Exclusive: Ex-Chief Building Inspector Andrew Espinoza on Permit Backlogs, ‘Lemon on Stemmons’

Where is Andrew Espinoza now, a few months after his untimely departure as the Dallas chief building inspector? Well, he’s still in Dallas and he’s still faithfully reading CandysDirt.com. 

We caught up with Espinoza earlier this week and learned what led up to his abrupt exit from City Hall. In our exclusive interview, the former director of Development Services shared what he thinks he did wrong during his two-year tenure, where he believes other city leaders messed up, and what he hopes to see happen in the future. 

RELATED: The ‘Lemon on Stemmons’ Whistleblower Speaks to CandysDirt.com

Difficulty in Development Services

When Espinoza officially took the reins of Dallas’ Development Services in June 2022, he stepped into a leadership role that had been vacant for 18 months. The city department responsible for reviewing and processing building permits had been languishing “in a perfect storm” of COVID-era remote work, short staff, and a rocky launch of new permitting software, Espinoza told CandysDirt.com when he first took the job.

He vowed to clean up a permitting backlog that was drawing ire from city council members and the Dallas Builders Association, who said it took most builders more than 10 weeks to secure a permit. Builders were losing money and in some cases, chose to take their business elsewhere. A consulting report said in part, “Make no mistake. The long wait times are losing Dallas real dollars and real development. This isn’t an embellishment by negative PR.”

Changes Increase Efficiency…

Espinoza soon made progress, with officials announcing in January 2023 that the backlog was cleared. He also implemented Saturday permit pop-up events at their Oak Cliff Municipal Center office. He expected the department’s 300-plus employees to work until 5 p.m. rather than 4:30 p.m. as they had done traditionally. They installed a time clock and other accountability measures. 

Some employees didn’t like the changes and quit, contributing to morale problems and further staff vacancies. But the straw that broke the camel’s back was the now-infamous move of 70 employees to “the lemon on Stemmons,” a multimillion-dollar building plagued with code violations. 

… But Lower Morale

“A lot of the changes that were implemented were requested by our city leadership team, our management team,” Espinoza explained. “You know me, I’m going to do what my boss tells me. I’m going to take my marching orders and get it done.

“Unfortunately for our team members, it was too much, too soon, and I think the pace of the change and the dynamics of the change really impacted how people felt about work,” Espinoza said.

“It’s the whole ‘Who moved my cheese?’ kind of mentality. Unfortunately, we were in a position where we didn’t have time to wait.”

Dozens of city employees moved out of the antiquated Oak Cliff Municipal Center into 7800 N. Stemmons Freeway in December of last year. No one disputes that the Stemmons building had problems, including numerous fire code violations and upgrades in various stages of completion. Employees complained, got the attention of the Dallas City Council, and were moved back to OCMC in April. 

During a May meeting of the City Council’s Ad Hoc Committee on General Investigating and Ethics, Espinoza and other key leaders were in the hot seat. Espinoza took responsibility at the time but told us this week that a series of oversights led to the problems at Stemmons. 

Culture Shift

Employees went from a 1980s cubicle-style office model at OCMC to an open-floor concept at Stemmons “where everyone can see what time you come in, what time you go to lunch, what time you get back, whether you’re at your desk, whether you’re working, whether you’re on your phone,” Espinoza explained. 

“That was a huge change in the organizational culture. I think that was the tipping point for a lot of employees.

“I also think that when the project lead, which was the bond office, met with city staff and said, ‘There’s nothing wrong with the building, it’s completely safe, you should feel 100% comfortable’ … I think [the employees at Stemmons] took that personally.

“Many of those employees are code professionals,” Espinoza said. “They could see the condition of the [Stemmons] building, the missed code violations, and things that needed to be fixed.

“It was not up to par. How can you tell us we’re safe and nothing is wrong? I think that really did hurt the relationship between the city and [Development Services] staff.”

Fire Watch

A fire inspector reported on April 3 that a fire alarm could only be heard on the second floor, so the building was placed on “fire watch,” a temporary measure to monitor a building or portion of a building to identify and control fire hazards, detect fire, raise a fire alarm, and notify the fire department.

Former Assistant City Manager Robert Perez, now the manager of Topeka, Kan., said during the May committee meeting there were no negative impacts on the permitting process or performance caused by the move to the Stemmons location and subsequent move back to OCMC. 

“We did not tell staff because when we were made aware of the noncompliance issues we implemented a fire watch, which is a consistent practice across the private sector or private buildings while fire alarm non-compliance items are addressed,” Perez said in an April 30 news report. 

Espinoza told us he wasn’t the one who authorized the fire watch. In fact, he learned about it from employees. 

“Obviously it was the fire department,” he said of who authorized the measure. “They made the call and said, ‘You guys can stay in here but you need a fire watch.’ Who did they communicate that to? I’m assuming to the bond office but they most certainly did not communicate that to me. I wish they would have given me professional courtesy and said, ‘We have some concerns but the team is safe, they can stay. There are no issues but this does need to be addressed. Do you want to leave your team members in there or would you like to move them out?’ … I was never informed. I was never even given the opportunity.” 

Espinoza said he stands by his choice to take ownership for the fumble at Stemmons but “there are some major communication gaps between Development Services and the fire department.”

New Leadership

Development Services merged with Planning and Urban Design in June and is now the Planning and Development Department, led by Director Emily Liu. 

The restructuring left Espinoza without a job, but he was not terminated. 

Although Espinoza was criticized over the Stemmons move, council members seemed to like him and some actually thanked him at the May committee meeting for being transparent and taking responsibility. 

“In my mind, I had not done anything unethical or illegal, and in my mind, I was fine to stay. I wasn’t going to run from the truth,” he said. “Unfortunately, as you know, as city employees we have to be very discreet about what we say. They didn’t fire me and that tells me they didn’t have grounds to do that.” 

But they didn’t make it easy for him to stay. His critics within the department campaigned against him in the comments section of several local publications including CandysDirt.com. Espinoza said those who were talking badly about him didn’t address their concerns with him directly. In hindsight, he says he should have taken those employees to coffee or lunch and tried to work things out. 

Lessons Learned

Employees were moved to the fifth floor of Stemmons when the Office of Bond and Construction Management said it was ready to go. A couple of months later, some employees were moved to the second floor, again because the bond office said it was ready, Espinoza explained. 

“Had I known that they were not completing the process, applying for the certificate of occupancy, and making sure it was all in order, we would not have moved in,” he said. “Lesson learned, I probably should have double and triple-checked what other departments were doing. That’s really difficult to do when you have a team of our size and pressing issues.

“The other thing I learned from this, I’ll be 100% honest and transparent, I would have outsourced every inspection, every plan review, and every permit,” Espinoza said.

“That way folks could say I’m not being biased. I’m not overlooking anything. I’m not being dishonest or doing anything unethical. We have a third-party inspector, a third-party agency making sure everything is kosher before we move in. You know, lesson learned.”

Getting the Train Back on the Tracks

Espinoza said he inherited a department plagued with problems and the city manager at the time, T.C. Broadnax — who has since taken the top job in Austin — was under fire. Department heads were under pressure to make swift changes and stop the bleed. 

“There were so many things that needed to be fixed,” Espinoza said. “If we succeed, we all succeed and if we fail we all fail. I don’t mind taking ownership for the team but the team should also try to recognize that we failed as a team. In Dallas, we fix issues and we move on and we don’t address the symptoms and the underlying problems. That’s something I think could happen with a robust strategic plan.”

He reported some “serious ethical issues” within the department to the Office of Inspector General. 

Espinoza said he’s at peace and is not mad at anyone but he told the human resources director and an interim assistant city manager about the internal processes that need to be fixed. The $14 million DallasNow Project, which ensures efficiency in permitting, “must not fail,” he said. 

“You have to have someone in a leadership role 100% dedicated to DallasNow,” he said. “You can’t blow it. You can’t mess that up.” 

Inspectors also need to be certified in their respective disciplines, he added. 

“It’s a liability,” he said. “We had people doing the job for years that were not meeting the minimum job requirements.” 

What’s Next For Andrew Espinoza

The former chief building official said he’s taken the past couple of months to “self-evaluate.” He wants to stay in Texas and said there are a few high-ranking city officials who have offered to write letters of recommendation for him. 

“At the end of the day my record speaks for itself, and if anybody asks me about what happened at Stemmons, I would just be honest about what occurred,” he said. “I’m very disappointed I am no longer on the team. I left San Antonio to be here in Dallas. I came to Dallas to serve. I don’t think I was given the opportunity to even say goodbye to my team in the proper way.” 

Espinoza, 52, spent 14 years at the City of San Antonio and came to Dallas to work in Code Compliance. He said his original plan was to retire from Dallas.

“I loved coming in early; I loved staying late; I loved working on Saturdays,” he said. 

City government officials can learn from every situation but how one is treated is beyond the employee’s control, Espinoza added.  

He said he did some good work in his two years at Dallas City Hall and hopes the department will be successful in the future. 

“I had the privilege of leading the team,” he said. “The team and the leaders in the department were the ones who really got the work done. It was an honor. We have to move on and have faith that things will work out for the best.”