Fire and Life Safety Overview
Fire And Life Safety is the main entity within the department for the application of laws and regulations related to fire prevention, life safety, fire protection systems, building construction and protection. This is achieved through code compliance inspections and plan review of State-Owned and State-Occupied buildings and institutions, as well as detention facilities, high-rises, schools, camps, places of assembly, hospitals, care facilities for children and the aged as well as other types of occupancies under the jurisdiction of the SFM. There is a direct relationship with the California Fire Service through their requests for assistance, training and code interpretation as well as partnering in the code development process and the resolution to code related issues within the various jurisdictions..
Within the framework of the Fire And Life Safety Division is the plan review section. Plans for projects under the SFM jurisdiction statewide are submitted for review. Plans are logged in based on the receipt date. They are reviewed in the order received and returned back to the architect for correction of items identified in the review. The architect is asked to make the corrections and call for a back-check appointment. If all of the comments have been corrected, the original plans are stamped approved, and a letter of approval is given to the architect. The program attempts to maintain a 60-day turn around time for all projects. This is the time period from the receipt date, to the date the plans are sent back to the designer or architect after having been reviewed.
