In a one-year follow-up to its 2021 report criticizing long-standing problems within Portland’s building permits system, the city auditor's office says the city made "substantive progress" in addressing the previous audit recommendations.
The March 2021 report called for city council-level leadership to solve the long-standing problems in Portland's building permits system. Time-consuming delays, shoddy customer service, and a lack of accountability threatened the city’s post-pandemic economic recovery, the report concluded.
Commissioners Dan Ryan and Mingus Maps co-chair the Permit Improvement Task Force, which was established in April 2021 with three overarching goals: to reduce permitting timelines, improve the customer experience, and improve performance management.
According to its own dashboard, the city has only gotten slower at processing most permits in the months since. However, the report applauds the city tracking timing publicly at all, noting "The knowledge that in recent months the City has been taking roughly twice as long as stated goals may help customers set more realistic expectations about permit duration."
The update also reports that a manager has been hired to improve communications and centralize work among the various bureaus involved in the permitting process, and the city has created a new position who will be tasked with working on "customer complaint accountability."
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| Click to visit the Permit Timeline Dashboard May 2021 - May 2022 |
Read the full report at Portland.gov
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