By Samantha DeMoss, Madelaine Braggs | Rose Law Group Reporter
Signed by Governor Hobbs on March 31, of 2025, House Bill 2447 (HB2447) requires the legislative bodies of Arizona cities and towns to authorize administrative personnel to review design review, lot splits, and site planning without a public hearing. The motivations of the bill came from a place of desiring faster processes for those development reviews outside of zoning, but issues with the bill lie in what it does not contemplate rather than what it includes.
HB 2447 is to go in effect on January 1st of 2026.
Rose Law Group land use attorney Samantha DeMoss says, “I could see from an outsider’s perspective how the elimination of a public hearing would make these processes more efficient. However, that view point does not consider the legal complexities of the differences in administrative decisions and legislative decisions. Administrative and legislative decisions have vastly different boundaries from both a constitutional purpose standpoint and a judicial precedent perspective.”
DeMoss explains while not all municipalities could feel a large impact from HB2447, for some it will likely result in cities increasing review depth at the zoning level of these processes, which is still legislative, forcing developers to make more detailed decisions on elements such as design and site planning long in advance of the construction is in process.
Guidance Not Included in the Bill
- Which administrative personnel are to process each review type. For example, hearings for design review tend to be guided by a council-appointed panel of architectural experts, and this will now have to be reviewed by internal staff, likely specializing in urban planning or civil engineering, but not architecture.
- How municipalities are to decommission existing commissions on these topics and respond to projects already submitted in these processes.
- How to handle the extent of overhaul this will require of existing ordinances. For cities that were requiring public hearing for any of these processes, the entirety of their development ordinances will need to be written. Additionally, ordinances will need to give a much greater amount of guidance to administrative reviewers if the review is to be objective.
- How much discretion a reviewer has. HB2447 essentially changes processes that once included a legislative component to being completely administrative. It is unclear whether these reviewers will be held completely to development standards or have a discretionary authority in approving these items.
- How this will affect existing case law, zoning stipulations, and development agreements. Stipulations on prior-approved developments may now be more stringent than future developments if amendment required a council hearing. This law may also be retroactive in its applications and invalidate prior terms and judicial oversight, it does not say.
- How neighborhood outreach will be conducted. Noticing may still be required, but if the decision is non-discretionary, public input may be of no effect.
- By narrowing review power to one reviewer or review department, approvals may be very individualized to the opinions of the employee reviewing if they are given discretion.
- The potential that applicants already in these processes with legislative components may withdraw and reapply when the standard is moved to administrative for a more likely approval.
- Impact on personnel workload. Reviewing personnel in cities will likely see an extreme uptick in correspondence now that they are making final decisions on major projects. Decision making will be based on internal hiring instead of elections, so development departments will have to take on a larger role in project management.
- What constitutes an “objective” in terms of design review. Despite the inclusion of a definition for objective decision making, design is innately subjective and will never be completely bounded by even detailed regulation.
- All administrative standards are still subject to the interpretation of the reviewer, giving them a near legislative decision-making power.
