4 days ago
Insurance Commissioner's office plans to hire more elevator inspectors after $4M budget shift
The Georgia Office of the Insurance and Safety Fire, the department responsible for public safety issues such as elevator inspections, amusement park safety and fire investigations, will be hiring six new inspectors come July.
According to an OCI spokesman, the department was able to move $4 million from one line item to their staffing, allowing them to hire the new inspectors.
The openings will hit the public on July 1.
Channel 2 Action News reported last year that about one-third of elevators across the state of Georgia had not been inspected on time, meaning their safety certifications were out of date.
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In 2024, OCI said there were about 32,000 elevators in Georgia and 11,520 were out of date on their inspections.
As previously reported, OCI said each inspector had a goal of eight elevator inspections per day in metro areas and six per day in rural areas last year.
Additionally, due to the number of elevators in the state, officials said previously that 'it is nearly impossible for our inspectors alone to reach every elevator.'
That means they occasionally 'work with third-party inspection companies, approved by our office, to assist in completing annual elevator inspections.'
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Now, not only are there more elevators in the state, according to an OCI spokesman, but they need more inspectors to keep up.
To make that goal a reality, they're hiring new inspectors, and all six will be based in the metro Atlanta area.
Of Georgia's 33,000 or so elevators, OCI said 20,000 were in the metro Atlanta area.
Statewide, there are 32 inspectors for all of the elevators and 15 are already assigned to the Atlanta area.
At the moment, there is a single vacancy that OCI is trying to fill. The additional $4 million will allow them to open another five positions, beginning in July.
In terms of inspections being on time, OCI said they'd made progress since last year's report, saying the average of elevators inspected on time had risen from about 65% to roughly 66.7%.
The exact amount in the Atlanta area that are in compliance, meaning inspected on time, was not clear.
While the new inspectors will work on ensuring elevators work correctly and safely, OCI told Channel 2 Action News last year that some inspectors also 'double as boiler/pressure vessel inspectors or amusement/carnival ride inspectors, which may impact their ability complete six or eight elevator inspections in a given day."
Channel 2 Action News is waiting for the additional information from OCI.
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