Under an excessive heat wave crashing down on residents, in addition to drought conditions and increased risk of fires, Redmond Fire & Rescue tested their new fire and light inspection system on businesses on Monday, July 25.

Developed by ESO, a technology company focused on software for emergency services such as EMS, fire and hospitals, the new system will reduce the amount of time it takes for local Fire & Rescue to complete on-site inspections.

In the past, inspectors would complete a paper form at the site, return to the office to print it and return to the site to provide the business with the report — a costly and time-consuming process that relied on old databases and hard copy materials.

With Redmond Fire & Rescue covering many rural areas and businesses, it could take hours out of an inspector’s day just to complete a couple of reports and transport back-and-forth to a site.

The new software, however, will let inspectors complete the entire inspection on a tablet and send it to the owner’s email immediately

“It’s an inconvenience,” said Tom Mooney, fire marshal for Redmond Fire & Rescue. “We don’t want (inspections) to be a negative for people.”

According to Mooney, the new process will save about two hours per inspection.

On July 25, Mooney and Deputy Fire Marshal Wade Gibson were able to complete about four inspections in an hour at businesses off of SW Veteran’s Way in Redmond.

With the new software, crews “don’t have to interrupt your business day,” said Mooney.

He mentioned they will call businesses about two weeks in advance to let tenants know they’ll be inspecting for deficiencies in fire code. Some of these include blocking fire sprinklers with stacked boxes, inaccessible fire extinguishers, non-functioning exit signs and daisy-chained power strips.

They will check businesses that have inherent fire risks, such as restaurants, more often. A common code violation with restaurants, Mooney said, is forgetting to clean range hoods over stoves, which can lead to a higher chance of fire.

Redmond Fire & Rescue will give 30-day notices for fire code violations.