Planning Administration Considers Fees for Self-Approval Building Permits

Israel’s Planning Administration is weighing new collection fees under the “Morasha Le-Heter” self-approval permit reform. At a conference in Rehovot on Monday, Hani Moyal, head of the Planning Administration’s licensing process development division, said officials are considering charging for the information and procedures included in the reform, but no decision has been made yet on the amount or the exact calculation method.

The reform, also known as self-licensing, was officially launched in October 2022 to allow architects, not only local planning committees, to issue building permits. The goal is to shorten the permitting stage, which is often seen as a long and burdensome hurdle to new construction. Moyal said the local committees have to invest far more resources in permit information under the self-approval track than under a regular permit, and that the current information fee is the same in both cases.

She said, “The Morasha Le-Heter reform forces planning committees to add time and manpower inputs that were not taken into account. We are definitely now examining a move that would require permit applicants to pay a fee.” The idea, according to the Planning Administration, is to create a mechanism that would better compensate local committees for the work they do at the permit-information stage, even when the permit itself is handled through self-approval.

At a contractors’ conference last week, the Planning Administration said 370 architects have already been approved for self-licensing, 27 projects have been approved, and about 900 new projects have already begun the process toward self-approval. Ruti Schwartz, acting chair of the Zamora regional committee and chair of the Haifa district committee, said she supports the reform because it can ease pressure on local committees and speed up licensing, but stressed that faster permits must also be professional and high-quality.