Can a city permit a project to install a retaining wall without a proper inspection?

In Manolakos v. Gohmann, supra, an owner of a sloping property wanted to install a retaining wall so that he could have a flat backyard. The inspection department issued a permit based on a rough sketch, on the basis that the project would be evaluated during construction. The owner’s contractor went ahead with pouring concrete and backfilling without notifying the city. The wall then started moving. The court found that a municipality, once it had made the policy decision to inspect construction, is not bound to discover every latent defect in a given project, nor every derogation from applicable standards. It only incurs liability for such defects as it could reasonably be expected to have detected, and which it had ordered remedied. Here, the court divided liability between the city 70 per cent and the owners 30 per cent, with the contractors liable for the loss suffered by the owners.

In Ingles v. Tutkaluk, supra, an owner wished to lower the basement floor in his home. The contractor had to put underpinnings under the walls to hold them up. By the time an inspector got to see the work, the underpinnings were covered up and the inspector took the contractors word for it that they were properly constructed per the drawings. The court held that the city was not required to discover every latent defect in renovations, but it is required to conduct a reasonable inspection in light of all of the circumstances. It was unreasonable for an inspector to conclude that such a project had met the standards of the Building Code simply because the contractor had said so.