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Permit Expediting?

IrishEyes

IrishEyes

ADMIN
Staff member
Joined
Jan 15, 2024
Messages
32
Location
PA
One of the more common questions I get asked is, does your town have a permit expediting option? Which my response is, at this time we do not.

What are your thoughts on permit expediting? Does your town/city have that option? Pros? Cons?

I want to hear from you!
 
TheCommish said:
We do not offer, really you just decided to do this project or you have been working on it for x months, years?
Urgency on you part is not an emergency on my part.
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I can defintely understand that. Maybe for an emergency in the instance of an AC changeout or a Water Heater, then it has the potential for an expedited nature but outside of that, I don't see why it would be necessary.
 
steveray said:
Not opposed, but it gets complicated...We tried having staff handle those off hours on OT, but the problem is the responses/ questions come back in during the normal work hours...I do struggle a bit with allowing people to pay their way to the front of the line....
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I agree with the concern of paying their way. At who's expense does that really come at, the homeowners? Or are they taking on that extra fee themselves? I can see how that can be complicated in trying to sort that out with staff as well. One person may have to be solely assigned to those types of situations alongside their daily workload.
 
IrishEyes said:
I agree with the concern of paying their way. At who's expense does that really come at, the homeowners? Or are they taking on that extra fee themselves? I can see how that can be complicated in trying to sort that out with staff as well. One person may have to be solely assigned to those types of situations alongside their daily workload.
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It comes at the expense of anyone that got in the queue before them...My shed might be the equivalent of a million dollar project to me....And much easier to review....Don't get me wrong, I would love to find an ethical way to do it, but really the best way to expedite a permit is to have a good, complete submission....
 
steveray said:
Not opposed, but it gets complicated...We tried having staff handle those off hours on OT, but the problem is the responses/ questions come back in during the normal work hours...I do struggle a bit with allowing people to pay their way to the front of the line....
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We do not have an expedited process. The reason (at least one of the reasons) is the one touched on above: Everyone who pays a permit fee is paying to have their application reviewed in a timely fashion. It's unfair to allow someone else to pay extra so they can jump the line. It apparently happens in some places -- we've had multiple requests for our "expedited review fee" recently -- all from out of state architects.

... really the best way to expedite a permit is to have a good, complete submission ...
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I probably say this at least three times per week -- if not three times per day.

The ones who really frost me are the resubmittals. We review the first application within the 30-day window we're allowed by state law -- often within two weeks of receipt. We give them a detailed explanation of the issues, complete with references to the code sections involved. They take MONTHS to revise and resubmit ... and then they get pissy because we slot them in based on the date received, and there are other applicants ahead of them.

"But it's urgent, it's costing our client money."

Was it costing your client money while you spent five months revising your plans to respond to obvious code non-conformities?
 
IrishEyes said:
I can defintely understand that. Maybe for an emergency in the instance of an AC changeout or a Water Heater, then it has the potential for an expedited nature but outside of that, I don't see why it would be necessary.
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Unless your state edited it out, the IBC and the IRC both allow emergency repairs to be performed without a permit, and the permit is applied for the next day.
 
I get asked all the time "how long will your review take?". I respond by saying "It depends on the quality and completeness of your plans". When it takes weeks to complete reviews, I wonder if they say to themselves..."Hmmm, maybe I should submit better plans".

Never worked anywhere that offered an official "expedited" review, except maybe right now. I say maybe, because I do see a checkbox on the electronic application, bet never have I seen it checked. If I did, it wouldn't change anything for me, because of what thecommish said-Urgency on you part is not an emergency on my part. and steveray said- I do struggle a bit with allowing people to pay their way to the front of the line.
 
Sifu said:
I get asked all the time "how long will your review take?". I respond by saying "It depends on the quality and completeness of your plans". When it takes weeks to complete reviews, I wonder if they say to themselves..."Hmmm, maybe I should submit better plans".

Never worked anywhere that offered an official "expedited" review, except maybe right now. I say maybe, because I do see a checkbox on the electronic application, bet never have I seen it checked. If I did, it wouldn't change anything for me, because of what thecommish said-Urgency on you part is not an emergency on my part. and steveray said- I do struggle a bit with allowing people to pay their way to the front of the line.
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If I could ensure it wasn't to the detriment of other projects, I would be all in....Therein lies the problem....
 
Yankee Chronicler said:
They take MONTHS to revise and resubmit ... and then they get pissy because we slot them in based on the date received, and there are other applicants ahead of them
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Please clarify. Do you put their resubmittals back into the review process at the end of the line or do you review the resubmittals within a couple of days?
 
mtlogcabin said:
Please clarify. Do you put their resubmittals back into the review process at the end of the line or do you review the resubmittals within a couple of days?
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We put resubmittals in line along with new applications, all chronologically based on the date received. We don't think new applicants (who might accidentally have their ducks in a row) should keep getting pushed back because of resubmittals from people who have already had their first (and second, and third, and ... ) bite of the apple.
 
Yankee Chronicler said:
Unless your state edited it out, the IBC and the IRC both allow emergency repairs to be performed without a permit, and the permit is applied for the next day.
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They have not edited it out. Contractors have 48 hours to apply for a permit after an emergency repair has been completed. That is what we go by in the town I work for in South Florida.
 
Yankee Chronicler said:
We don't think new applicants (who might accidentally have their ducks in a row) should keep getting pushed back because of resubmittals
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May I suggest you don't think of it as new applicants getting pushed back because of resubmittals, think of it as a time management practice. Set aside one or two hours a day to review the submittals in the order of the dates they are received. This will allow you a break from being focused on the same project for hours on end which can lead to brain fog for the reviewer. Grab a resubmittal and review it, this will help clear your mind of the previous review you where focused on
and get the resubmittals out in a smaller time frame.
 
Many of the municipalities here in So Cal will contract with 3rd party review firms, either for all their plan review work or just for "overflow" work.
When someone requests expediting, they can offer the option of outsourcing it, and the extra expedite fee covers both the cost of the 3rd party review plus the overhead of running the building department.
 
One other thing from the other side of the counter: the Owner tends to think of the city as a monolith. They may have been dealing with planning and economic development departments for 2-3 years or more to just get discretionary approvals in place. They've committed many preconstruction dollars at-risk, because no lender will finance the project until discretionary approvals are done. So they've told the architect to do the bare minimum for planning approvals.
By the time entitlements are in place, the wacky economy and interest rates are playing havoc with their proforma and financing, and they've been told that switchgear has a 12 month lead time.

The building department may be seeing the plans for the first time, and it's "new to you", but from the Owner's perspective, it's been "the city" (as a monolithic bureaucracy) that's stretched the project viability to the limits.
Yes, that's why developers get the big bucks, for taking the risks, so you may not feel too sorry for them. But you at the building department are the last hurdle to construction start and the road to this point has seemed longer to them than it has to you.
 
mtlogcabin said:
May I suggest you don't think of it as new applicants getting pushed back because of resubmittals, think of it as a time management practice. Set aside one or two hours a day to review the submittals in the order of the dates they are received. This will allow you a break from being focused on the same project for hours on end which can lead to brain fog for the reviewer. Grab a resubmittal and review it, this will help clear your mind of the previous review you where focused on
and get the resubmittals out in a smaller time frame.
Click to expand...

Great idea, but with the absolute dreck we get for resubmittals, reviewing resubmittals generally takes longer than the initial reviews.
 
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