Planning, permitting and parks outline FY2026 budgets; staffing and fee adjustments cited

City planning, permitting and parks officials presented department-level highlights of the proposed FY2026 city budget at the Finance Committee meeting April 29, describing operational changes, staffing adjustments and targeted revenue actions.

Why it matters: Department budgets determine how the city delivers permitting, planning, building inspections, parks maintenance and recreational programming. Officials described modest overall expenditure changes driven primarily by labor cost increases, while identifying service-level needs and new or restructured roles intended to improve delivery and revenue capture.

Planning and Urban Development: Kevin Craft, director of Planning and Urban Development, told the committee the department employs 17 full-time staff across development review, long-range planning and historic preservation and is proposing less than a one percent net change in its FY2026 budget with no new FTEs. Craft highlighted the department’s approvals last year — more than 450 new homes approved including roughly 268 deed-restricted affordable units — and other outcomes: about $1.2 million allocated to the JLC Doosan Housing Trust Fund, 100 new EV charging stations, more than 300 bike racks and roughly 100 new street trees. He also recapped large projects in process: the Roo Institute’s first phase with three acres of public open space along the waterfront, the Union Branch pathway (bids out, construction expected this summer), and Forest Avenue planning and design with a recommended road diet and further outreach to adjacent businesses. Craft said the department will start a comprehensive transportation plan update and a new comprehensive plan process in the coming year.

Permitting and Inspections: Director Jessica Hanscomb said her department has 40 staff and issued 5,432 permits in FY2024 and 6,587 licenses, including 904 short-term rental licenses in 2024. Long-term rental registrations totaled 19,046 units. In March 2024 the department launched proactive rent-control inspections; Hanscomb reported 3,911 units inspected last year (3,521 proactive, 309 complaint-driven). The department performed 13,439 inspections across building, health and housing safety services. FY2026 shows no proposed new staff; budget changes reflect wage adjustments from recently negotiated contracts and the conclusion of a $19,000 grant that funded training in FY2025. Revenue projections increased: building permits (+$870,000), electrical permits (+$85,000), short- and long-term license fees up and late‑filing fees for rental registration. Hanscomb also described an ordinance change affecting short-term rentals that takes effect in 2026 and divides short-term rentals into eight categories; the non-owner-occupied cap will be computed each year as 1.5 percent of long-term rental licenses (a calculation Hanscomb said would produce roughly 287 non-owner-occupied short-term licenses under current counts).

On regulatory scope, Hanscomb told the committee that state law preempts municipalities from licensing or inspecting rideshare drivers such as Uber and Lyft.

Parks, Recreation and Facilities: Director Hippel presented the largest and most complex department in the session. Parks, Recreation and Facilities manages about 1,400 acres of public land, roughly 20,000 street trees, 40 miles of trails, 11 community gardens and 13 cemeteries; the department has about 164 staff. Hippel said FY2026 reflects planned hires and restructuring to speed capital project delivery and improve venue operations. The department proposed a landscape architect/park project manager to manage about 50 funded projects, an additional full-time park ranger (totaling three full-time rangers), and a field-booking manager to centralize athletic-field scheduling and billing across roughly 40 athletic fields and two stadiums. Public assembly and venue management will receive additional venue managers to better coordinate Merrill Auditorium, the Expo and Fitzpatrick Stadium amid higher event volumes; Hippel described adding an Expo-focused manager to improve marketing, bookings and facility upkeep.

Hippel said the department’s largest cost increases come from contractual wage adjustments for unionized staff; he reported that wage and benefit changes account for a substantial share of the department’s proposed expenditure growth. To offset expense increases, the department proposed modest revenue adjustments: raising aftercare (before/after-school) fees by between $2 and $4 per week (creating about $250,000 in additional revenue), incremental cemetery fee increases, and higher daily-play and membership fees at Riverside Golf Course (about $300,000 in added revenue). Hippel said some accounting-line shifts were administrative (for example, changes in how concessions revenue is shared with professional tenants) and not net new expense.

Questions and operational details: Committee members pressed departments on staffing levels and vacancies. Permitting reported one posted vacancy; Planning said it had no current vacancies and was not proposing new positions; Parks reported roughly 4–5 current vacancies at the time of the report but said vacancies generally filled quickly and that the department is near pre‑COVID staffing levels. Recreation staff and seasonal wages were increased to $19 per hour to improve recruitment and retention for before/after-school programs and camps. Committee members asked how many additional recreation staff would be needed to eliminate waiting lists in aftercare; department staff estimated that adding roughly 8–10 positions across sites would materially reduce waiting lists but noted space constraints at some school sites and ongoing turnover in seasonal hires.

Short-term rentals and housing safety: Hanscomb explained the 2026 licensing changes in detail: categories will include owner-occupied and several Peaks Island classifications; the licensing renewal and notice process will include email blasts and mailed renewal notices to licensees. On housing safety and rent-control inspections, Hanscomb said the goal is to inspect every long-term rental unit once every three to four years; with about 19,000 registered units, the department averages roughly 5,000 unit inspections per year depending on building sizes and complaint levels.

Next steps and schedule: Committee Chair Bridal closed the session by confirming upcoming meetings to handle public works, police and health and human services budgets and by noting tentative dates for further reviews of downtown, parking, library and housing line items.

Bottom line: City departments presented a budget cycle focused on absorbing contract wage increases, modest targeted hires to improve operational delivery and a small set of revenue increases to offset costs. Many changes are driven by labor costs and by the city’s desire to accelerate capital and maintenance work and to professionalize venue and field scheduling for revenue capture.