Dallas Developers Battled Glacial-Paced Permitting Process For Years. Will A New System Improve Things?

Texas is known for being business-friendly, and with the number of deals happening and projects starting throughout the Metroplex every week, developers don't like wasting time.

But it's no secret that the city of Dallas' notoriously slow permitting process has long been a thorn in the side of its movers and shakers.

Now, Dallas is out to change that perception with the launch of its simplified, online permitting system, DallasNow. The cloud-based system went live Monday to expedite permitting, planning, platting, inspections and engineering 24/7. 

“It will allow you to track your project from the very beginning and see who's got it,” The Real Estate Council President and CEO Jamee Jolly said. “It's going to cut out a lot of the back-and-forth that we have right now in the process, which we hope will even better fine-tune the timeline for projects.”

City officials have been working to improve things for a while, and The Real Estate Council consulted on the development of the new system. In one of her first actions after being put in charge of the city on an interim basis, new City Manager Kimberly Bizor Tolbert combined Dallas’ planning, development and urban design departments into a single unit and put Emily Liu at the helm. 

The new planning and development director and her staff then got to work removing thousands of stale permits and improving efficiencies. By January, the median wait time for new commercial construction permits was cut from nearly 300 days to 189 days.

City Council Member Jaynie Schultz called that “a transformative experience,” though it still amounted to more than a six-month wait.

By late April, the median permit time had been cut to around 112 days, and Jolly said the goal is to get it down ever further.

“A lot of the mindset has changed within the department, thanks to city leadership, and it's not, ‘Let's start with … this is why your project won't work,’” Jolly said. “Let's start with, ‘Here are some of the challenges we've got to figure out, and let's get to a yes.’”

Most developers, contractors and architects reached by Bisnow are taking a wait-and-see approach to the new system and were reluctant to comment before they see more of it in action.

“The current system has had its challenges,” Sycamore Development owner Jess Krochtengel said. “We are optimistic that the technology upgrades will streamline the process.”

According to numbers shared with the council in 2022, more than $31M of tax revenue was lost for every three months of permitting delays, including $9M in revenue for the city. For builders, those delays racked up costs of $250 to $300 per home each day, said Phil Crone, the former executive director of the Dallas Builders Association.

“That process being so difficult can be disheartening on both sides of the counter,” Crone said at the time. 

He called the city’s zoning system “unfortunate” and said the update was urgent given that he was hearing from builders that planned to leave Dallas in favor of cities with faster permitting. 

But the new system took time to develop and was still a major issue last year.

“The city has been losing lots of property tax revenue from completed projects because of the long permitting process,” Cawley Partners CEO Bill Cawley said via email last year.

The new system is designed to improve those issues, but Planning and Development Deputy Director Vernon Young expects some “growing pains.”

“Both city staff and customers will need time to adjust, but once fully implemented, this will be a game-changer for how Dallas handles permitting, zoning and inspections,” Young said in a statement.

The Planning and Development Department announced an increase to commercial remodeling permit fees last month after a staff error cost the city $8.6M.

Tolbert also put a moratorium on all city real estate deals last month after deeming a $14M office tower purchase in 2022 a “waste.” That purchase, which was made by the city's previous administration, was to be the permitting department’s new home. That never came to be, as the building had numerous code violations and has cost the city around $29M already, city officials said.

With an online dashboard and an email system that will keep applicants abreast of every step along the way, city officials are optimistic DallasNow could be the lifeline needed to bring developers back.

“It's pulling all the information into one area for the applicant to track and monitor, and then on the back end, it's assigning it to someone that is truly watching the progress along the way,” Jolly said. “We're going to see more efficiencies going forward, and that’s the goal for the city.”