Case Study: City of Omaha achieves cost savings, enhanced transparency and 50% online permitting with Accela

Accela expedites Omaha’s permitting and inspection process and manages staffing

Omaha, Nebraska’s Building and Development Division needed to modernize an aging mainframe system that relied on green‑screen interfaces, paper inspections and hard‑to‑access, error-prone data. The lack of a public portal and seasonal staffing pressures made it difficult to deliver services to builders and residents quickly, transparently and cost‑effectively.

The city deployed Accela’s cloud-based suite (Land Management, Citizen Access, Mobile Office/Inspector, Electronic Document Review and GIS) and launched online permitting. Workflows and mobile inspections were streamlined, enabling faster permitting during a post‑storm surge (about 6,000 permits handled) and resulting in roughly 50% of all permits and 83% of electrical permits processed online, higher inspector productivity, and significant cost savings from reduced overtime and overhead.

City of Omaha

Stu Craven

Senior Applications Analyst