Santa Barbara homeowners may be letting out a sigh of relief this week after the Santa Barbara City Council approved a new process to approve single-family home projects. 

The amended ordinance was approved unanimously by the council on Tuesday and is set to reduce the number of minor projects that go to the Single Family Design Board, streamlining the approval process for homeowners. 

Councilman Eric Friedman praised city staff for working to simplify the process while still allowing neighbors to weigh in on major changes.

“This is an opportunity again that we are looking to improve our efficiencies, better serve the public, have more efficient outcomes,” Friedman said. “But also preserve the neighbor’s ability –that’s why the hedge issue was so important and the fencing– to have a say in their neighborhoods as well.”

Under the new rules, a project won’t have to go to the Single Family Design Board for review if there’s no new floor area. The project’s materials and architectural details also must match or be cohesive with the existing style.

There are also new zoning standards for the size of common home improvements, such as balconies, decks, fences, hedges, and porches.  

The amendments will also expand the staff’s ability to approve minor projects by increasing the size limits that can be approved at the staff level.

For example, staff can currently administratively approve an accessory building up to 500 square feet. With the amendments, they could approve one up to 800 square feet, according to the city staff report.

Ted Hamilton-Rolle, a city design review supervisor, said the changes will maintain aesthetic oversight while reducing review hearings. Exemptions or modifications can be addressed by the Single Family Design Board.

The ordinance was approved by the city’s ordinance committee last month but the committee asked for more flexibility on porch standards. 

City staff was originally proposing a maximum porch size in the coastal zone of 16 feet by 10 feet. 

Now a new porch can encroach up to 10 feet into the front yard, as long as it’s 5 feet from the property line and it can be 16 feet wide by 10 feet deep, or if it’s wider than 16 feet, it can be up to the width of the building and 6 feet deep.

Under the new rules, single family homes in inland neighborhoods do not have to build a covered garage and can use their garage as extra living space. 

Councilwoman Kristen Sneddon praised this change, saying it provides more flexibility for how people use their garage.

“It seems like such a small thing but people just don’t use their garages anymore to park in,” Sneddon said. “It just matches how people live now and how they use the space that’s available to them.” 

Under the new rules, Hamilton-Rolle said staff expect a 24% reduction in the number of projects each year that have to go to the Single Family Design Board. 

About 221 projects a year require Single Family Design Board review. Now 54 of those projects could be approved at the staff level.

“We think this is a reasonable reduction for now as we wanted this project to take a measured approach using a scalpel, not a hatchet, so that the proposed ordinance will strike a balance between streamlining and maintaining reasonable aesthetic oversight of single family projects,” Hamilton-Rolle said.

The amendments also include adding an emergency permits procedure. That would allow the community development director to approve temporary emergency permits for projects meant to stabilize a structure or property when there is a threat to life, the environment or property.

The amendments are set to go into effect on May 28.