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Audit finds inconsistent fees, missing policy and monitoring gaps in Santa Clara permitting; city lays out fixes
Summary
An independent audit of the city’s building permit process found fragmented written procedures, inconsistent fee calculations and uneven performance monitoring. City staff told the council they have already deployed new digital tools, an expedited review pilot and a multi‑year roadmap to address the findings.
The Santa Clara City Council on Oct. 7 received an audit that found the city’s building permit process lacked comprehensive written policies, sometimes applied fees inconsistently and did not track performance or customer complaints in a formal, auditable way.
David Knowles, city audit manager, summarized the independent review by Baker Tilly: auditors sampled 45 permits and identified variability in plan‑review timeliness and instances where fee calculations did not consistently match the municipal fee schedule. The audit recommended creating formal policies and procedures, better monitoring of processing times and more training for technicians who calculate fees.
Community Development Director Afsha Hamid told the council staff had already started implementing many changes since receiving early findings. Those steps include a fully digital permitting platform (Accela) launched in 2021, weekly workflow reporting introduced in mid‑2024, new customer‑facing handouts and a new expedited plan‑review pilot for eligible single‑family and tenant‑improvement work launched during the week of the meeting.
City staff also said they are recruiting a business‑analyst position to manage the Accela rollout and other permitting technology, and an organizational assessment of Community Development is under way to identify capacity and structure needs. A fuller “development process mapping” exercise is planned to identify remaining bottlenecks.
Council action: The council voted to note and file the auditor’s report and asked staff to return with a follow‑up within a year to summarize progress; the motion passed unanimously.
Why it matters: Building permits affect housing, business openings and construction timelines. The audit’s findings — inconsistent fee application, informal procedures and limited tracking of customer complaints — help explain complaints from applicants about delays and unpredictability in the review process. The city’s response centers on digitization (Accela), clearer service standards and staffing to run the new tools.
Key numbers and steps reported to council: - Auditors sampled 45 permit files drawn from FY 2022–23. - After process changes staff reported 70% of simple permits issue the same day; an internal Qmatic customer survey (Jul 2024–Mar 2025) showed 87.6% of respondents gave service a top rating. - Next steps include continuing the Acela rollout, hiring a business analyst and a planned development process mapping in 2025–26.
Sources: David Knowles, City Auditor’s Office; Afsha Hamid, Community Development Director.
