City of Palm Desert
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The Planning Department guides the growth and development of Palm Desert to ensure a well-designed, vibrant, and sustainable community. Our team manages land use, zoning, and design review; supports property owners, architects, and developers with their projects; and helps implement long-range plans that shape the City’s future. From neighborhood improvements to major development proposals, we work to balance community needs, economic vitality, and quality of life.
- For a list and map of current projects, please use this link
- To view an interactive zoning map, please click here
Apply for a Permit
Permit Types
- Adjustment Permits:
- Development:
- Subdivisions:
- Use Permits:
- Other Applications:
- Planning Fee Schedule:
The General Plan is the City’s long-term roadmap for land use and development, guiding decisions about growth, housing, transportation, the environment, and community design. Required by State law, it identifies community goals and policies, provides standards for development, and establishes strategies to address important local issues.
The plan includes major initiatives such as reimagining the City Center, transforming Highway 111 and San Pablo Avenue into vibrant mixed-use corridors, and creating a connected University area with diverse housing, pedestrian options, and open space.
Housing ElementAs part of the General Plan, the Housing Element outlines the City’s housing needs and strategies to meet them. It is the only element certified by the State and was last approved in 2022, with the next update expected in 2028.
Annual Progress ReportsEach year, by April 1, the City submits reports on General Plan and Housing Element implementation to the Planning Commission, City Council, and State agencies. These track progress toward the City’s adopted goals and housing commitments.
General Plan Documents
- 2025 Combined General Plan and Housing Element APRs
- 2016 Combined General Plan
- Table of Contents and List of Figures and Tables
- Chapter 1 - Vision & Guiding Principles
- Chapter 2 - Introduction
- Chapter 3 - Land Use & Community Character
- Chapter 4 - Mobility
- Chapter 5 - Health & Wellness
- Chapter 6 - Environmental Resources
- Chapter 7 - Noise
- Chapter 8 - Safety
- Chapter 9 - Public Utilities & Services
- Chapter 10 - City Center Area Plan
- Chapter 11 - Housing Element 6th Cycle
- Chapter 12 - Work Plan
General Plan EIR
- City Council Resolution No. 2016-86
- 2016 General Plan Update Final EIR
- 2016 General Plan Update Draft EIR
- 2016 General Plan EIR Mitigation Monitoring and Reporting Program
- Draft EIR Technical Background Report
- Draft EIR Traffic Data
Resources
The Housing Element identifies the City’s housing conditions and needs and establishes goals, objectives, and policies that are the foundation of the City’s housing and growth strategy. The Housing Element is one of the mandatory components of the General Plan and is the only Element individually certified by the State's Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) for an eight-year cycle. The City's Housing Element for the planning period 2014-2021 was last certified in 2013.
On March 10, 2022, the City of Palm Desert City Council adopted the 6th Cycle (2021-2029) Housing Element Plan (Plan) and the associated environmental review. However, after review by HCD, the updated Plan (Housing Element 4th Draft) was required to be recirculated for public comment and must be re-adoption by the City Council.
To meet these requirements, a Planning Commission public hearing was held September 6, 2022 and the public hearing for City Council readoption was held September 29, 2022. On September 29, 2022, the City of Palm Desert City Council readopted the 6th Cycle (2021-2029) Housing Element Plan Update. On November 4, 2022, HCD confirmed certification and found the City's readopted 6th Cycle (2021-2029) Housing Element Plan to be in full compliance.
Housing Element DocumentsReadopted Housing Element 6th Cycle 2021-2029 Update - September 29, 2022
- 09-06-2022: Public Hearing Notice for Planning Commission regarding readoption of the revised Fourth Draft Housing Element.
- 09-29-2022: Public Hearing Notice for City Council Meeting regarding readoption of the revised Fourth Draft Housing Element.
- 09-29-2022: City Council Adopted 2021-2029 Housing Element Update (Readoption)
- Fourth Draft Housing Element: Housing Element update 2021-2029.
Adopted Housing Element 2021-2029 6th Cycle - March 10, 2022
- 03-10-2022: City Council Adopted 2021-2029 Housing Element
- 03-10-2022: City Council Adopted Safety Element Update
- 03-10-2022: Public Hearing Notice for City Council Meeting regarding adoption of Updated Housing Element.
- 01-18-2022: Palm Desert Housing Element Excerpt
- Revised Draft Housing & Safety Elements presented by the City of Palm Desert Planning Commission, January 18, 2022 and February 1, 2022. This plan was adopted by Resolution 2804.
- 01-18-2022: Public Hearing Notice for Planning Commission Meeting regarding adoption of Updated Housing Element.
- 01-03-2022: Palm Desert AFFH Proposed Revisions
- 12-28-2021: Palm Desert Housing Element Proposed Amendments
- Notice of Intent
- View the Palm Desert Municipal Code Zoning Ordinance to learn more.
- To view an interactive zoning map, please click here.
A Specific Plan is a master planning tool under California law that guides development for a defined project area. Once approved, it becomes the zoning document for that site and must be consistent with the City’s General Plan.
DSRT Surf Specific Plan
The DSRT SURF Specific Plan establishes building and development standards for the entire 17.69-acre Project area. This Specific Plan proposes the development of a 5.5-acre surf lagoon and surf center facilities to include restaurant, bar, retail and similar facilities, hotel rooms, and resort residential villas.
MCP Palm Desert Specific Plan 32.2 acres near the City’s northern gateway at I-10, offering opportunities for retail, high-density housing, and complementary mixed-use development.
17.8 acres at Monterey Ave. and Dinah Shore Dr., planned for a commercial center with retail, restaurants, hotel, and auto-oriented services.
152 acres between Cook St. and the future Portola interchange, planned as an integrated commercial, residential, and mixed-use center with a major regional park.
400+ acres near the CSUSB and UCR campuses, designed as a mixed-use community with housing, business opportunities, open space, and pedestrian-friendly design.
106 acres south of Gerald Ford Dr., planned as a walkable residential community with up to 969 housing units of varying types and densities.
Objective Design Standards are clear, measurable rules that guide the design of new development without relying on subjective judgment. Required by State law, ODS ensure housing projects — such as multifamily and mixed-use developments — can be reviewed and approved based on uniform, verifiable criteria.
In Palm Desert, ODS replace certain discretionary design reviews, streamlining housing approvals while still upholding the City’s design goals. These standards help ensure new projects fit the community’s character while meeting State requirements for housing production.
Fire Marshal Services help protect life, property, and the community by reducing fire risks and ensuring compliance with fire and life safety regulations. In Palm Desert, the Fire Marshal works in coordination with the Riverside County Fire Department to promote fire prevention through inspections, plan reviews, investigations, and public education.
These services play a critical role in supporting safe development, business operations, and special events throughout the city.
What the Fire Marshal Does
- Conducts fire and life safety inspections of commercial and multi-family properties
- Reviews building and construction plans for fire code compliance
- Issues permits related to fire safety and hazardous materials
- Investigates fire incidents when necessary
- Supports community education and fire prevention efforts
- Reviews and approves special events for fire and life safety requirements
How to Contact Fire Marshal Services
Palm Desert City Hall
73510 Fred Waring Drive
Palm Desert, CA 92260
Office: 760-776-6388
Email: crodriguez@palmdesert.gov
For additional information about Fire Marshal Services and related programs, visit the Riverside County Fire Department Fire Marshal webpage.
Historic Preservation
Palm Desert’s story is told not only through its people, but through the places that have shaped our community over time. From mid-century modern architecture to long-standing cultural landmarks, these sites reflect the character, creativity, and evolution of our City.
The Planning Division supports historic preservation by providing the tools, research, and guidance needed to identify and evaluate historically significant properties. Designation is a voluntary process, and we work in partnership with property owners who choose to recognize and preserve the historic value of their structures through local, state, or national programs.
On April 24, 2025, the City Council accepted a Historic Context Statement and Historic Resources Survey. This document serves as a valuable information tool that can assist city staff, the public, and decision makers in understanding, identifying, evaluating and protecting identified historical resources and guide local preservations planning and land use decisions.
- Historic Context and Survey
- Historic Context Statement and City-wide Resources Survey Document
- Appendix A Survey Area Map
- Appendix B Chronology Map
- Appendix C Recon Survey Findings Map
- Appendix D1 Preliminary Property List, Individuals
- Appendix D2 Preliminary Property List, Districts
- Appendix E Tract Development Summaries
On January 13, 2011, the City Council adopted Palm Desert’s Mills Act Program, a state initiative that provides property tax relief to owners of historic properties to help cover restoration and maintenance costs. To qualify, a property must be listed on a national, state, county, or city register.
Under the program, property owners receive reduced property taxes in exchange for committing to restore and maintain their historic property. Owners enter into renewable 10-year contracts that transfer with the property upon sale. Properties may be inspected by city, county, or state officials, and penalties can apply if the contract is not upheld.
Tax savings are determined by the County Assessor using a state formula based on “capitalization of income” rather than market value, with most participants saving about 50% annually.
Resources
The Top Ten Myths About Historic Preservation
by Ken BernsteinMyth #1: “If a property gets designated as a historic landmark, it’s protected forever and ca n never be demolished.”
Fact: Landmark designation ensures a more thorough review of demolition proposals, but it does not prohibit demolition outright. In the City of Los Angeles, designation as a City historic landmark (Historic-Cultural Monument) allows the City’s Cultural Heritage Commission to object to the issuance of a demolition permit, but only for 180 days. The City Council may then extend the objection to demolition for an additional 180 days.
Many East Coast cities, including New York, do actually prohibit demolition of their landmarks, but these cities also leave an exception for cases of demonstrated economic hardship. Even listing in the National Register of Historic Places, which sounds more elevated than “mere” local listing, does not provide for more iron-clad protection.
Although demolition of a designated landmark in California additionally requires preparation of an Environmental Impact Report to assess the feasibility of alternatives to demolition, a truly determined property owner may be able to obtain approval to destroy even our most cherished landmarks.
Myth #2: “Historic designation will reduce my property values.”
Fact: Study after study across the nation has conclusively demonstrated that historic designation and the creation of historic districts actually increase property values. Why? In part, historic designation gives a neighborhood or an individual historic site a caché that sets it apart from ordinary properties. Many buyers seek out the unique qualities and ambiance of a historic property. Historic district designation gives potential homebuyers two rare and economically valuable assurances: that the very qualities that attracted them to their neighborhood will actually endure over time, and that they can safely reinvest in sensitive improvements to their home without fear that their neighbor will undermine this investment with a new “monster home” or inappropriate new development.
Myth #3: “If my property is designated as a historic site, I won’t be able to change it in any way, and I don’t want my property to become like a museum.”
Fact: Owners of designated historic structures may make very significant changes to their structures. Historic preservation laws, at their essence, are not meant to prevent change, but, rather, to manage change. The tool to manage change is the Secretary of Interior’s Standards for Rehabilitation, the nationally accepted benchmark for evaluating changes to historic structures.
Myth #4: “Preservation is only for the rich and elite, and for high-style buildings.”
Fact: Historic preservation isn’t just about house museums anymore. Today’s preservation movement is increasingly diverse: here in Los Angeles, the two newest Historic Preservation Overlay Zones (HPOZs) are in Pico-Union and Lincoln Heights, home to economically and ethnically varied populations.
Preservation today also focuses not just on grandiose architectural landmarks, but on more modest sites of social and cultural significance. Just look at the small Ralph J. Bunche House in South Los Angeles, boyhood home of the pioneering African-American diplomat, and Little Tokyo’s Far East Café, a beloved gathering place for the city’s Japanese-American community – both recently restored. Or, consider a current preservation effort to save the modest Vladeck Center, a Boyle Heights building that was the center of the Jewish labor and immigrant resettlement movements of the 1930s. Such sites underscore that preservation can be about the “power of place” found at sites containing rich social and cultural meaning.
Myth #5: “Historic preservation is bad for business.”
Fact: Historic preservation is at the very heart of our nation’s most vibrant economic development and business attraction programs. From Southern California examples such as Old Pasadena or San Diego’s Gaslamp Quarter, to traditional, historic southern cities such as Charleston or Savannah, to the recent boom in “heritage tourism,” today’s economic development strategies no longer see preservation and business development as competing values.
The National Main Street Center, a program that uses historic preservation to revitalize town centers and neighborhood commercial districts, has actually tracked economic results in 1,700 Main Street communities nationally. These preservation-based programs have created over 231,000 new jobs and resulted in over $17 billion in reinvestment to date, with every dollar spent on a Main Street program yielding $40 in economic reinvestment.
This is certainly true at times, but, in fact, historic preservation is typically more cost effective than new construction. Why? Historic buildings certainly do sometimes need upgrades, but these are usually less expensive than the costs of building all-new foundations , structural systems, roofs and building finishes.
The National Trust for Historic Preservation reports that in Chicago, where the public school system is now spending $2.5 billion to upgrade facilities, bare-bones new construction is costing $155 per square foot -- but renovation is costing just $130.
Here in Los Angeles, the State of California learned the potential savings from historic preservation in comparing the construction of two State Office Buildings: the new Ronald Reagan State Office Building on Spring Street at 3rd St., and the Junipero Serra State Office Building just two blocks away on Broadway at 4th St., in the renovated former flagship location of the Broadway Department Store. The historic renovation not only reused and reinvigorated an important landmark from 1914, but it saved taxpayers money by delivering office space at about half the cost per square of the all-new Reagan building just a few years before.
Myth #7: If I buy a historic property, there’s lots of government money available to help me fix it up
While it doesn’t necessarily cost more to renovate a historic structure than to build anew, few large government or foundation grants are available to owners of historic properties, and even those few typically limit eligibility to government agencies or non-profits.
What is available tends to be tax incentives for private owners of historic buildings. Owners of sites listed in or eligible for the National Register of Historic Places may take advantage of a Federal Rehabilitation Tax Credit that provides a 20% tax offset for the cost of rehabilitation. National Register properties are also eligible to benefit from “conservation easements” – binding legal agreements with preservation organizations such as the Los Ange les Conservancy that can allow owners to claim a charitable deduction on their Federal income taxes. Finally, the State’s Mills Act program, implemented by local governments throughout the State, including Los Angeles, allows historic property owners to take often-significant property tax reductions.
Myth #8: Old buildings are less safe
Although historic structures do sometimes require structural retrofits or the addition of fire sprinklers to enhance their safety, historic buildings typically perform better than newer construction in earthquakes and other natural disasters. What determines the safety of buildings is the quality of construction, not age, and, in many ways, “they just don’t build ‘em like they used to.” Los Angeles’ signature historic structures have survived every major temblor of the past eight decades. Yet, in the 1994 Northridge earthquake, the most catastrophic damage occurred no t to historic buildings but to newer construction such as parking garages, concrete tilt-up buildings, and newer apartments with “tuck-under” parking.
Historic preservation laws no more infringe on property rights than do many other laws and private rules that Americans have long accepted. Though everyone likes to believe “my home is my castle and I can do whatever I want,” this statement simply doesn’t reflect reality. Zoning laws prevent you from replacing your single-family home with an apartment building or a five-story vertical mansion. We should all be happy that such laws prevent our neighbor from putting a landfill or a skyscraper behind our back fence.
If you live in a condominium (or an Orange County gated community), your property rights are limited by Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions (CC & Rs), documents that can le gally prevent you from owning a pet, washing a car in your driveway, or having a basketball hoop over the garage. CC &R’s restrictions are far more onerous than historic preservation laws, yet are commonly accepted even by vocal property rights advocates.
Myth #10: Preservationists are always fighting new development and only care about the past
Historic preservationists do care deeply about the past - generally not just to wallow sentimentally in a bygone era, but as a way of anchoring ourselves as we move forward confidently into the future. Historic preservation is not about stopping change and is certainly not about squeezing out creative and exciting new architecture and development. Preservation allows us to retain the best of shared heritage to preserve sites of unique quality and beauty, revitalize neighborhoods, spur economic revitalization, and, quite simply, create better communities.
Ken Bernstein is Director of Preservation Issues for the Los Angeles Conservancy.
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