The City of Summerville is still trying to come up with a solution for a building inspector.  At a meeting on Monday evening, the Summerville City Council decided to approach the Town of Trion about the possibility of splitting-the cost of a building inspector between the two municipalities.

Currently, Summerville employs a part-time building inspector who also works for Floyd County.  The problem with that arrangement is the building inspector isn’t available during normal business hours and is having to conduct code enforcement in the evenings.

To remedy the issue, Summerville Mayor Harry Harvey recommended hiring a full-time building inspector. The city council voted to advertise for a full-time building inspector earlier this month (See related story from WZQZ ).  The salary they mayor and council wanted to pay was $45,000.  At the time, the city’s financial director made the comment that  it wasn’t likely anyone would want the position for the salary being recommended.  The financial director was right.  No one applied for the job.

At a called meeting on Monday of this week, the council decided to approach the Town of Trion with the idea of splitting the cost of a full-time inspector.

Summerville Councilman Rickey Hughes told WZQZ News, “We need a part-time inspector during the day and if we partner with Trion an inspector could split the duties between both places and save us money as well”.   Councilman Joe Money said that he needs some more questions answered.  Money said that he would have to know how the building inspector would attend court dates for both municipalities and hear the details on how the arrangement would work.

Trion Mayor Lanny Thomas told WZQZ News on Wednesday afternoon that he has heard about the idea, but as of yesterday, no one from the City of Summerville had reached out to him.