If you’ve ever tried to pull a building permit in Los Angeles, you know the drill: one department doesn’t talk to another, corrections come in waves, and a project that should take months can stretch into years.
Mayor Karen Bass just signed an executive directive aimed at breaking that cycle—and for anyone building affordable housing or trying to add units to a property, the changes could be significant.
Executive Directive No. 19, signed April 27, sets new permitting timelines for 100% affordable housing projects in what Bass described in the directive as a system “too often fragmented, unpredictable, and uncoordinated across departments.”
The centerpiece: all city departments must complete every required review and issue all ministerial approvals for 100% affordable housing projects within 60 days of a completed application—not 60 days per department, but 60 days total, with departments required to work simultaneously rather than in sequence.
What counts as ‘100% affordable’ under the directive
The directive defines “100% Affordable Housing” as any project with five or more units where all units are rented at 80% of Area Median Income (AMI) or below.
A mixed-income version also qualifies: up to 20% of units can go up to 120% AMI, with the rest at 80% AMI or lower.
Under the new rules, departments must hand applicants all required corrections within 30 days. Clearances and utility releases must be processed within 5 business days for affordable housing projects—and within just 2 business days for shelters.
AI tools and a smarter plan review system
The directive kicks off a procurement process for AI-powered pre-plan check tools. The idea is to let developers run their plans through an automated review before ever submitting to the city—catching zoning conflicts and code issues early, before the costly correction cycles begin.
Within 30 days, the Los Angeles Department of Building and Safety (LADBS) must also begin implementing access to its ePlan system for all city departments, so reviewers at the Los Angeles Fire Department, Bureau of Engineering, Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP), and others can move toward concurrent review of submitted plans rather than waiting in line.
Fire rebuild plans go citywide
One provision will directly affect homeowners across the city. Pre-approved standard plan sets that the city fast-tracked for fire recovery rebuild under Executive Directive 13 will now be available to any property owner in L.A.—meaning you could select an already-approved architectural plan and use it without additional plan review.
Within 30 days, LADBS must consolidate all standard plan programs—including ADU plans and fire-rebuild plans—into a single online portal. The department is also directed to explore expanding the program to additional residential and accessory structure types.
Virtual inspections, online permits, and the LADWP bottleneck
The directive also targets two more pain points for homeowners and small landlords. Within 60 days, LADBS must expand the scope and availability of virtual inspections as both a supplement and replacement for in-person visits, with a focus on certain commercial permits and additional residential permit types. LADBS also has 45 days to report on expanding the online Express Permit program to a wider range of projects that can be approved entirely online.
On the power side, LADWP is directed to join a new task force to identify barriers in the new power connection process. The department has 45 days to report on a customer-facing energization portal and potential financial mechanisms—like amortization—that could help projects avoid large upfront fees for temporary power hookups.
The City Administrative Officer also has 30 days to deliver a list of vacant city-owned land that could serve as temporary construction staging areas. A new City-Owned Land Taskforce will form within the same window to evaluate which parcels are viable for housing development.
Whether these deadlines hold will depend on whether city departments have the staffing and systems to back them up—something the directive itself acknowledges by requiring each department to report on resource needs and phased implementation plans. But for developers and homeowners who’ve watched projects stall in L.A.’s permitting maze, the 60-day clock is a number worth watching.
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