Michelle Craven Explains DOT's Plan Review Process and Outreach Efforts

So we're gonna 213.

Okay.

So one thing I guess from the very beginning, we assign every application to a dedicated plan reviewer.

They work with the restaurants directly to um make sure the applications are complete to make sure that the site plans include what they need to include.

I will point out, just because there was a lot of discussion about um site plans and the kind of review that needed to happen of the site plans up front, some of the site plans we receive are like they don't have any dimensions.

It may not have a street name on it, like a very, very, very basic.

And I think we found that if we sent those to the community boards, the community boards would be very unhappy with us for sending that little detail about a particular site plan to them.

And so that is why we work with the restaurants very closely up front to try to get those site plans into complaint into compliance and to make sure that the restaurant itself, the the outdoor dining setup would be in compliance.

Um we try to we work to make every application viable to make sure it gets approved.

Anything that we think we can get it approved, we're going to try to get it approved.

We offer, as the first deputy commissioner said, we have a lot of Zoom and team sessions with people.

We take remote calls so that we can be online updating the site plans for the restaurants instead of asking them to do it themselves.

We can do it in one fell swoop.

They can take any measurements if they need to, they'll be at the restaurant.

We take care of that right away.

We can make site visits if we need to, we have done that.

If there are minor issues with an application that maybe don't affect the site plan or really affect the application that severely, we'll send it to the community board right away rather than hold it up.

If for roadway applications, I'll say because the community boards get 30 days to look at it, and the lead time for a public hearing notice is approximately a month.

We will basically start the advertising process for a public hearing as soon as we send it to the community board so we can hold the public hearing right away after the community board's time has run out.

Yeah.

And what type of specific outreach are you doing to restaurants about the program?

And if you can be specific by borough, because we're seeing a real equity issue.

We're seeing a lot in Manhattan, but not in some of the other boroughs.

So I want to understand what's happening.

Okay.

We have done over the last year, year and a half, um, a lot of outreach.

We've worked with the Department of Small Business Services in particular to help us reach a lot of the restaurants.

We have contacted every single restaurant that has a food permit what is the food service establishment permit.

Yes, thank you.

We've done 15 webinars with community boards, 29 webinars with for QA sessions with restaurants, the bids, the hospitality groups, other city agencies.

We've done a tremendous amount of email blasts with dining out program information with links to the website.

We've done a number of in-person presentations, tabling a business events.

We've presented at New York City Interagency Task Force meetings, 13 press releases since 2024, and distributed over 15,000 POM cards with information.

And our inspectors have gone to every restaurant that participated in the temporary program twice in order to give them information on the permanent program to make sure they understood it.

That's just a sampling of it.

I don't have it broken down by borough.