The Denver City Council on Monday approved a $4.6 million contract with the company ComplyAI to use its CivCheck tool to speed up development plan reviews.
Councilmember Sarah Parady asked for the planning department to review the contract and technology in a year to see if it’s actually living up to its promise.
The move comes months after Mayor Mike Johnston laid off 19 employees and cut 40 open positions in Community Planning and Development, including some who did planning reviews.
“This is a lot of money that otherwise could go towards staff, and we know that CPD lost a lot of staff in layoffs,” she said.
Councilmember Flor Alvidrez said she supports modernizing how the city does business and acknowledged that developers have been clamoring for improvements to the permitting system, which is a key part of the development process.
Nonetheless, she was the lone no vote.
“I'm growing more concerned because we're seeing more reporting nationally about inaccuracies and limitations of AI systems, especially when they are also asked to interpret complex rules and regulations,” Alvidrez said. “I've also heard concerns from local architects and professionals in the development community who say that current AI tools may not be yet ready to handle the full complexity of our zoning codes, building codes and site-specific conditions.”
Robert Peek, with the planning department, acknowledged the concerns. But currently, he said, the city approves just 37% of applications on first review and hopes to get to 80% with the efficiencies the new technology will bring.
CivCheck is meant to help customers check whether their applications are complete, offer immediate feedback, shorten the overall plan review time by increasing accuracy on earlier drafts, and reduce the number of review cycles, according to city documents.
“It should save our staff a lot of time so they can use that time that they're saving for other more complex parts of their job,” Peek said.
Plans will ultimately still require a human review. The council passed the item 10-1, with two members absent.
