The building department requirements are what I would expect so the drafter appears to not only be unfamiliar with these requirements but also did not read the list of requirements available from the town. The missing structural info is odd from a structural engineer but it would not be the drafter's fault. When a bedroom is added smoke and CO detector plans are normally required to be submitted so they can be reviewed by the fire service rather than being reviewedd on site. I don't understand the trail of responsibility or the involvement of the designer or architect but I would have been surprised if a drafter had submitted a better set of documents for a permit without some help. I would have asked the builder or the architect to oversee or at least review the documents before they were submitted. The cost issue gets hung up in what the contract specifically said about time and professional supervision and the person's professed professional experience and capacity. I don't blame you for hoping for better professional service but I'm not sure you should have expected it. On the bright side, many building plan reviewers would have returned the submission after several weeks without providing such complete revision instructions and that may have saved you weeks. Also, using a drafter instead of an architect or professional designer probably saved you many times more than what you could have saved working on the project so things may yet work out.

If you move the entrance to the stairs (so they end in the same spot in the basement but start in a different place on this floor) and turned the biggest window on the back wall into an even-bigger sliding glass door, you could actually fit nicely-proportioned kitchen, dining area, and living area with plenty of space to walk around and through all of them. Like so: Every layout always compromises in some area. In focusing on making the living areas generously sized for furniture/cabinets/counters/walkways/human traffic, I compromised a bit on the experience guests will have when they first walk in the front door. As you can see, when guests walk in, straight ahead is a staircase and the kitchen. It's not the norm to have a barrier of sort directly in front of you when you first walk in the front door rather than a straight shot down a walkway or into a room. It's also not the norm to have the kitchen be the first thing you see when you enter a home, and a lot of people feel really strongly that they don't want guests to be able to see the kitchen sink/dishes when the guests first walk in. I think the barrier-in-front-of-you-when-you-enter thing isn't a huge deal because people entering have almost 10 feet of walking space before they hit the staircase. It would be very natural for foot traffic to flow diagonally to the right to enter the living spaces rather walking directly into the stairs, and you wouldn't have any issues with people feeling cramped or blocked. However, I'm concerned you won't like the immediately-visible kitchen aspect of this. I found a picture of a relatively similar kitchen to what I've drawn and edited in a staircase in front of it so you can see what that would look like if you simply do a half wall behind the big kitchen counter. This is what would greet your guests: Picture a huge window above the sink and a stove where the fridge is. Having a half wall behind the big counter would preserve maximum openness if you want your big counter in the kitchen to feel like an island and/or to be able to keep an eye on kids in the family room and/or to interact with people in the family room. However, that would also means your guests' main view when they first walk in the house would be of the kitchen. If you don't like how people would see the kitchen when they first walk in, you could always do a full wall there. It'd be an ideal place to hang a piece of statement art to greet your guests. Like so: P.S. In case it is not obviously to you, in the kitchen where the pantry cabinets overlap with the counter is an appliance garage situation like this:

depends so much on the specific people. for example, I had a designer at Lowes who was honest and creative and improved my designs every time. now he's retired, and I find myself pushing other designers up hill or battling the "cabinet salesperson" orientation. I also have contractors who are happy taking my choice of materials and finishes and making them work, but some contractors will worry that they're going to get stuck with choices that get them in a bind because the client doesn't know what to anticipate, so you need to know your own skills/limitations as well as what you want the other side(s) to provide. I like to go (1) contractor, to talk about how the project might work, general things I might or might not be considering, and how their process works. (Sometimes I can get an estimate too, but there's likely to be a lot of handwaving about unknowns.) (2) kitchen designer or cabinet designer, to sketch out an initial kitchen layout. (3) back to GC, to nail down the logistics, pricing, and the rest. I don't order cabinets until the kitchen has been gutted and wall boards are up, because somehow inches seem to come and go during that process, but before they touch a stud, the contractors know what appliances are coming, where the lights and plumbing will be, and all the rest. I also don't start a THING until I've picked all the finishes -- tile or wood, counters, cabinets, backsplash, so that nothing comes as a surprise and everything can be made available at the right time...

Best bet is like @millworkman said... local search. Yelp, Google Reviews, NextDoor app, look around neighborhood and ask around.