Photos by Sarah Bennett
A man was paying fees for an application to open a barber shop. A general contractor was having a roll of home-remodel blueprints reviewed for approval. It was business as usual earlier this morning in the Department of Development Services Office on City Hall’s fourth floor.
Except, of course, for the presence of Fire Chief Mike DuRee, Health Department Director Ron Arias, Mayor Bob Foster and a host of other City officials who lined the horseshoe-shaped counter of the normally mellow office for an announcement Foster says has been a long time coming.
A series of consolidation and business-attraction efforts have been underway in this department for the last year, designed to reduce inefficiencies, combat applicant complaints and streamline the inspection processes necessary to open a business in Long Beach.
“This is an important day,” Foster said at a podium erected in the middle of the office’s waiting area. “What we’re trying to do here is create a one-stop shop for one of the most important functions of the city. This is where businesses and residents go to begin the process of starting a new business, building a home, adding to their home—all kinds of economic activity start here…And we need to be facilitators.”
For years, Foster said, complaints have consistently come in noting how frustrating, time-consuming and full-of-hurdles the City’s process is for those trying to open a new business or engage in home construction. In addition to an information gap that forced applicants to do much of their own research on regulations pertaining to a particular request, the system often found customers driving back and forth across the city or calling inspectors back to properties multiple times to obtain proper signatures.
Mayor Bob Foster holds up new Development Services guides, designed to spell out the permitting process for opening restaurant and retail businesses in Long Beach.
By providing detailed checklists for various common business and structural rehab projects and reorganizing the public counter on the fourth floor, Foster along with Director of Development Services Amy Bodek are proud to say that they are beginning to chip away at the number of negative experiences many customers used to report.
“I want to thank the Mayor for his contributions to these changes,” said Bodek. “I hear from him and I hear from many business districts that we need to do a better job in getting our businesses up and running and getting our residents to get their improvements made in a much more efficient manner than we have been doing in the past.”
{loadposition latestnews}Since 2010, the permitting center has increased its customer satisfaction rates from 60 to 90 percent, a shift that can be attributed not just to shorter wait times in the office, but also helpfulness of plan-check workers—who are now trained to thoroughly explain and demystify the process for customers—as well as health, fire and building inspectors in the field who are less deniers and more problem-solvers, offering options to get projects where they need to be.
“When I first came in in 2010, all I heard was, ‘No, no no,’” said Tracy Ames, owner of Red Leprechaun, an Irish-American pub that recently opened on Anaheim St. “Now, it’s ‘Let me call someone.’”
Foster described the increase in helpfulness and efficiency as “a win-win.” By streamlining the process, customers get into their business or their new structures sooner, which allows them to begin making money more quickly. But it also means that the City can begin collecting much-needed property and business tax revenue sooner.
{loadposition twitterbox}Coordination between the plan-checkers and the inspectors is a major component of speeding up the permitting process and it has allowed the City to reduce its fees by 15 percent, a reflection of the reduced time needing to be spent on each customer.
“Today is just a stepping stone in the process of improvement,” Bodek said. “There is more to come.”