The state's fire marshal issued an emergency order
Thursday barring occupancy of the DiRimini apartment project after the 
developer apparently continued to move in residents in defiance of city
orders. The state order, posted on every door in the 31-unit project at 733 N. Capitol Ave., says the building poses a "serious
and immediate hazard of death or serious bodily injury." State officials inspected the building on Wednesday and found
it does not contain fire walls between apartment units or a working sprinkler system, brazen violations of the Indiana Building
Code. The order, signed by Indiana State Fire Marshal James L. Greeson, also notes that a required exit on the fourth-floor
was not built as proposed, and that exit-stair treads do not meet the code.
The city's department of code enforcement has cited developer Jeff Sparks with several violations for building a project that differs in 35 ways from the approved plans. Sparks has not returned multiple phone messages. It still isn't clear how city and state inspectors could have missed so many violations until the building was almost complete and a neighborhood group spoke up. A spokeswoman for the department of code enforcement said the developer secured permits for one set of plans but built another.
IBJ first reported on the controversy in a print-edition story on Oct. 2. A list of the 35 violations follows that story. Blog posts on the DiRimini saga, which include the original rendering and fixes proposed by the developer, are available here, here and here.
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Who did the construction?
It would be interesting to know what other projects this guy has been involved in.
It would be nice to clear his name if they are two different men.
Apparently, you have not followed this story from the beginning. The problems began when the City stopped the construction of this monstrosity when it was known that Sparks was building something entirely different from the approved plans.
What disturbs me most on this project is this-Every architect or builder of anything other than a home knows by now that multi-family apartments must have a sprinkler system..either a NFPA or NFPA13R..So I cannot understand how in any sort of hurry that the system was not installed. Ugly aside, this building lacks even the most basic of life safety and I am glad to see the officials not allow for occupancy. The code fixes will not be cheap! I too would like to know who designed the structure and who built the structure. Think I will go check the state fire/building website to see.
There was also a code enforcement official who demonstrated apparent deficiencies. She pulled on a standpipe and it seemed ready to pull out of a brick wall.
At least they dumped the large particle board "MODEL OPEN" sign in the alley (that had been leaning against the building). I confess that I'm watching with morbid curiosity now...
Even so, Code Enforcement should have caught this in the very early stages - such as in the footings and foundations stage (missing stairwell) or at framing or rough-in. (you can tell there's inadequate sprinklers at rough-in)
Also note that they had no teeth - even without an occupancy permit the owner was able to move residents in. It took the State Fire Marshal to enforce the issue.
The City needs to fix the DCE - rather than give the billionaire Simons another $30 million.
When I built a large addition to a fraternity several years ago, the then DCAM building inspectors were all over our project like white on rice, so I'm amazed at the folks who seem to think they should be let off the hook for letting this one get so far into construction before stopping it. We were cited (wrongly) for things like fire dampers, fire walls, ramps, etc. They issued SWOs on us like rain, all of which were either easily resolved or overturned. For folks to say they had no responsibility here seems a bit disingenuous. The developer IS ultimately responsible but DCE should have stopped this before they got this far.