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It took more than a year for one processor hired to help clients get permits secure one for an emergency repair job. A property owner, at wit’s end, has appealed to the governor’s office for help. And one contractor, tired of unreturned voicemails, won’t take jobs in the city anymore.
These few examples represent just a snapshot of the complaints from contractors, property owners and professional permit processors who need required permits for housing and construction work in Baltimore. The permits are meant to ensure certain standards are met in new building construction and renovations, housing use and occupancy, and gas, electrical, heating and plumbing jobs.
But actually getting one can be incredibly difficult. Poor communication and an outdated, unintuitive computer system make navigating the process difficult, according to data from a nearly month-long survey by the Baltimore housing department Baltimore City Department of Housing & Community Development in February.
The Baltimore Banner obtained the more than 900 survey responses in a public records request and has spent the last several weeks reviewing the feedback.
Not all reviews were negative, but nearly four out of every five respondents said the process was difficult. More than one in three said it was very difficult — and, as one person put it more colorfully, a “loop of death.”
“Your current portal is a morass of dysfunction,” a property owner wrote.
“I AM ASKING TO HELP SPEND MONEY IN THE CITY. Why does the city make it so hard?” wrote another.
“It is ridiculously inept,” a respondent added.
More than a third of survey respondents said it took longer than 60 days to get their permit approved or denied. Getting encroachment plan permits — which authorize work on city and state-owned land — take the longest.
Read the story: ‘Ridiculously inept’: Just how hard is it to get a permit in Baltimore? .
The vast majority of the data provided to The Baltimore Banner needed only light cleaning before analysis. The Baltimore Banner manually reviewed unstructured text responses and classified the most important, common responses.
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