Additional information on permit performance metrics

Technical information on how the City calculates permit performance metrics and targets. This information is meant to help the public and other technical audiences understand how permit performance is estimated.

Department of Building Inspection

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Learn about our building permit review processes

General information about the permit performance metrics

Calendar days

All of the review time estimates in the dashboards and the performance targets are in calendar days unless otherwise specified.

Median days

We use median days which represents the number of days that the median plan check or permit application took to complete. Medians are different than averages in that they represent the permit in the exact middle of all permits when they are arranged from shortest to longest number of review days.

Time period used for the estimates presented

The time periods presented in the dashboard (last 12 months, last 6 months, and last month) refer to the last 12, 6 or 1 full calendar months. The data used to estimate the metrics is automatically updated daily so the estimates may change from day to day as existing permits or reviews are completed.

Data sources for the performance metrics

The estimates can be recreated using the following datasets available on the City's Open Data Portal:

Technical information on the Planning Application review metrics

Time to Planning Application approval metrics

Definitions

Median days to approve: Number of days from when the Planning Department determines the application to be complete to final approval. This includes both the time the City spends reviewing applications and the time applicants spend reviewing and responding to comments, revising plans, and paying fees.
Number of applications approved: Number of planning applications approved during the reporting timeframe.

Exclusions: Only includes planning applications approved within the reporting timeframe. Excludes any PRJs with status of "cancelled" or "withdrawn" (these are customer-initiated cancellations).

Source: Planning Accela PPTS

Caveats/ known issues: This includes applications that were started before significant process improvements were implemented in planning and building permit review processes in January 1, 2024. Planning applications and permits filed before these improvements tended to have significantly longer approval timelines which will increase the total median days estimate reported.

Time to Planning Application review metrics

Definitions

Median days to review:

Completeness check: Number of days from when the applicant first submits the application to when the Planning Department issues a letter outlining all missing materials. This includes letters with an application complete or incomplete determination. There may be multiple rounds of completeness check review per project.
First plan review: The median number of days from when the Planning Department receives a complete application from an applicant to when the Planning Department issues a letter outlining how the proposed project meets or does not meet the code and any necessary changes required to obtain compliance.
Resubmission review: Median number of days from when an applicant submits a set of revised plans to when the Planning Department issued a letter outlining how the proposed project meets or does not meet the code and any necessary changes required to obtain compliance. There may be multiple resubmissions for one project.

Target days to review:

Completeness check: The Planning Department’s current target for issuing a letter outlining all missing materials from the date the applicant submits the application, in calendar days.
First plan review: The Planning Department’s current target for issuing a first plan check letter after the application has been deemed complete (i.e. "accepted"), in calendar days.
Resubmission review: The Planning Department’s current target for responding to a set of revised plans submitted by the applicant with a letter outlining how the proposed project meets or does not meet the Planning code and any necessary changes required to obtain compliance, in calendar days.

Percent meeting target: Percent of completeness check, first plan or resubmission reviews that were completed within the target number of days.

Exclusions:

Only includes completeness checks, first plan reviews, or resubmission reviews started within the reporting timeframe. Excludes any review events with a negative number of review days.
Excludes Environmental Review only projects initiated by other City agencies. These are usually public capital improvement projects, for example a new park or upgrades to City or public buildings.
Excludes planning applications that are not associated with traditional development projects (e.g. IMP, MAP, rezoning parcels). This includes the following types of projects: 'PCA' - Planning Code Amendment (usually done by the Board of Supervisors), 'CWP' - Citywide Project , 'GPR' - General Plan Referral (legislative change), 'DES' - Historic designation, 'IMP' - Institutional Master Plan (Academy of Arts, University of California, etc.), 'MAP’ - Map Amendment (zoning change for parcel, usually done by the Board of Supervisors).
Excludes Development Agreement and large multiphase projects.

Source: Planning Accela PPTS

Caveats/ known issues:

There can be a delay b/w application submitted date and completeness check or fist plan review start date, this can be due to the review waiting to be assigned or follow up with applicants to address minor issues (i.e. application documents missing, duplicate applications, etc.).
Projects that are code compliant upon first review will not receive a Plan Check Letter and instead will move straight to Planning Approval Letter issued. These projects are included in the percent meeting target estimate.
Resubmissions are emailed to planners who then enter the plan revision received date manually. For planning applications and resubmissions received via the Accela online portal, the revision received date is auto-populated.
The last Plan Revision Received event may not have a corresponding “Plan Check Letter Issued” date to close out the review period. For these cases, the review period is closed out by the next “Notice Start Date”, “Hearing - Published Agenda Date” or “Project Code Compliant” date.

Technical information on the Building Permit Application review metrics

Time to Building Permit issuance metrics

Definitions

Median days to approve: Number of days from building permit application filed to permit issued. This includes both the time the City spends reviewing a plan or permit for safety and code compliance, and the time the applicant spends reviewing the City’s comments, correcting and resubmitting plans, and paying various issuance fees. Calculations for this metric are broken apart for in-house review permits and over-the-counter permits.
Number of applications approved: Number of permits issued during the reporting timeframe. Calculations for this metric are separated by in-house review permits and over-the-counter permits.

Exclusions:

In-house permits are defined as permit types (forms) 1, 2, 3, 5, and 6 and over-the-counter permits are defined at permit types 4, 7, and 8.
This includes site permit addenda and Fire permits that are issued by DBI.

Source: Department of Building Inspection PTS

Caveats/ known issues:

This metric includes time that the City is waiting for the customer to respond to comments or pay fees.

Time to Building Permit Application review metrics

Definitions

Median days to review:

Completeness check: The median number of days from application submitted to building permit application completeness check letter sent. This includes letters with an application complete or incomplete determination. There may be multiple rounds of completeness check review per project.
First plan review: The median number of days for each station to issue first plan review comments, starting from the permit filed date. First reviews were identified by removing all reviews with a review result of “administrative” or “not applicable” and then each stations rows were sequenced based on the “arrive” date. The station row with sequence number 1 was classified as the first plan review.
Resubmission review: Number of days for each station to issue resubmission review comments once they a plan reviewer starts working on them. There may be multiple resubmissions for one permit.

Target days to review:

The number of calendar days the City aims to take to review building permit applications for completeness check, first and resubmission review at least 75% of the time.

Percent meeting target: Percent of completeness check, first plan or resubmission reviews that were completed within the target number of days.

Exclusions:

Only includes completeness checks, first plan reviews, or resubmission reviews started within the reporting timeframe. Excludes any review events with a negative number of review days.
This only includes in-house permits (permit types 1, 2, 3, 5, 6). Permit types 1 and 2 are new construction, permit type 3 is for complex alterations and repairs, permit type 5 is grading and shoring, and permit type 6 is demolition.
This includes site permit addenda and Fire permits that are issued by DBI.
Only stations that conduct plan review (not administrative or inspections stations) are included in this metric.
Review steps where the review result was marked as "Administrative" or "Not Applicable" were excluded.
Only stations from the following departments were included: Building Inspection, Public Works, Fire, Public Health, Public Utilities Commission, Planning, Office of Community Investment & Infrastructure.
Only the following review stations were included: BLDG, MECH, DPW-BUF, MECH-E, SFFD-HQ, SFFD-PRT, HEALTH-HM, HEALTH-HP, HEALTH-CN, HEALTH-RF, HEALTH-MB, HEALTH-SW, HEALTH-PL, HEALTH-AQ, SFPUC-PRG, DPW-BSM, CP-ZOC, SFFD, HEALTH, PAD-STR, REDEV, PID-PC, SFPUC, PW-DAC, HEALTH-FD, HEALTH-MH

Source: Department of Building Inspection PTS