Agenda Index City of Vancouver

ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT

TO: Standing Committee on City Services and Budgets
FROM: Director of Development Services, in consultation with the Chief Building Official and the Director of Current Planning
SUBJECT: Development and Building Review - Implementation Progress and Next Steps
 

INFORMATION

GENERAL MANAGER’S COMMENTS

CITY MANAGER’S COMMENTS

COUNCIL POLICY

Council has approved a number of resolutions supporting the Better City Government Program. All changes in level of service are to be reported to Council.

SUMMARY

The Development and Building Review (DBR) was initiated to improve the development and building application review and approval processes. The Review begun with a design team, then progressed to a “pilot” project. In the summer of last year, a review of DBR was conducted by senior management and five priorities for implementation were identified. Since that time, work has proceeded on those priorities and a new department - Development Services - has been created which brings together CSG staff who are directly involved in the review and approval processes.
Staff are now ready to put a new “Enquiry Centre” in place which will provide customers with: more and faster over-the-counter permits; a one-stop customer service facility; more and better information about potential roadblocks and likelihood of project success; “streaming” of applications for more efficient processing; consolidation of public information materials and sales and a modest phone centre.

The “Processing Centre” is also ready, pending completion of renovations, with a detailed process guide completed. Project management will be provided through ProjectCoordinators on less complex projects and Project Facilitators on the more complex projects; there will be earlier and more involvement in the process by the applicant; projects will have a single point of staff contact through facilitators or coordinators; conflict resolution will be undertaken where necessary and most importantly, development and building reviews will be integrated at the beginning of the review process.

The full implementation of the new process depends on renovations to the East Wing. CSG and Facilities Management staff are continuing work in this area and are currently producing construction drawings and developing a phasing plan for construction. It is anticipated that renovations will be completed early in 2001.

PURPOSE

The purpose of this report is to advise Council of the progress made in implementing the new process for reviewing development and building proposals. Accompanying this report is one on Resource Requirements for implementation.

BACKGROUND

Development and Building Regulation Review (DBRR) was one of the priorities of the Better City Government program. This priority item reflected continuing community and development industry concerns regarding:
… the scope of regulation (either inadequately or excessively “protective” of neighbourhood, developer or City objectives);
… the timeliness and openness of City review/approval processes ; and
… the City’s inability to differentiate between small and large development projects; both in terms of regulations and approval processes.

Although the application and review/approval processes are, in part, a consequence of the regulations that apply, the DBRR initiative chose to initially focus on improvements to the processes, leaving to a later date the review of the related regulations. DBRR thus became DBR (Development and Building Review).

DBR commenced with a ‘design team’ of seconded staff which worked to: document existing review/approval processes in the City; document ‘best practices’ from other cities; identify principles and objectives to be achieved and develop a conceptual model for a newdevelopment and building review process in the City. The resultant model was endorsed by Council in early 1997.

Subsequently, an implementation team of seconded staff was put together to prototype the new process. This “Pilot” was expanded in May 1998 as it expanded in testing, defining and developing new staff roles. However, further expansion of the Pilot was deferred in March 1999 when a review of the DBR process was initiated.

The need for a review stemmed from the growing recognition that implementation of the new process was not progressing as intended as a consequence of several obstacles. These included:
… difficulties in addressing space requirements without affecting other work groups;
… problems in progressing with classification of the positions/roles in the new process;
… lack of progress in developing new information technology to support the new process;
… lack of staff “buy-in” to a new process; and
… concerns with the impacts of developing the new process at the expense of staffing needed to undertake day to day customer service.

In July 1999, the DBR Review concluded that the DBR principles were sound but that implementation required a focus on five priority items instead of an original twelve. These five priorities are:

… Development of an Enquiry Centre
… Development of detailed procedures for project review;

… Development of an appropriate management structure; and
… Work on renovations to support the new process;

There are also other aspects of the process which are essential to implementation and which will be developed as time allows. In fact, some work has been completed on some of these and is described later in this report. These other priorities include: community involvement; education and training; measurement; information technology; conflict resolution, sectors/area generalists and fees.

DISCUSSION

The following provides an overview of the progress made toward implementation of the five priority items identified in the 1999 DBR Review.

ENQUIRY CENTRE

PURPOSE

The goal of the Enquiry Centre is to create an integrated “one stop” customer service facility for enquiries and application preview regarding regulations and procedures pertaining to the use, development and building on property within the City. The impact of Enquiry Centre services will be to:

… provide customers with a single point of contact for information;
… provide much better service for less complex applications through project streaming (employing a “concierge” function) to appropriate review staff;
… better inform prospective customers and reduce “late hits” through the scoping function;
… provide faster service for many permits that can be issued over-the-counter;
… consolidate our public information materials and publication/map sales;
… provide a modest phone centre to respond to caller enquiries, thereby reducing call abandonment rates and wait times.
…
WORK TO DATE

Emanating from the work of a staff team which detailed the needs of the Enquiry Centre, the following has been achieved:

… The Phone Centre is ready to implement as soon as construction is complete;
… An electronic customer queuing system will be put in place;
… Staff are now cross-training and making the other adjustments necessary to prepare for full Enquiry Centre implementation;
… Protocols have been developed for “on-call” experts who would provide more in-depth information and advice, when required, to the public at our Enquiry Centre;
… Staff scheduling has been worked out to allow for staff rotation between the counter, phone centre and concierge function; and
… Scheduling has been finalized regarding rotation of three Project Coordinators from the “Processing Centre” into the Enquiry Centre for the purposes of over-the-counter permit issuance for minor development and building permits

NEXT STEPS

The Manager of the Enquiry Centre advises that full implementation only awaits renovations and the resolution of staff requirements. The latter is covered in the accompanying report.

2. DETAILED PROCEDURES FOR PROJECT REVIEW

PURPOSE

The goal of the new process is to better manage and integrate the numerous, fragmented, unnecessarily sequential and often conflicting City approvals that projects may require in order to proceed. The initial focus is on development and building permit application approvals. The impact of new process implementation will be to:
… Reduce “late hits” by:

… Provide “project facilitation” for complex development and building projects. This will give applicants a single point of contact and project management throughout the process;
… Provide for more inclusion of the project applicant and the community so that they can better identify and understand where their interests coincide or diverge;
… Undertake conflict resolution where there are significant disagreements amongst interested parties;
… Enhance the Design Review process through more timely involvement of applicants in the process prior to decision-making;
… Make the project reviews more “transparent” and;
… Better coordinate and integrate development and building reviews. Involved staff will be brought together at the beginning of the review process which will enableconcurrent reviews, a more comprehensive understanding of issues and competing objectives, and the management of conflicts to provide greater efficiency.

WORK TO DATE

Commencing in September of 1999, a team of eight staff began to document the changes required to the current development and building permit application processes. Achievements resulting from their initial work include:
… The completion of a “Process Guide” which explains the new steps to be undertaken by individual staff or work groups, in order to integrate the development and building review processes. The guide outlines innumerable changes in procedures and responsibilities. However, the two most fundamental changes are: (i) the incorporation of the Project Facilitators and Part-time Project Facilitators; and (ii) procedures to “team” zoning and building staff;
… Minor development applications will be streamed to ensure faster processing;
… Improvements to the Design Review process are being developed to provide for more applicant involvement and greater efficiency;
… Building/zoning integration is being piloted for mixed use commercial and RM4 applications
… Improved public notification has begun;
… A dispute resolution mechanism has been established;
… Full and part-time Project Facilitator roles are being detailed, specifically with regard to referral criteria.

NEXT STEPS

The anticipated space alterations in the East Wing will facilitate implementation of the new procedures by enabling co-location of Processing Centre staff (currently located on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th floors) on the same floor as Planning Department staff predominantly involved in processing (Development Planners, Rezoning Planners and Heritage Planners) and alongside the Subdivision & Strata Title staff. The proximity of development and building staff to one another will greatly facilitate teaming of staff with different expertise for cross-training and joint reviews.

Provided necessary resources are in place, the new procedures should be fully operational by late spring of 2001.

3. NEW STAFF ROLES AND ORGANIZATION

PURPOSE

The goal of this work was to formalize and recruit staff to the new roles of Project Coordinator, Project Scoper and Project Facilitator. The full impact of these new roles will not be realized for some time. However, there are already some identifiable benefits, with many customers and previously resistant staff letting us know that the functions being performed by staff in these roles are very valuable. The anticipated impacts of the new roles include:
… the early identification of all approvals required by a project, issues likely to be encountered and possible late hits, thus reducing unanticipated requirements, delays and associated financial costs to the applicant and increasing applicant satisfaction with the process;
… a single staff person being the point of contact for a project, thus minimizing the “runaround”;
… sound project management, producing a more efficient, seamless process for the applicant; and
… the employment of conflict resolution techniques to better understand competing values and seek cooperative solutions, reducing antagonism, frustration and an “I won, you lost” outcome.

WORK TO DATE

Achievements in this area are as follows:
… In January, classifications for Project Coordinator Is, IIs and IIIs were finalized. The new classifications combine the requirements for reviewing plans for both development (principally zoning) and building compliance.
… In early February, most development and building permit application processing staff positions were reclassified to the new PC positions.
… Classifications were also finalized in January for the positions of Project Scoper and Project Facilitator and recruitment and hiring was completed by March.
… Development Planners (for the DE portion) and the Professional Engineers in the BCRB (for the BU portion) have been identified as part-time PFs for their respective parts of the process.

NEXT STEPS

One Project Facilitator position has yet to be filled. Issues regarding this position is covered in the accompanying report on resources.

4. MANAGEMENT STRUCTURE

PURPOSE

The goal of developing a new management structure was to bring various staff together to create two major work groups within Development Services: Enquiry Centre and Processing Centre. This had been foreshadowed in the DBR Review and was long anticipated by many staff prior to the formal establishment in late April. Anticipated impacts of the creation of Development Services and its two major branches (Enquiry and Processing) are:
… improved communication regarding individual work group completion expectations;
… timely involvement of decision-making staff required to resolve intra- or inter-departmental issues or City/applicant issues; and
… improved overall project management and integration of all City review and approval processes.

WORK TO DATE

… The new organizational structure, along with the identification of managers and supervisors, was formalized and announced in late April;
… The relationship between the processing responsibilities of the Director of Development Services and the legal/approving authority responsibilities of the Director of Planning, the Chief Building Official and the Subdivision Approving Officer have been detailed and conveyed to the managers required to administer these responsibilities.

The organizational structure of Development Services and its current relationships are schematically illustrated in Appendix A. This also identifies the managers and supervisorsnow in place within the new organization. Appendix B provides numbers regarding all Development Services staff, departments and branches from which these staff have come to Development Services and numbers of staff and names of branches/divisions left in the Planning and Permits and Licenses departments.

NEXT STEPS

This work is now complete. Refining the organizational structure and team building will continue with the new process.

5. RENOVATIONS

PURPOSE

The impact of the renovations in the East Wing and Inspections “bull pen” will be to:
… Locate those services having the highest volume of customer visits on floors most convenient to our customers;
… Provide improved space for Inspections staff and co-locate Inspectors with their Manager and Supervisors;
… Provide a space configuration that accommodates the Enquiry Centre functions, including construction of a Phone Centre;
… Co-locate Processing Centre staff, and locate them in proximity to other staff predominantly involved in application review;
… Consolidate staff in Community Services’ Support Services, including moving several staff from the W. 10th Ave. Annex (VanCity);
… Maintain Licensing and Property Use Inspections in recently renovated space; and
… Minimize the renovation expenditures in achieving the foregoing by utilizing existing interior partitions where possible and utilizing existing furniture.

WORK TO DATE

Again, working with a staff team comprised of work group representatives and in consultation with Facilities Management:
… A spatial concept plan was completed in February. This achieved, to the greatest extent possible, both the goals identified above and the proximity requirements identified through a survey of staff in September/October.
… A signed-off space plan was sent to Facilities Management in early May.

NEXT STEPS

With the assistance of CSG staff, Facilities Management is currently working on the coordination of construction phasing, budget preparation, construction drawings and documentation, tendering and finally, the actual construction. Construction is scheduled for completion in the early part of 2001.

6. WORK ON OTHER PRIORITIES

Although work has focused on concluding the foregoing priority items, some work has also been done on the following:

Community Involvement
The development application process frequently solicits community input into those projects seeking discretionary approval. However, the Development Permit Application (DE) notification process has long been the subject of criticism. Two significant changes have been undertaken to improve both the notification process and the notification letters:
… An additional notification has been added. Residents who respond to the original notification are now notified once a decision has been made on the development application, acknowledging the comments received and explaining the decision(s) reached on the discretionary matter(s) raised by the application. The purpose of this additional notification is to keep neighbours informed, particularly with regard to the impact of their previous input;
… The content of the DE notification letters is also being changed, clarifying which aspects of the application require special approval and which do not, indicating how comments are factored into the decision, and generally simplifying the technical by-law references. A much more friendly, less officious style is to be used;
… A brochure is being prepared for distribution to applicants, staff and members of the public who may be involved in the more complex and controversial projects submitted, explaining the role of the Project Facilitator and how to reach the facilitator;
… As part of the current phase of the Public Involvement Review, staff involved in a controversial project are employing both the PIR principles and the new process, engaging one of the three Project Facilitators. Staff will be measuring the benefits of improved public involvement and identifying the costs to the City of doing so on a sustained basis;
… The Public Involvement Review has produced a draft guide for staff on how to conduct effective public involvement processes. This will be used by Development Services staff and will be modified for use by applicants required to conduct public processes;
… Staff are currently working on the next steps for refining public involvement in the permitting process and will be engaging members of the Community/Industry Advisory Committee in this process.

Measurement
In order to determine benefits and identify areas of performance needing attention, both quantitative process measurements and qualitative customer satisfaction measurements are required.

Because of the delay in the implementation of the Development Tracking component of MAP, staff are now developing interim measures, using the existing system - PRISM - for producing quantitative data. This data will be helpful in measuring changes in: overall elapsed time for the review/approval processes; wait times for reviews; turnaround times for certain application processes and in our ability to meet target dates.

During the “Pilot” prototype, Nova Quality Research assisted staff in developing a series of questionnaires and other means of soliciting customer feedback on the new process. This yielded some valuable information. As part of future work, staff intend to build on the previous work and develop a simple, easily-administered process for obtaining customer feedback.

Information Technology (IT) to Support the New Process
The new process efficiencies, while not entirely dependent upon IT, will only be maximized if supportive IT is provided. For instance, information as to how each review group might be seeking modifications to the project must be readily available to all other review groups.All project participants also need to be able to monitor the status of the process, particularly if some review group’s resource scheduling might be affected by a delay elsewhere. A single “project file” is required to eliminate lost information and the costly expenditure of staff time spent in searching for information.

Work continues on the evaluation of MAP as a vehicle for providing the desired IT application, and in particular the viability of implementing the Development Tracking (DT) application in MAP. VanMAP has clearly provided staff with immediate access to various background data that assist in responding to enquiries and project reviews.

A corporate report on the future implementation of MAP is expected to be before Council in the next few months.

REGULATION REVIEW

Regulation review is another important aspect of the original DBR mandate. Work on this will be two-fold: firstly, on problematical regulations as they arise during project review and specifically where there are conflicts amongst our various by-laws; secondly, on developing an approach for more systematic review. Staff have already , for example, been working on establishing commonality among use terms in the Zoning and Development By-law, the Vancouver Building By-law and the License By-law. This latter work will be undertaken as soon as resources are available. Notwithstanding the importance of regulation review, the process improvements remain a priority.

CONCLUSION

The vision of the DBR is now becoming a reality. From the original design team, to the “Pilot” and now to the new Development Services Department, staff have worked hard to bring the developmental process to fruition. It has been a difficult, but very worthwhile endeavour. The Development Services Department is composed of two major components: the Enquiry Centre and the Processing Centre. Management and staff in both these centres continue to refine the details of implementation. For some new activities, such as the Phone Centre and some other parts of the Enquiry Centre, implementation awaits the completion of renovations. Other work, such as the teaming of Project Coordinators to better integrate building and zoning reviews, will also be greatly facilitated by the renovations. However, much is being and will continue to be put in place over the next six months. Whenimplemented in full, staff will be able to monitor and measure the impact of the work. The new process will significantly improve the development and building review procedures for our customers by providing: a more rewarding and transparent process; a single point of contact for much of the process; project management and facilitation services where required; clearer and earlier notification to residents; early identification of late hits and project viability; shorter wait times and turnaround times in many cases; better service for the telephone customer and more information available for those who wish to help themselves.

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