Dallas Building Permit Delays Linger Despite Promises

On Wednesday, Dallas City Council Members heard more bad news about chronic building permit delays.

Fixes have been promised by October, but officials said Wednesday that software and staffing issues will linger, perhaps years longer.

Meanwhile, Dallas leaders fear a continued loss of business to the suburbs.

“We are here trying to help the residents, people from the east coast, the west coast, to move into the city. And we want to move the City of Dallas up. The suburbs are kicking our tail,” said Dallas City Council Member Tennell Atkins.

Dallas builder Kelly Reynolds with Keen Homes puts people to work and offers new houses which he said are still in strong demand despite inflation and rising interest rates.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, Reynolds said Dallas permits were issued the same day. But Reynolds said his most recent Dallas permit took 10 weeks. He said that kind of delay makes construction more expensive.

“The prices of material and labor have stabilized, so it’s up to us to get it built quickly to avoid the additional interest carry,” Reynolds said. “Frisco, McKinney, the booming burbs, they get many times the permit applications of Dallas and they're somehow able, using the same software systems in fact, they're able to turn those around much quicker.”

A new Dallas Building Department Director, Andrew Espinoza, was hired in June.

Since then, the Dallas Jefferson Boulevard permit office has made some progress. Reynolds said a permit took him 5 months last year.

But the number of permit applications is also rising. And Espinoza told the Dallas City Council Wednesday that 54 new permit review jobs have yet to be filled.

The City of Dallas purchased a Stemmons Freeway office building to become a better permit office but that won’t be fully available until spring 2023.

“It seems to be headed in the right direction. It’s just like turning a battleship. It doesn’t happen quickly,” Reynolds said.

The briefing for the Dallas City Council Wednesday reviewed the pyramid of technology, process improvement and staffing resource analysis work launched in March 2021, with support from city-hired consultants who appeared at the council meeting with city staff to discuss the situation.

Some improvements recommended by consultants have already been made.

A City Council Committee received another report last week that included details.

But Dallas Builders Association Executive Director Phil Crone Wednesday said 80% of his members are seeing average delays of 10 weeks.

“We need to run the most critical department for economic development like a business. It needs to be entrepreneurial. You can’t have a situation continue where they aren’t able to meet their IT and technical needs. Currently, we can’t measure the most important bit of data on all of this.  How long is it going to take for your permit,” Crone said.

City Council Member Cara Mendelsohn said she remembers a promise from city officials.

“I recall a discussion where we were told this would all be fixed by today,” Mendelsohn said.

Assistant City Manager Majed Al Ghafry admitted that he said that in June.

“We've had some setbacks that were not anticipated,” Al Ghafry said.

City officials said software has been their major hurdle along with staffing and they won’t be solved quickly.

“Two years to fully load and then a year of training and onboarding and all that,” asked Council Member Jaynie Schultz.

“That's a good assessment, yes,” Espinoza replied.

Tennell Atkins said he is tired of hearing complaints.

“If we don’t get this right, you won’t be here. No one will be here. We will not have a safe city because that’s what pays the bills. The developer pays the bills,” Atkins said.

Several other City Council Members thanked city staff for the work that has been done attempting to fix the mess.

“I think they’re sincere, but it’s just a matter of implementing and executing their plan,” Reynolds said. “Going back three years the city has missed opportunities on many millions of dollars of revenue from this permitting delay. These homes could have been completed. They could have been occupied. These people could have been paying taxes.”

In February, Dallas Mayor Eric Johnson appointed his own working group to tackle the permit problems.

City Manager T.C. Broadnax made building permit issues the number one point in his 100-day performance improvement plan announced in June when he escaped Johnson’s push to replace him.

Broadnax was out of town and Mayor Johnson was home with sick kids Wednesday. Both were absent from this latest permit discussion.