San Juan, Puerto Rico — December 10, 2025 — The Permitting System Simplification Task Force, created under Executive Order 2025-002, presented its Final Report to Governor Jenniffer González-Colón, outlining a comprehensive reform of Puerto Rico’s legal, operational, and technological permitting framework with the goal of streamlining processing times and modernizing oversight.
The report provides a thorough assessment of the current system, identifies the structural challenges affecting its performance, and offers concrete recommendations that build on optimization measures already underway.
The document outlines 17 key recommendations, including the creation of a new Permitting Code and a revision of land-use planning frameworks. Its objectives include expediting critical and strategic projects with significant economic potential, encouraging greater private-sector investment, and proactively reducing bureaucratic barriers within permitting processes.
One of its principal proposals is the creation of a consolidated Permitting Code that brings together regulations currently dispersed across more than 45 laws and 46 administrative instruments. This consolidation seeks to eliminate redundancies, contradictions, and overlapping regulatory requirements across agencies and levels of government.
The report also recommends adopting a new Joint Regulation that removes unnecessary burdens and standardizes processes, as well as implementing a Consolidated Construction Permit that enables simultaneous review and digital validation of plans and certifications.
“This report moves us closer to the promise we made to the people of Puerto Rico: to transform and simplify the permitting process. We have identified the obstacles that have held our economy back for decades, and today we present concrete, viable solutions. A modern, agile, and transparent permitting system is essential to attracting the investment our Island needs to achieve real, sustainable economic development,” said Governor Jenniffer González-Colón.
“This is an important step toward leaving behind decades of bureaucracy and fragmentation that have slowed Puerto Rico’s economic development. With these recommendations, we are transforming the permitting system to make it more efficient, transparent, and aligned with market realities. These efforts will stimulate investment and job creation,” said Governor’s Chief of staff, Francisco Domenech.
The report further proposes strengthening the role of accredited professionals and delegating ministerial permitting tasks directly to Authorized Professionals, incorporating traceability, digital technical validation, and automated payments through the Single Business Portal (SBP). This functionality will require a full modernization of the SBP and integration of agency systems and platforms.
For planning matters, the report recommends revising zoning criteria using simpler schemes based on intensity of use and rural-urban transects, accompanied by expanded self-certification options for low-risk processes.
“With these reforms, we send a clear message to the world: Puerto Rico is open for business, and the government is here to facilitate, not obstruct progress. This report represents months of technical, interagency work aimed at dismantling bottlenecks that have stalled projects, investment, and development for years. It is a data-driven proposal aligned with the principles of effective, agile, and transparent government and it will strengthen Puerto Rico’s competitiveness. Now, execution and implementation are our top priority. Every business, entrepreneur, and project will find in our agencies a committed partner,” said Secretary of Economic Development and Commerce (DDEC), Sebastián Negrón-Reichard.
During the evaluation process, the Task Force identified five structural issues driving delays and friction in the system: the dispersion and overlap of the legal framework, the excessive complexity of processes, digital and operational fragmentation among agencies, limitations in human capital, and the use of burdensome preventive controls that fail to provide effective oversight.
Efficiency Coordinator, Veronica Ferraiuoli, emphasized the impact of these deficiencies, noting that obtaining a construction permit can take 9 to 18 months, while certain environmental assessments have taken up to 577 days, even for single-family homes. “This aligns with the commitments of Governor Jenniffer González-Colón’s Administration: a permitting system that is agile, efficient, competitive, less bureaucratic, and business-friendly. The submission of this final report provides a clear starting point and next steps for transforming the island’s regulatory framework.”
Based on this diagnosis, the report proposes a functional model that delegates tasks based on the type of permit, risk level, and degree of discretion required.
“The report proposes standardized criteria, substantial improvements to the SBP, regulatory consolidation, technological integration, and clear oversight mechanisms, all aimed at increasing efficiency without sacrificing rigor,” said the Assistant Secretary of the Permits Management Office (OGPe), Norberto Almodóvar-Vélez. “The system must differentiate more effectively between simple and complex processes, allowing the government to focus technical resources on high-impact or high-discretion cases,” he added.
“The permitting system must provide certainty for investors, agility for entrepreneurs, and control for regulators. With these proposals, we are moving toward a proactive, modern system aligned with the realities of today’s economic development landscape,” said the President of the Planning Board, Héctor Morales.
Among the immediate advances already achieved, the report highlights the elimination of the backlog of Single Permits, significant reductions in interagency response times, automated notifications to businesses, and the integration of artificial intelligence to validate structured and unstructured documents.
Additional actions include a new regulation for professional oversight, the elimination of inspections for low-risk home-based offices, and interagency agreements establishing Permit Officers with decision-making authority within OGPe. These measures are already improving user experience in the SBP and reducing processing times.
The Final Report of the Permitting Simplification Task Force is available on the websites of La Fortaleza and IDEA: https://www.fortaleza.pr.gov/ and https://www.eficiencia.pr.gov/
