Laguna Beach planners report faster plan-checks but rising active caseload

City planning staff told the Laguna Beach City Council that average turnaround for zoning plan-check reviews has dropped sharply since late 2024, even as the planning office’s active caseload increased.

Assistant Director Matt Schneider and other Community Development staff reported that the department’s average time “with us” for plan-check activity dropped from 57 days in August (the department’s baseline) to an average of 14 days at the most recent measurement. The department said the reduction follows a combination of measures including fuller use of the EnerGov permitting platform, improved staff training, clearer first-round review checklists and additional staff hires.

At the same time staff reported the number of active cases rose from 192 to 276 over the same period. That increase, staff said, explains why total end‑to‑end processing times (from initial submittal to final decision) have not fallen proportionately: higher volume has kept overall workload elevated even as individual review rounds have accelerated.

Staff described several next steps: pursuing an urgency ordinance and other code edits to reduce discretionary triggers, improving application completeness at intake, continuing EnerGov migration to improve automated metrics and exploring whether private pre‑check services or new digital tools (including pilot uses of AI) could reduce incomplete resubmissions.

Council members and staff discussed whether some work could be outsourced or supplemented temporarily to knock down backlog; staff said hiring a contractor is difficult without code simplification because of the steep local code learning curve, but agreed to explore options. Staff also flagged a possible counter-hours change so staff could concentrate in‑office time for public counter availability and remote work days for processing.

Council received the presentation and thanked staff for progress; no formal land‑use decisions were taken.