drawings, please include the entire drawing set, collated (in order according to the Sheet Index), with all revisions clouded. A Revision Narrative responding to each specific correction comment is required to help expedite the next review round.
Step 3.5 – Additional review rounds – If the assigned plan reviewer finds additional corrections that need to be made, they will send another round of correction comments. Our goal is to capture as much as we can in the first round of review, but this is not always possible. The permit applicant is expected to respond, following the same steps as the initial review. This cycle will continue until the reviewer is satisfied that the submitted drawings have addressed all potential Code violations and/or design deficiencies.
Step 4 – Receiving Approved plans – When your project has been Approved, you will receive an invoice to pay the plan review fee. Once the fee is paid, the Approved plans will be available for download through your portal account. This Approved plan set must be printed (hardcopy) full-size and kept at the project site for viewing by the field inspector.
Deviations from Approved plans – If a field inspector notices the installed condition does not match the Approved drawings, they may put the permit on hold until drawings are resubmitted and reapproved. With limited exceptions, the installation must match the Approved drawings. Minor differences in installation methods or piping locations are allowable.
Any design change is required to be resubmitted and reapproved prior to inspection sign-off. A design change is considered to be anything that requires a change in pipe size, material, or configuration (i.e., traditional vent to wet vent). These revisions must be submitted by the original applicant (not the Contractor). In order to avoid construction delays, please ensure the installation matches the Approved drawings. If a field-derived design change is expected or unavoidable, we recommend you have the drawings updated, resubmitted, and Approved prior to calling for inspection. Revisions to Approved plans are typically reviewed within a few days of being received.
Plan revisions – If revisions need to be made to the Approved plans, a complete drawing set must be submitted to the reviewer that conducted the original plan review. If the original reviewer is unavailable, please send an inquiry to planreviewinfo@kingcounty.gov for guidance. Any sheets in the revised set that have not changed should be an exact copy of the originally Approved and stamped sheets. Any revised sheets need to have revisions clouded, dates updated on titleblocks, etc. The drawing set must be collated (sheets in order according to the Sheet Index).
For example, if you are only changing the make/model of a piece of equipment on a schedule sheet, you would submit the entire previously Approved and stamped set and replace only the applicable schedule sheet with an unstamped, updated, and clouded schedule sheet. Along with the drawing set, provide a brief narrative of revisions and a list of sheets that have changed. Please be thorough when submitting revised drawings. If the reviewer notices a revision on a revised sheet that is not compatible with design information shown on an unchanged sheet, the entire set will be sent back for additional revisions.
Special project types – Certain project types such as rainwater harvesting and/or graywater systems have a special submittal process and must be submitted under separate permits for each special system type. Reference our Schedule A guidance document for more information.
Priority reviews and expedited requests – We do not have an option to expedite most plumbing projects. There is no option to pay a fee for overtime or after-hour reviews. We do allow separate Below Grade/Above Grade permit submittals for large projects, but there are very specific conditions that need to be met with regard to how drawings are prepared and submitted. For more information, send an inquiry to planreviewinfo@kingcounty.gov.
There are a few specific project types that will be prioritized according to the goals and priorities of the King County Executive and King County Council. These project types include low-income housing, homeless shelters, daycares and child-care facilities, schools, and Level 2 Priority projects (designated by SDCI). If you are submitting one of these projects, please follow up with an email to planreviewinfo@kingcounty.gov and confirm your project has been given priority status.
As always, if you have any questions about the plan review process, please send an inquiry to planreviewinfo@kingcounty.gov. For project review status updates, send an inquiry to planreviewstatus@kingcounty.gov.
|
