Newport Beach rebuilding permit-approval process

June Casagrande

NEWPORT BEACH -- In response to criticism that building permit

requests sometimes are delayed for months, city staff are working to

streamline the process.

“I’ve gotten a lot of complaints in my district from people getting

held up in the building permit department and not being able to get

permits expeditiously,” City Councilman John Heffernan said. “This is a

basic city service. The city needs to do a better job.”

Heffernan said that because the city uses outsourced contractors to

review plans, residents often find it difficult to learn about the status

of their requests or get details about why plans are rejected.

Deputy Building Director Faysal Jurdi said more city staff have been

added and plans are underway to improve the city’s permit process. Right

now, a single-family project could take 13 to 16 weeks for the initial

review. A new office building could take eight to 11 weeks. The goal,

Jurdi said, is to reduce the turnaround time for most plan-review

requests to about four weeks, they hope by July 1.

Jurdi said the amount of growth in recent years has served to slow

things down over the long term. In the last eight months, 1,480 plans

were submitted to the city. Last year, the average number of requests

over the same period was 1,216.

One of the biggest problems comes when a resident’s or builder’s

request must go through multiple departments. Most permit requests go

through the Building Department and the Planning Department. But,

depending on the details of a job, a request might also be reviewed by

the Public Works, Fire, Utilities or other departments.

Instead of going through one department at a time, officials say they

are looking for ways to have departments review plans concurrently.

Department heads are working now to make that happen.

“Time is money for these people, and we have to find a better way of

doing things,” Heffernan said.

* June Casagrande covers Newport Beach. She may be reached at (949)

574-4232 or by e-mail at o7 june.casagrande@latimes.comf7 .