People seeking building permits in Honolulu, currently faced with months-long and sometimes years-long delays, should get some relief in the coming months thanks to technology upgrades, the department announced on Wednesday. 

Dawn Takeuchi Apuna, the director of the Department of Planning and Permitting, said the city is making long-overdue investments to replace the systems it’s used for decades. 

The department currently uses software called POSSE that has been around since 1998, she said. And when Mayor Rick Blangiardi’s administration took office, DPP was still using pneumatic tubes — an archaic system that used compressed air to suck cylindrical containers through pipes to deliver documents. 

“We aren’t going to suck anymore,” Takeuchi Apuna joked at a press conference.   

DPP is pursuing tech improvements in three key areas.

First, POSSE is being replaced by a building permit software called Clariti. The department described it as a user-friendly solution designed to “streamline and expedite permit processing and inspections and enforcement.” 

The effort began in February and will continue over the course of 18 months, with a public roll-out at the halfway point, according to Takeuchi Apuna. 

Users will be able to apply and pay for their permits via an online portal. Currently, many applicants have to bring checks to the department in person. 

In the next six months, Honolulu will also implement “major upgrades” to its ProjectDox system. This will move DPP functions into the digital cloud for “faster processing and higher performance,” she said, and add new features to help applicants answer the question: “Where’s my permit?”  

Applicants and interested parties, like contractors, will be able to see how long a permit has been waiting and clearly identify “who is holding it up, and who’s not,” Takeuchi Apuna said. Users will be able to download comments into an Excel spreadsheet that can be shared with their project teams. 

“Step-by-step task instructions will be provided to applicants that clearly indicate what needs to be addressed,” Takeuchi Apuna said. 

DPP will also build on the success of its bot, which has reduced the backlog in its prescreen queue — the first step in permitting that checks for superficial formatting issues. 

In 2022, prescreening was taking months. As of this year, it takes an average of five days, according to departmental data.

A new partnership with CivCheck, an artificial intelligence-based software company, is allowing DPP to run actual building plans through a robotic system to check for code compliance. The system will be used only for residential jobs, including single and two-family homes, additions and alterations.

Getting straightforward plans processed digitally will free up staff to take on more complex jobs, according to the director. For compliance gray areas, though, a staff member’s interpretation may still be needed, she said.

The system will help applicants fully understand what is expected, which will improve the quality of their plans and reduce the number of review cycles by DPP, Takeuchi Apuna said. 

“The result is a more rapid, accurate and predictive permitting experience,” Takeuchi Apuna said. “This is a game changer for permit review.”

CivCheck is currently being used as part of a five-month pilot project the county is participating in for free. The Clariti system will cost $5.3 million over the next three years, and ProjectDox will cost $206,000 — both covered by American Rescue Plan funds, Takeuchi Apuna said. 

The director said the combination of tools will help DPP fulfill a promise made by Mayor Blangiardi at his State of the City address: that in one year, it will take DPP an average of two to four weeks to review residential permits and six months or less for commercial jobs. 

As of January, it takes residential projects an average of more than six months to go from application to permit issuance. Commercial projects wait an average of more than a year.

Aside from technology, the department is working to hire third-party code reviewers to decrease the backlog, train staff in standard operating procedures and issue pay raises to engineers, who are needed to review commercial plans but who have a high vacancy rate.

At the press conference, Blangiardi acknowledged the challenge the city faces to speed up permitting but expressed unequivocal confidence in Takeuchi Apuna.

“This is akin to trying to change a tire (while) going 60 miles per hour down the freeway,” the mayor said. “We all wish it was a lot better today than it is. So we’re not where we want to be, but we will get there.”