Land Resources Management outlines multi-year e-permitting push and large subsurface digitization
Loading...
Summary
Staff reported nearly 3,000 online permit submissions since January and said ARPA and capital funds will support a multi‑year rollout of e‑filing via Windsor Solutions’ Nform and a project to digitize millions of historic subsurface files; shoreland rule changes will be considered during next year’s readoption.
Land Resources Management staff told the Capital Budget and Capital Project Overview Committee that they have made substantial progress moving permit applications online and are digitizing decades of subsurface septic records.
An unidentified LRM presenter introduced assistant commissioner Adam Crapo and Phil Trowbridge, who led the update. An LRM presenter said the department has two capital appropriations and one ARPA award supporting the work and that “we're trying to spend the ARPA funding down first,” because ARPA “needs to be obligated by the end of this year and spent by the end of 2026.”
Staff said the move to electronic filing is intended to replace paper forms and multiple legacy databases, improve turnaround times, and reduce back‑office data entry. The presenter said that since January the department has received “nearly 3,000 total submissions online,” with shoreland and wetland permits accounting for the largest share of applications.
On e‑permitting the department is working with Windsor Solutions’ Nform product to move from PDF-based uploads toward a true e‑filing workflow that will permit most applications to be submitted without PDFs except for detailed plans. Staff described the effort as a multi‑year rollout, expecting work to continue over the “next two or three years” to bring additional programs online.
Trowbridge described a separate subsurface records project, saying the department is digitizing historic septic records and “we are digitizing around 4,000,000 old subsurface files.” He reported the project is roughly 15% complete and said the digitized archive helps constituents, for example, during real‑estate transactions or development reviews.
Committee members asked about shoreland permit‑by‑notification thresholds (the transcript referenced a 900 square‑foot threshold). Trowbridge said the shoreland rules are scheduled for readoption next year and staff will look at streamlining and permit‑by‑notification options during that rule review; he offered to bring threshold changes into the discussion.
The presenter and committee also exchanged numbers about subsurface activity: staff stated roughly 3,000 online submissions for shoreland/wetland programs and later referenced a figure of 6,000 in relation to subsurface applications during questions. Staff did not explicitly reconcile those two figures in the meeting; the digitization project number (about 4,000,000 historic files) was presented as a separate inventory figure.
Next steps: staff said they will continue implementing the e‑permitting rollout, prioritize obligating ARPA funds before the end of the year, and follow up during rule readoption and with any specific threshold proposals that may emerge.
Quotes in this article are taken verbatim from the meeting transcript and are attributed to the speakers as identified in the transcript. Direct attributions come from the speaker list tied to the transcript segments.
