Calling it an agency “stuck in the past,” Los Angeles City Controller Laura Chick on Monday issued a sharply critical audit of the city planning department.
Chick’s audit prepared by planning consultant Paul Zucker, who also reviewed city planning practices for former Mayor Tom Bradley in 1991 criticized the planning department from top to bottom and listed 30 recommendations for improvement, some of them quite sweeping.
“My audit of City Planning found an agency cast in a time warp of past practices, old procedures and outdated technology,” Chick said in her audit cover letter to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and members of the City Council. “Of the over 90 audits conducted since I became Controller, there is not a more striking example of an organization stuck in the past than this one.”
In response to the audit, Deputy Planning Director Gordon Hamilton said the agency, “views this as a valuable third party assessment of our operations. Paul Zucker is a professional in planning. He’s looked at other cities and made recommendations for improvement here. We look forward to going through the recommendations in the audit to see how they might improve our operations.”
The audit said most permit applications and cases are handed off to at least four people, creating “impediments to efficiency.” It also noted a backlog of thousands of case-file documents to be scanned into the agency’s computer system and that staff reports are not posted on the Internet.
The audit also found no time limit for taking cases under advisement following a public hearing, resulting in lengthy delays. It further noted that planning commission meetings don’t use a consent calendar, making the hearings long and unwieldy.
In addition, the audit found that the “expedited planning” unit for developers willing to pay higher fees for faster processing is too small and does not meet the demand, even though the costs are fully recovered from developers. The audit also found “questionable charges” on interdepartmental invoices for expedited work.
Among the recommendations for improvement: consolidating staff review of individual cases, expanding the role of zoning investigators, a 90-day time limit for cases taken under advisement and bringing the agency’s computer files of cases up to date as quickly as possible.
Longtime planning director Con Howe left the agency in September. The city is seeking community as it searches for a permanent replacement. Chick said the audit should provide a road map for a new planning director to overhaul the department.
Interim Planning Director Mark Winogrond was out of town Monday at a planning conference and unavailable for comment.
