Builders and developers here say the city of Spokane Valleys building and land-use permit processwhich they describe as inefficient and sluggishhas been improving in recent months due to recent efforts by the four-year-old city.


Some procedures still need to be overhauled, though, before development activity can start humming along smoothly, they say.


The Valleys building and planning department says it has been struggling under the strain of the construction boom, and builders and developers say the time and complexity involved in the permitting process has delayed their projects unnecessarily and, in some cases, hurt their relationships with clients.


In one case, a retailer has been unable to get a store started on time to take advantage of the holiday shopping season. A land-use consultant has been frustrated by duplicative and unnecessary process, and an engineers plat application took too much time.


The city held two public forums this past summer to discuss its permitting system with contractors, developers, engineers, and others, and to receive feedback on how to improve it. As a result of that feedback and the citys own internal evaluations, it has hired more employees and streamlined some of its procedures, says Mary Kate Martin, a building official at the city. Additional improvements are in the works, Martin says.


In the last three months, the city has been trying to improve their level of service, and in general, that has helped significantly, says John Miller, president of Divcon Inc., which has been involved in a number of big projects in Spokane Valley, including the Pinecroft Business Park in the Mirabeau area.


Is it perfect? No, he adds.


Among its efforts, the city has consolidated its development engineering, planning, and building departments under the community development department to improve communication and coordination between the divisions, Martin says. It also has hired five additional employees, including two planners, a development engineer, a building inspector, an engineering technician, and a planning technician, she says.


The department also now conducts monthly staff meetings to talk about projects and possible problems that have arisen, she says. Also, it holds an internal project meeting every week with the permit review staff to make sure they have the paperwork they need.


Were all working together as a team to look at processes and evaluating them to streamline them and make them more effective, Martin says. Integrating all the new processes takes awhile for the staff to get used to.


The community development department also has implemented a quality control check, which gives applicants an early response about their application, she says. After an application has been submitted, an engineering technician and senior permit specialist check the forms to make sure theyre suitable for review and then either return them to the applicant for revisions, or route them through to the appropriate channels at the city.


Also, applicants who turn in complete forms now receive a sheet with their project number and the date they should expect to receive comments from their first full review, she says.


Back to the bottom


One of the main problems with the permitting process has been the practice of putting applications back at the bottom of the pile after a minor change has been required, says Kevin Rindlisbacher, owner of the Steinway Piano Gallery of Spokane Inc. store at the Spokane Valley Mall.


Rindlisbacher has been trying for months to get a permit to build a new store on the south side of Nora Avenue, between Pines Road and Evergreen Road. He attended a pre-application meeting with city planners, who told him that if he incorporated their suggestions he should be able to get a permit in four to six weeks. He says he submitted his application, but it wasnt stamped for 10 days as having been submitted. The application then was sent to an outside consultant for review, and Rindlisbacher was forced to go back to the end of the line.


Name another organization that can sit on something for 10 days and pretend it doesnt exist, he says. Its a never-ending process, and its getting a little frustrating.


Rindlisbacher had hoped to open the store for the Christmas shopping season, but says he now has missed the construction start date necessary to do that.


The community development department now tries to review applications within a week from when theyre submitted, says senior city engineer John Hohman. If the revisions the applicant has made are relatively minor, employees try to focus on moving the application through the system, rather than putting it back at the bottom of the pile, he says.


In some divisions, people treated it as, I did that one and now Im working on another so, it will just have to wait, he says. Were trying to look at revisions as soon as possible, but it could still be several days because sometimes people cant just drop what theyre doing.


The city also has changed its pre-application meeting process, which Spokane land-use consultant Dwight Hume says wasted time for both applicants and city staff. In the past, all applicants, regardless of how much experience they had in working with the city on permits, were required to meet with city staff when they picked up an application to discuss permitting procedures, Hume says. He says he urged the city staff during the first public forum to make the meeting optional for some applicants.


Now, certain applicants, such as developers who have been involved in a number of projects in the Valley, dont have to attend meetings prior to submitting an application, Hohman says.


Hume says his biggest criticism of the Spokane Valley permitting process in general is that the city follows too many unnecessary procedures, such as the pre-application process, that take up time and complicate the process further.


Youve got the tail wagging the dog, Hume says. They make work for themselves that engages their time unnecessarily and causes delays, and then your client looks at you and says, I hired you to get something done.


Divcons Miller says part of the problem is that the citys priority is to follow procedures, while contractors and developers want to expedite the process so they can start work on schedule.


Their procedures take precedent over performance, so its the process thats important rather than the result, and contractors and developers are result-oriented, Miller asserts. We dont have the ability to wait forever on permits.


While some of the citys procedures still are more detailed than necessary, the turnaround time on applications has been improving, thanks largely to the additional staff members the city has hired, says Chuck Simpson, owner of Simpson Engineers Inc., of Spokane Valley.


The city has made tremendous gains, but still could make more, Simpson says.


He says the city took two months to issue its first comments on a plat application he made for a 13-lot subdivision. In contrast, Spokane County issued first comments within two weeks on an application he submitted to that jurisdiction for a 30-lot subdivision.


Martin says the community development departments next priority is to streamline the short-plat application process. A short plat is a subdivision of a piece of land into nine or fewer lots, city spokeswoman Carolbelle Branch says. The city also currently is working on improving its system for grading permits and right-of-way street vacations, Martin says.


One of the most time-consuming processes has been boundary lot-line adjustments, Simpson says. Hohman says the planning division has restructured that process and implemented those changes at the end of last month. The city also has streamlined its commercial building permit procedures and has implemented an over-the-counter permit program for small residential projects, Martin says.


The community development department is considering conducting another public forum in about six months to go over concerns about the permitting process once again, she says. Miller says such forums have been a good sign to builders and developers that the city at least is hearing their concerns and trying to make progress.


Says Miller, Im encouraged not with the results primarily, but because there seems to be a dialogue going on and thats constructive. I think everyone is trying.


Contact Emily Proffitt at (509) 344-1265 or via e-mail at emilyp@spokanejournal.com.