Could Higher Permit Fees Speed Up Review Times? A Genuine Inquiry

[Anonymous]

I have spoken with many colleagues in the development community, and a recurring theme is that the biggest cost driver is not usually the permit fees but the time spent in long review processes. This is a genuine question about whether cities might consider charging higher permit fees or offering an expedited option, with the extra revenue going toward hiring more staff to speed up approvals and allow more direct communication with planners. That could help reduce the slow back-and-forth when clarifying comments.

I understand there may be restrictions that make this challenging, such as legal or regulatory limits on how fees can be used, concerns about creating an unfair system, or difficulties in hiring and retaining qualified staff (which I feel could be offset by providing higher salaries and charging more for permits). However, from my perspective, many developers would be willing to pay significantly higher fees if it reliably cut down review times and improved consistency in feedback.

Has anyone seen or experienced a successful approach to this?

 

[alishna]

You bring up a great point as the permit fees aren’t usually the biggest issue; it’s the long review times that really slow things down. Some cities have tried offering expedited options for a higher fee, but legal restrictions and staffing challenges can make it tricky. In some cases, outsourcing reviews to third-party consultants has helped speed things up without sacrificing oversight. A balanced approach where higher fees directly fund better staffing and faster reviews could be a win-win situation, if done right.

Have you come across any cities that have pulled this off successfully? It’d be great to hear about real-world examples that have made a difference.

 

[BobaChewie]

Hello fellow member,

I am currently working with Building Plan Check in the City of Los Angeles and we do have an expedited option at an additional 50% of the submittal fees cost, which typically assigns a plan checker within 5 business days vs. the typical ~15 business days. However, that option is limited to Regular Plan Check projects. Expanded Counter Plan Check projects are typically done within 1.5-2 weeks and Over the Counter projects are typically done within 30 minutes < 1.5 hours.

I know for wildfire projects related to the fires we experienced back in January, expedited is free for those projects and you can inquire additional information with the West Los Angeles LADBS Office if you so wish.

However, to my knowledge, there has been no mention of the city charging higher than the standard 50% for expedited projects. In addition, you are correct about the legalities and unfairness it would cause if developers had the option to pay more money to speed up their projects. I have heard of an employee who got into legal troubles who accepted briberies from developers and purposely incorrectly assigned their projects as OTC instead of Regular Plan Check/ECPC. I hope this information helps and/or answers your concerns.

 

[Anonymous]

My post started out focusing on fees and turnaround times, but I feel the bigger concern is the lack of clarity in the review process, which often involves long back-and-forth discussions. I know the city is juggling many priorities, so I truly appreciate the complexity of the job. However, I'm currently dealing with a situation in a different state that has been ongoing for 12 months, even though the city’s official timeline is eight weeks, and I can't wrap my head around the process.

All I need is an additional six inches of right-of-way access for a building in a severely rundown part of town. With that minor adjustment, I can invest millions to improve the sidewalk and street (as requested by the city), enhance the overall building with modern, efficient systems, and ultimately lease it to tenants who will create jobs. The specific area in question is an unused portion of an unused parking lot that happens to be designated as right-of-way. If I showed my plans to every citizen that lived in the municipality, I'm convinced they would be on board and shocked that it's even an issue, and thankful that this building that has been an eyesore for 30-years is finally getting improved.

 

[Emily C]

I am fascinated by this question and the discussion. I appreciate everyone's perspectives and insight.
In short, I don't think people would appreciate spending more money on permit fees. They already think they're too high, and yes, that review takes "too long."
We don't have an expedited review process, so maybe I am speaking from a lack of experience, but I don't know if it would help much. What about all the people who pay the "regular price" and have been waiting for four weeks or more for a "simple project" then get bumped by Joe Developer who paid XX more for a jump in line and a far more complicated project? We have one building plans reviewer here who's also our inspector, fire marshal, and building official, so it's hard for me to see beyond the lens where we actually have more staff who can take some of the burden away.

 

[W3 Planning and Research]

So I will add my two cents. When I ran a large county in Arizona, I had to make the cutover to new software as well as raising permitting fees. I was directed to go to 100% cost recovery on the fees and the software I was building with the devleoper to be tailored to our needs.

First of all, fees are great, but they aren't a direct solution. There is a lot more that goes into having enough staffing for review than just the permit fees. In our case, we did a holistic review and asked the question, "should we even be doing this?" Taking that approach we simplified the review process and stopped requiring permits for simple things such as solar panels, which the local utility was already permitting and inspecting. That dropped our workload.

We then streamlined the actual process in the software for review. I looked at it from the point of view that if we could save 15 or 20 minutes per plan set, over 6000 plans, that added up to very real time.

We also started holding classes with the local contractors and started educating them on making stupid mistakes. We also started including their customer on every single permit that came in and included them in ALL of our comments, so that the contractors could no longer hide behind the "the county is holding us up", when the actual failure was the poor quality work submitted by the contractors.

Lastly we prioritized the the internal review of plans and empowered staff to make a lot more comments as "as noted" versus redlines on minor items reducing the number of 2nd or 3rd submittals.

All of these things combined, dropped our permitting turn around time by 50% at the same time as our permits grew by 200%. Suffice to say our customers, and more importanly the elected officials, were very happy with the results.

Now, they weren't too happy with the doubling per permit fees, but I had political cover on that, and honestly we sold that from the point of view that development pays for development and should never be a burden to the rest of the tax payers.

In the end we accompllished all of this with only a slight increase in staff, but it was the process improvements and contractor training that made the biggest difference.