Platform · Facility use permitting
Rentals, reservations and permits, with the policy enforced automatically.
A single permitting engine for one-time rentals, recurring bookings, seasonal field allocation and park special events. It holds your residency test, your fee schedule, your insurance limits, your deposit policy and your approval delegations, and it applies them to every request without a staff member checking by hand.
Works for cities, counties, townships, villages, and independent park and recreation districts.
- 1Who is askingAddress inside city limits, nonprofit tierResident rate
- 2Is the space freeChecked against every diary, buffers includedNo conflicts
- 3Fee scheduleAdopted rates, deposit and amplified-sound surchargeApplied
- 4Compliance conditionsWaiver signed, certificate of insurance at required limitsInsurance pending
- 5Approval routingParks, police and risk management, in parallelAwaiting 2 of 3
- Booking types
- One-time, recurring, seasonal, internal, permitted events
- Rate classes
- Unlimited, with residency and organization tests
- Compliance
- Insurance, deposits, waivers, background checks
- Approvals
- Parallel or sequential, per facility class
What the engine actually does
Five decisions, made the same way every time.
The reason permitting eats staff time is not the calendar. It is that every request needs five judgments applied consistently, and applying them by hand across hundreds of requests a month is where the errors, the delays and the revenue leakage come from.
- 01
Who is asking, and what do they pay
The applicant's address is tested against your jurisdiction boundary, so resident and non-resident rates apply without a staff member squinting at a map. Organization type sets the tier: private, commercial, nonprofit with a 501(c)(3) determination letter on file, co-sponsored youth sports, school district under a joint use agreement, or another city department. Change the tier and every fee, deposit and insurance requirement on the request recalculates.
- 02
Is the space genuinely free
Conflict detection runs across the whole portfolio, not one department's calendar. It accounts for setup and teardown buffers, adjacent-space conflicts where a gym divider is open, maintenance closures and field rest periods, tournament holds, city holidays and weather cancellations. Two staff members in two buildings cannot double-book the same room.
- 03
What does the fee schedule say
Hourly, half-day, daily, per-session, per-participant and seasonal rates. Minimum durations, after-hours and holiday surcharges, alcohol and amplified-sound surcharges, staffing and equipment add-ons, attendant and lifeguard requirements by headcount. Effective dates so a schedule adopted by resolution in October takes effect on January 1 while bookings already quoted keep their rate.
- 04
Are the compliance conditions met
Certificate of insurance at the limits that facility class requires, with the additional insured endorsement and waiver of subrogation verified and the expiry date tracked. Signed liability waiver with parent or guardian consent where a minor is involved. Damage or cleaning deposit authorized. Background screening current for coaches and volunteers. Alcohol permit, food handling permit or road closure where applicable. A permit cannot be issued with a condition outstanding unless someone with authority overrides it, and that override is recorded.
- 05
Who has to approve it
Approval routing mirrors your delegation of authority. A library study room auto-approves. A community room books on supervisor review. A park special event over 250 people routes in parallel to parks, police, risk management and public works, and everyone sees the same record. Escalation and reminder rules stop a request from sitting on one person's desk while they are on vacation.
Seasonal field allocation
The spring allocation meeting, without the spreadsheet.
Allocating athletic fields among competing leagues is the single most political thing a recreation department does. OptimoGov was built in a market where seasonal ground allocation is a formal, defensible process, and that engine transfers directly to US and Canadian field permitting.
- Open an allocation window. Leagues submit requested hours, preferred fields, age divisions and registered participant counts through the portal before a stated deadline, with documentation attached.
- Score against your policy. Priority by resident participation share, youth versus adult, returning user history, co-sponsored status and prior-season compliance, applied as your adopted policy defines it rather than by whoever shouts loudest.
- Draft, review, publish. Build the season grid, see who is over or under their request, adjust, then publish all permits at once. Every league sees the same allocation and the reasoning behind it.
- Roll a season forward. Copy last fall into this fall, then work only the exceptions instead of rebuilding a full season's schedule from scratch.
- Track what was actually used. Recorded no-shows and unused allocated hours feed next season's scoring, which is the only real answer to a league that books three fields and uses one.
- Handle in-season change. Rainouts, field closures, makeup games and tournament holds applied across a season in one action, with automatic notification to every affected league.
Coverage
One engine, every booking type your agency issues.
Most agencies run different tools for different booking types because their reservation system only handles one well. This is the matrix your evaluation panel should score every vendor against.
| Booking type | Typical instrument | Approval | Payment point |
|---|---|---|---|
| One-time facility rental | Facility use permit | Supervisor review or auto-approve by facility class | Deposit at booking, balance before the date |
| Recurring rental | Facility use permit, multi-date | Reviewed once, applies to the series | Monthly invoice or pay-per-date |
| Seasonal field allocation | Field use permit for a season | Allocation window, scored against policy | Seasonal invoice, optional payment plan |
| Park special event | Special event permit | Multi-department parallel review | Application fee, then permit fee on approval |
| Library study or meeting room | Room booking | Auto-approve on library card verification | No charge, or per-hour for meeting rooms |
| Council chamber or hearing room | Internal or public meeting booking | Clerk approval | No charge internally, fee for external use |
| Internal staff room booking | Internal reservation | Instant, subject to room rules | None, or internal cost allocation |
| Program, class or camp | Registration | Instant, subject to capacity and waitlist | At registration, with payment plans and fee assistance |
| Ticketed public event | Ticket order | Instant | At purchase, reserved seating or general admission |
Operational effect
The change shows up in cycle time and self-service.
Two things tell you whether a permitting system is working. How long a resident waits for a decision, and how many bookings arrive without a staff member touching them. Both move quickly once the policy is in the system rather than in people's heads.
- Same-day decisions. Cardinia Shire moved from a lengthy manual approval process to same-day booking confirmations after consolidating five business areas onto one platform.
- Self-service that climbs month on month. Resident self-service rose steadily after go-live as the fee schedule, insurance rules and approvals moved into the platform.
- Instant confirmations where policy allows. Most bookings at Mildura's regional sporting precinct are confirmed the moment the resident submits them.
- Staff time back. Hours spent re-keying requests, chasing certificates and calculating fees are redirected to the work only people can do.
Reporting
Answers for the questions you get asked in public.
Built-in reports and dashboards, plus a Power BI feed and an open REST API if your analysts want the raw data. These are the ones agencies run most.
- 01
Utilization by facility and time of day
Which spaces earn their operating cost and which sit empty on Tuesday mornings. The report a capital request or a closure decision needs.
- 02
Revenue and subsidy by rate class
What resident, non-resident, nonprofit and commercial use each contributed, against direct cost. Feeds a cost of service study and NRPA pyramid pricing work.
- 03
Permit cycle time and bottleneck by reviewer
Median and worst-case days to decision, and which approval step is holding requests. This is how you defend your service level to a council member.
- 04
Insurance and compliance exposure
Active permits with expiring or missing certificates of insurance, unsigned waivers, or overdue background checks. Risk management should have this on a schedule.
- 05
Deposits held and released
Outstanding deposit liability, retained amounts by reason and refunds pending, reconciled to the general ledger.
- 06
Self-service adoption and after-hours activity
What share of bookings arrive without staff involvement, and how much of your revenue is collected outside business hours.
Bring your fee schedule and your three hardest permits.
We will configure them live on the call. A park special event with four reviewers, a seasonal allocation with competing leagues, and whatever your staff currently handle by exception.