If the city stalls your building permit, a new law lets you force it through

The claim — "if the city doesn't act in 30 days, your project is auto-approved" — is half right and half scrambled. Two different laws are getting mashed together. Let me untangle them.

What AB 2234 actually does

AB 2234 (2022) covers post-entitlement permits — the building permits that come after a project is already approved. A city has 15 business days to decide if your application is complete; miss that, and it's deemed complete (not approved). Then it gets 30 business days of review for projects of 25 units or fewer, 60 for larger. Miss that, and the city is in violation of the Housing Accountability Act — exposed to lawsuits, fees, and fines. Not an automatic approval.

If a local agency fails to meet the time limits in this section, it shall be in violation of Section 65589.5.

Government Code §65913.3 (AB 2234)

The real "deemed approved" lever: AB 253

For residential building permits, the genuine auto-approval mechanism is newer: AB 253, the California Residential Private Permitting Review Act, effective October 2025. If a city hasn't found your application compliant within 30 business days, you can hire a state-approved private plan checker — and if the city then ignores the resulting compliance report for 10 business days, the permit is deemed approved. (ADUs have their own fast-track under SB 543.) Note: these are business days, not calendar days.

Missed deadlines used to be the denial. Now they're leverage.

My read for clients: a slow-walking planning department isn't the dead end it used to be. The catch is knowing which clock you're on — post-entitlement permit, residential building permit, or ADU — because the deadlines and the remedies are different for each. If a project of yours is stuck, that's worth a conversation before you just keep waiting.