Eleven inspectors from the public service have refreshed their skills and expanded their knowledge on the technical aspects of site assessments.

The inspectors from the Town and Country Planning Department (TCP) and the Department of Disaster Management (DDM) participated in a ‘Development Control Inspector Training’ workshop earlier this month. 

The workshop was aimed at cross training the inspectors to effectively analyse building and development plans to ensure that developments are conducted in line with planning regulations and giving adequate consideration to environmental conditions and potential hazard impacts.

Director of the DDM, Ms. Sharleen DaBreo said, “The training is part of our drive to build the capacity of inspectors within government, which is in line with our strategic plan for disaster management.  We are starting with inspectors from DDM and TCP but the intention is to expand this training to include other inspectors within and outside of the Government system.”

These sentiments were also shared by Chief Planner in the Town and Country Planning Department, Mr. Gregory Adams who said he expects the training to positively impact the delivery of services as “we aim to ensure the sustainable development of the BVI as a whole”.

Mr. Adams added, “We have several agencies that are very closely related in the regulation of development in the Territory. We chose to start with TCP and DDM and others will be brought on stream because ultimately, if we can have everyone more aware of what each other is doing then we could have a much more comprehensive approach to regulating development and that can bring nothing but good things for the Territory.”

Following the completion of the workshop, the inspectors are expected to continue to work together to create a combined checklist for inspections.

Ms. DaBreo stated, “The workshop allowed for the sharing of ideas and procedures for conducting more efficient assessments and as such the inspectors will be collaborating to develop a ‘Master Field Inspection Checklist’ which combines the standards from TCP and DDM.”  

The training was facilitated by experts in Environmental Management, Physical Planning, Engineering and Disaster Management who exposed participants to the material using an interactive approach consisting of group exercises, pre and post-tests, brain storming sessions, plenary discussions and field inspections.

The participants were presented with certificates of completion at the end of the training.                                                                 

Photo Caption:  Inspectors at various stages of the training workshop. Department of Disaster Management