Since adopting measures to deal with delays in the Construction Permit Management System (CPMS), the City of Joburg’s development department has cleared a backlog of 1 067 building plan applications in the system.
From September 5 – 16 the department processed a total of 1 678 applications through the CPMS. During these two weeks, a total of 103 low-cost housing applications were also manually processed and approved.
“Since August 2022, the department has experienced technical problems with the CPMS. The problem being that applicants were unable to download signed copies of building plan applications that were approved on CPMS. This resulted in a backlog of applications at decision-making stage,” the city said.
To deal with this issue, the department has encouraged all applicants whose building applications were approved on the CPMS but were unable to download the signed copies because of the technical problems to bring two sets of copies of the plans submitted and approved on CPMS to the City of Joburg. The hard copies will then be verified against the applications submitted on the CPMS, signed and be ready for collection.
“The arrangement will continue until September 30, 2022, with all hard copies being signed off at the Metrolink Building at 158 Loveday Street, Braamfontein,” said the city,
The department warned applicants that, because of load shedding, some of the stamped approved hard copies might not be available the same day but could be collected the next day. The closing time of 7pm would be changed to 5.30pm depending on the load-shedding schedule.
Development Planning mayoral committee member (MMC) Belinda Echeozonjoku commended the hard work of the staff in the department and the patience of the industry stakeholders with the system. She said ensuring the city was “smart” and “business friendly” was a priority.