There are still about 100 vacant positions in the City and County of Honolulu's Department of Planning and Permitting.
The DPP has been trying to clear a backlog of building permits by speeding up its processing times, which it reportedly has done, but staffing continues to be a problem.
Director Dawn Apuna recently told the Honolulu City Council that the department has hired about 80 people to fill 130 total vacancies since October last year — but about 40 employees left during the same period.
Pay is a significant part of the DPP’s hiring and turnover problems, she said.
“People won't consider, electrical engineers won't consider working for DPP just based on the pay. So we're working on that, too. We're working with the union. But we will continue to tackle that, because that is basically the answer,” she said.
The DPP later said in an email that the issue of low pay is more pronounced for its engineering positions, but it’s a problem for all the department’s vacancies.
Another problem is that plan reviewers spend half their time on the phone with the public, Apuna said.
She wants the public to go to the department’s website for frequently asked questions and is hoping to direct calls to the city’s Department of Customer Services’ call center to help alleviate the problem.
Still, the department has reported that progress has been made.
Last November the average length of the residential permitting process was close to a year, DPP said, and commercial permits took a few months longer.
In September, processing times dropped to about six months and a year, respectively. Last year DPP automated its pre-screen process, which used to be about six months long on average.
Now it’s five days, the department said.
Those working on pre-screening are now being trained to do code reviews, which is actually longer than before and is now the lengthiest part of the process.
“We have shifted many of the pre-screeners to the code review, so that has upped the time for residential permits, excluding instant online permits,” Apuna said. “But we do think that in the next few months, we will be able to bring this duration down as well as more people are trained.”
A testifier from Waiʻanae said he has been waiting for his permit for close to 15 months, illustrating the problems still within the permitting process.
Apuna and city councilmembers appeared optimistic about speeding up building permit wait times.
She said the total review time for residential permits can drop to about two weeks within six months, and commercial permit times can drop to about two months in 18 months.
