Denham Springs, LA

In Denham Springs, Louisiana, city staff balances a wide range of responsibilities tied to public safety and property standards. For Building Official and Floodplain Administrator Rick Foster, that includes overseeing building codes, enforcing local ordinances, and maintaining the city’s standing in the Community Rating System (CRS).

Carrying out this work requires managing large volumes of information, from decades of Elevation Certificates to active code enforcement cases. For years, these responsibilities were supported by manual processes using paper files, scanned PDFs, and disconnected digital folders, making even routine tasks time-consuming and difficult to scale.

The Challenge: Fragmented Records and Manual Workflows

Before adopting Forerunner, Denham Springs relied heavily on paper-based systems and inconsistent filing methods that slowed down the team’s day-to-day work.

Critical records were scattered across filing cabinets and organized in different ways. As Rick recalls, “We just had drawers full of files, and everything was paper. Sometimes a road was filed under its name, a number, or a highway designation… You’d be digging for several minutes just to find one document.”

Although many records were eventually scanned, the process remained manual and internal - limiting accessibility and slowing response times for both staff and residents. Retrieving a single Elevation Certificate often required searching across physical files and PDFs, then verifying accuracy across versions.

Code enforcement workflows faced similar challenges. Complaints were received by phone, documented on triplicate paper forms, and tracked manually. Rick explains,

“We used to hate NOVs because of the amount of paperwork involved. You’d have to sit down, fill out a form, and then manually type out a letter to a resident... Eventually, with letter templates, you had to tweak the text every time, which left a lot of room for human error.”

Templates rarely reflected field conditions, and without reliable address verification, notices could be sent to the wrong properties. This created unnecessary friction with residents and additional rework for staff. Over time, these limitations accumulated, requiring constant manual effort that slowed case progression and increased the risk of errors.

The Solution: A Unified, AI-Powered Property-Level System

To address these challenges, Denham Springs adopted Forerunner in July 2025 to modernize both floodplain management and code enforcement workflows.

By moving to Forerunner’s centralized, property-level system, the city now ties every record, inspection, and interaction to a single address. Staff can access complete property histories instantly, whether in the office or in the field, eliminating duplicate data entry and reducing reliance on paper-based tracking.

This shift has led to several immediate improvements:

• A Single Source of Truth for Floodplain Documents: Elevation Certificates are now digitized, searchable, and accessible in seconds. What once required digging through file cabinets or PDFs is now a quick lookup, giving the team immediate confidence in the data they use.
  
  
• AI-Powered Code Enforcement: Code cases that once were documented on triplicate paper forms now move forward in a structured, digital workflow. Using built-in AI tools, inspectors can document violations, generate Notices of Violation letters, and complete reports directly from the field, allowing cases to progress without unnecessary delays. This combination of centralized data, structured workflows, and built-in AI has fundamentally changed how the team operates. As Rick shared, “Forerunner just makes everything easier. It helps show what work has been done, where it’s documented, and stores it all in one place.”
  
  
• Improved Access for the Community: The city has also changed how it shares information externally. Property compliance information and documents, like Elevation Certificates or enforcement records, are now available through a public-facing website. This enables residents, contractors, and real estate professionals to search by address and download documents without calling city hall.

The Impact: Faster Workflows, Fewer Errors

With manual steps reduced and workflows more consistent, Denham Springs has seen improvements in both speed and accuracy.

For floodplain management, the platform adds an important layer of quality control. Elevation Certificates are automatically reviewed and flagged for potential issues, helping the team catch discrepancies that might otherwise be missed. This reduces the need for repetitive checks and allows staff to focus on higher-value work. Rick shared that floodplain reviews, especially Elevation Certificate evaluations, are now over 50% faster.

Documentation quality has improved as well. Rick estimates that errors in Notices of Violation and related records have dropped by more than 50%, largely due to the shift away from manual data entry and toward a standardized, digital system.

The impact extends beyond the metrics. As Rick notes, “When you can make someone more efficient by providing the right tools, it makes them happier and lessens the daily stress of the work.” As Rick and his team continue to use Forerunner, its value has only grown: “The deeper we get into Forerunner, the more we discover how much it can do for us. It continues to impress us and has become an asset to what we do every day,” Rick adds.

A Partner in Progress

With more reliable systems in place, Denham Springs is now focused on building on that progress. One key priority is improving the city’s CRS rating from a Class 7 to a Class 6 - a change that would lower flood insurance premiums for residents further.

By automatically capturing inspections and documentation at the property level, the team can spend less time on administrative tasks and more time on initiatives like CRS improvements and case resolution.

Forerunner has become a core part of how the city operates. As Rick puts it, “Forerunner’s been worth every penny. The transition has been very enjoyable… and I know it’s going to streamline so much more as we move forward.”

What began as an effort to modernize workflows has become a lasting improvement - helping Denham Springs work more efficiently, reduce errors, and provide better service to the community.