This week, in recognition of Building Safety Month, we’re highlighting the people behind the scenes in Wake County’s Planning and Development Services department. Each day this week, we’ll share the story of one employee, showing how their expertise and dedication help protect our community and ensure that every project meets the highest standards.
Before Joseph LeFrancois ever picked up a code book, he was picking up a hammer.
He spent more than ten years building houses with his father; framing walls, watching foundations go in, learning what it actually takes to put a home together from nothing. He studied construction management at East Carolina University. He grew up in Rolesville, attended local schools, and always found his way back to the work he knew best.
These days, he’s on the other side of it. As a senior building inspector for Wake County, he’s the one showing up to check the work. But that background changes everything about how he does his job.
“I enjoy watching a house being built from the ground up for a family to live in,” he said. For someone who spent years doing exactly that, it’s not just a line. He knows what he’s looking at.
LeFrancois joined Wake County in August 2019, coming over from two years at the Town of Apex Inspections.
A typical day starts at the office, where he pulls up his assigned inspections and maps out the most efficient route. Then he’s out the door, moving from site to site, checking work against the code while fielding phone calls, texts and emails along the way. It sounds manageable until you consider what’s actually happening between stops.
“This job is mentally challenging,” he said. “Knowing how to take the code book and apply it to the field” is not something you pick up overnight. Every situation is a little different. Every contractor interprets things differently. And when an inspection fails, someone on the other end of that conversation isn’t happy about it. Handling that calmly, clearly, professionally is part of the job too.
People see the truck and the flexible schedule and draw the wrong conclusion. “People think it’s a walk in the park because I drive a truck and don’t have to do hard physical labor,” he said. What they don’t see is the mental load, the years of experience required to make quick, confident decisions on complex code questions, often while someone is standing right there waiting for an answer.
Joseph enjoys the challenge of finding code items, learning a new manufacturer requirement and talking through problems with contractors.
Outside of work, he is most at home outdoors; hunting, fishing, riding four-wheelers with family and friends. The kind of weekends that look nothing like a workday.
And then there’s the story he doesn’t lead with but probably should. At a Josh Turner concert, LeFrancois had the chance to hand the country music star his guitar on stage.
