The City corresponded with the representative, recognized other non-owners at will, asked no one for an authorization form, then relabeled and redirected him — while the supervising official, forwarding the representative's own email the same afternoon, asked "who is this person?" in a thread that already named him. ---
The City interacted with a property representative for over two years without requesting a formal authorization form, only to later redirect him and question his identity despite having recognized him from the start. Although the inspector responded directly to Chris Foley at their first contact in early 2023, he later began calling Foley the owner’s handyman and instructed him to communicate only through the property owner. During this same period, the Principal Building Inspector forwarded an email from Foley to the assigned inspector asking who he was, even though the message already named him and referenced the correct case. While the City uses a standard form for property owners to authorize representatives, no such documents exist in the file for Foley, the contractor, or other non-owners the City chose to work with. This shift in recognition occurred even though Foley had explicitly offered to deliver a signed authorization form the moment the City asked for one.
Across the case the City's produced file shows it corresponded with the property representative directly, recognized other non-owner contacts when it chose to, and never once told anyone that a written authorization form was required — yet later relabeled and redirected the same representative. The inspector knew the representative from the first contact email and replied to him the same day M024. By September the inspector was addressing him as "Chris" while also calling him "property owners handyman" and telling him to "reach out to the owner of the property" M036. Days later the inspector and the Principal Building Inspector met "a contractor and a representative of the property owner," gave the contractor a correction notice and "30 days to obtain the building permit," and recognized those non-owner contacts — again with no authorization document in the file M036. Separately, the Principal Building Inspector forwarded the representative's own email to the inspector asking "Paul, who is this person? How is he involved?" — inside a thread that named the representative and referenced the case E.3 R.25-4711. The produced file contains no owner-signed authorization form matching the City's current Agent-for-Owner Authorization mechanism CITY.CDD0204.AgentAuthorization for the representative, the contractor, or any non-owner the City chose to recognize; that is a negative full-production search of M001–M631, not a separate City admission.
When a property owner is sick or hard to reach, a city usually lets a trusted helper or representative speak for them — and most cities have a simple form the owner signs to put that in writing. Here the City talked to the owner's representative from the very first email in 2023 and kept dealing with him; later, a city inspector met a contractor and a representative at the property, handed over a correction notice, and gave them thirty days to get a building permit — all without ever asking anyone to fill out that authorization form. Yet around the same time the inspector started calling the representative the "owner's handyman" and told him to stop contacting the City and go through the owner instead. There is no rule in the file that explains who got recognized and who got pushed away — it came down to the inspector's own call, not a written standard. Separately, on the day Foley believed a senior city official had personally delivered the new enforcement packet to the property, the representative emailed that official directly; the official forwarded the email to the inspector the same afternoon asking "who is this person? How is he involved?" — even though the email named the representative and was about this exact case. One detail surfaced only after the owner's representative compelled the City to produce its internal records: the Principal Building Inspector's same-day forward of the representative's own email contained the question "who is this person?" — even though the thread already identified him and concerned this exact case. That internal email sits directly beside the representative's written offer to deliver signed authorization the moment the City asked — an offer the City never accepted.
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The 04/04/2023 case entry records "Good morning, My name is Chris Foley and Jacqueline Baritell has informed me you had stopped by," and the inspector "replied back" to him the same day M024. The City knew who he was.
No entry, email, or notice in the produced file shows the inspector, the Principal Building Inspector, or any staff asking the representative, the owner, or the contractor to submit an authorization form, or stating the City could not deal with a non-owner until one was on file. This is a negative search across the produced May case file M001–M631, checked against the City form source CITY.CDD0204.AgentAuthorization and the complete-production provenance R.26-1965.
On 09/16/2025 the inspector "met with a contractor and a representative of the property owner," gave the contractor "a correction notice, that included pictures," handed him "my business card," and let "the representative of the owner" know "I would give them 30 days to obtain the building permit" M036 — no authorization form requested from any of them.
> "I let the representative of the owner know I would give them 30 days to obtain the building permit." — M036, 09/16/2025 case note (Paul Lovato)
On 09/11/2025 the inspector recorded the email as one "from property owners handyman," then replied that the City "deals directly with the owner of the property, or the owners representative" and that "any concerns you have with the property, please reach out to the owner of the property" M036. The same entry records that the representative had offered written authorization on request — "If Jackie's consent must come first, please just confirm that and we'll bring it immediately" (referring to Baritell, the Principal Building Inspector) — and the City did not take it up M036.
On 09/02/2025 the representative emailed the Principal Building Inspector directly, referencing that the official had "just came by and delivered the new Notice and Order packet" and that he "tried to catch you before you left but missed you"; that same afternoon the Principal Building Inspector forwarded the email to the inspector asking "Paul, who is this person? How is he involved?" — in a thread that named the representative and referenced the case E.3.
The production carries no owner-signed authorization form for the representative, the contractor, or any non-owner the City recognized M001–M631 CITY.CDD0204.AgentAuthorization.
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Either written authorization was required before the City could deal with a non-owner — in which case the produced file lacks it for the representative, the contractor, and everyone else the City recognized M001–M631 CITY.CDD0204.AgentAuthorization — or it was not required, in which case nothing in the record explains relabeling the representative as "handyman" and redirecting him to the owner M036. The City replied to him at first contact M024, recognized a contractor and a representative the same month it redirected him M036, and never once asked anyone for a form M001–M631. The standard for whom to recognize, relabel, or redirect rested on the inspector's say-so, not a documented rule.
The strongest realistic City response: non-owner representatives may communicate about a case without an authorization form, which is a permit-application document rather than a rule for every conversation; staff acted in good faith to facilitate compliance; the inspector could reasonably redirect a representative whose role was unclear; and a high-volume official may not instantly recall one individual.
Answer: If a form was not needed for ordinary communication, the City cannot later justify redirecting the representative on the ground that he lacked one. If authorization *was* required before staff could rely on non-owner statements for compliance or permit coordination, the produced file contains it for no one — not the representative, not the contractor, not any other non-owner the City chose to recognize M001–M631 CITY.CDD0204.AgentAuthorization. The City also cannot rescue the redirection by calling the representative's role unclear: its own remedy for an unclear role is the authorization form, and the record shows the City never once asked anyone to complete one and did not take up the representative's offer to bring it M036. On the recognition facet, the "who is this person?" question was the Principal Building Inspector's same-day forward of an email the representative had sent him directly — an email in which the representative stated he believed the official had just come by the property that day — and it sat in a thread naming the representative and the case E.3. Ordinary administrative housekeeping does not require asking a question the surrounding record already answers.
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