From 4 p.m. April 25 through Sunday, permitting, planning and engineering services will be offline, and operations will be limited. On Monday, users can access DallasNow and set up accounts. Open house events for people needing in-person support will occur starting Monday through May 16.
Dallas is aiming to slash inefficiencies by moving off legacy permitting processes, heavily reliant on in-person visits and paper documentation, to a fully digital platform. The multimillion-dollar system, built in partnership with Accela and supported by Gartner Consulting, is expected to improve service delivery for developers, residents and staff alike.
The cloud-based creation combines several legacy systems and integrates with multiple databases. These include its 20-year-old Public One-Stop Service Engine, ProjectDox, GIS, Dallas County appraisal data, and state units. The platform allows customers to submit applications, track status and manage inspections online. It also provides automatic email notifications as steps are completed, along with document management and online payment processing.
“This is a whole new frontier for development in Dallas in terms of permitting and zoning,” Jason Pool, Planning and Development’s assistant director of customer experience, said. “We get to move forward in a way that we never have and communicate in a way we never have. That, to me, is very exciting.”
Dallas is the ninth largest city in the U.S. with more than 1.3 million residents and covering roughly 385 square miles. Its geography can pose logistical challenges for navigating city services, including permitting and land use. Applicants are often directed to multiple city offices for various parts of the permitting process.
These conditions, combined with requirements for substantial paperwork and photocopies, often hand-delivered, are cumbersome for residents and developers, Pool said. With the launch of DallasNow, staff will view and process applications in an online dashboard. Applicants will be notified by email when submissions are accepted, payments are due, and inspections are completed. To support the transition, the city has launched a dedicated customer information portal that includes step-by-step tutorials, FAQs and help desk contacts.
“Once a permit is issued, it’s emailed directly to them. When inspectors enter results, those are shared instantly,” Pool said.
Dallas is part of a continuing movement among local governments to modernize permitting and land management systems. Denver streamlined its vacation rental permitting process, resulting in an increase in compliance rates from 14 percent to approximately 80 percent over three years. Similarly, Polk County, Fla., adopted a new land management system, expediting its building and permitting process. Both initiatives used Accela’s platform.
Dallas City Council hired the firm in 2023 to build its solution. The service contract included licensing, implementation, maintenance and support for five years at a cost not to exceed $9.7 million, subject to budget availability, according to the documents. Additionally, Gartner Consulting was contracted for program assurance services for $2.5 million over 26 months, according to a May implementation audit. (Costs are rounded.)
The launch of DallasNow rethinks how the city engages with developers, residents and its own internal workflows, Pool said. To accomplish that, officials looked at how other cities did things — from Fort Worth and San Antonio to Houston and Arlington.
“We were shocked at the [lower number of] people that came in daily,” Pool said. “I mean, here we could have lines out the door sometimes, but places that have updated their systems like this, there weren’t that many people coming in, which is a culture shock for us.”
