Earlier this month, the City of Dallas announced that the median issuance time for construction permits dropped to its lowest level in years.
In a November 1 memo, Assistant City Manager Robin Bentley said the median time to issue New Construction Commercial Permits fell to 112 days in October, the lowest seen in 2024 “and one of the lowest since 2021.”
The drop is significantly lower than the 302 median issued days when looking at all of 2024 combined. It also represents a sharp decline from the 827 median issued days recorded in September.
Bentley also noted that the Planning and Development Department (PDD) began working on clearing out the nearly 10,000 stale permits that “have lingered in the permitting system, clogging workflows and skewing data outcomes.”
As of November 1, the PDD had closed over 4,500 stale permits.
In June, the PDD began publishing public dashboard tracking permits to make the process more transparent. The group, an amalgamation of former planning and permitting departments, was formed to help address delays with permitting in the City. Emily Liu, director of planning and urban design, heads the department.
“I think that this is also one of those [things] that helps the whole city, and it helps us compete with our suburban partners, so that people come here first, which is great,” said Jennifer Scripps, president of Downtown Dallas Inc., regarding making Dallas more competitive with surrounding areas.
According to the City memo, the Commercial Permitting Process Improvement Project, which aims to streamline commercial permitting, kicked off on October 1. The program’s goal is to reduce turnaround time and improve customer experience.
“This project will incorporate the use of Lean Six Sigma tools for the evaluation and analysis. The project is being led by the Continuous Improvement Specialist Team with the City of Dallas, in collaboration with the Toyota Production System Support Center (TSSC). The team aims to identify bottlenecks, improve process flow, and make the City’s permitting system more efficient and responsive,” wrote Bentley.
