We've been doin all our work on the Roosevelt with an early start permit. This basically enables us to start the work as long as we don't cover up anything. For example we can put in our plumbing but we must leave one side of the bathroom wall exposed (without sheetrock). Clearly the first step towards being able to utilize a raw space is to have a functioning male and female bathroom. Power can be provided temporarily by our diesel generator which Bryan converted to run on vegetable oil.
Today was very touch and go as Bryan & I went down to the City of Tampa building department to pick up our final building permit for our first buildout phase. Essentially the building department was telling us that this permit in itself can't really be looked at without taking into account the complete buildout picture. The biggest stumbling block was the fact that we are not hooking up to TECO (Tampa Electric Co) and that this triggers a whole range of issues.
Quite a lot of components that we will be implementing in this project are experimental and therefore they do not fall within a certain "box" the building department can wrap their head around. In addition to that, we can't really submit a final design for the complete development of the project because we simply don't know yet what that will look like. We are quite capable of building out this structure off-grid completely by ourselves but one of the main goals of this project is to attract new / better technologies to be implemented and there's obviously no way to predict what those may be. The world's first Web 2.0 real estate development.
The other part to this is that we are making it a point to go through all the proper channels to accomplish this. The goal is to change the way things are being done and therefore we must be able to get the proper approvals from the government agencies that regulate the very things we are seeking to impact.
Luckily the building officials are on our side. After thinking for about 45 minutes that the entire project would ground to a halt, a creative solution came up. Even though we don't need to hook up to the local grid, doing so will eliminate a whole hosts of problems. In other words we get the power hooked up with TECO even though we won't be using it and that satisfies building code. Then when we build an alternative method of power generation (among other things) we can get this engineering inspected and the goal is to get that adopted into code. The project moves forward without delay.
One more problem with that - TECO want a $ 1,600 deposit. That tells you that the average electric bill for a 5,400 sq.ft building in Tampa is $ 1,600 - and those rates just went up 25% this month. So $ 2,000 a month. To put that in perspective; a $ 2,000 a month payment at 6.5% interest on a 30 year mortgage finances $ 316,421.64. What we will demonstrate is that this expense can be eliminated for far less than that amount and we will package this conversion with turnkey financing. Green this and green that is great but in the end the only way to affect massive change is to make it a financial no brainer.
The one big exception on that deposit requirement is non-profits; they have no deposit requirements. Even though our business is for profit, we also have a significant nonprofit compoonent to our overal business plan & we are connected to several large and small nonprofits so we will be approaching them on getting the account set up. This further solidifies the team & useage of the building.
and onwards we go.
PS: Bryan got his final building permit for the Manatee County Earthship project TODAY. Took 9 months but now the precedent has been set and the State building code has been amended as a direct result of Bryan's efforts and determination. Congrats Bryan; we're proud of you man.
Unstoppable.
