City of Novato – Department of Community Development

If your neighbor leaves their garbage cans in their drive way for over a year, do not expect this department to help you. I offer photographs and phone call reminders. They offer excuses and a lack of action.

«The gated city of trees» is what the city of novato slogan should be. You ever grow up thinking how awesome owning your own house would be? Well in communist novato you apparently are confined to codes and permits down to the appearance of your home. You even need permission from the city to sell your home as a permit (aka paying a code inspector find code violations to generate income). If you overlook paying this permit they will fine you without notice and hold all other permits hostage.
They Provide no price sheet, only a list of items that need permitting that need to be paid. They encourage to come down to the «one stop shop» and just pay you fees and have a nice day. Well, I’ve made three visits and still not done. My only fault is buying a house here and thinking I own the right to do as I want to it (i.e. where I put my shed, build a fence, a deck…).
I wont get into the corrupt politics. If you intend to buy a house here, enjoy being a suburban sheep to be sheared of your monies and lorded over. I will never buy a house here again.

This place is no longer at this address. It has been moved back to 922 machin next to the police dept. The hours here have never been helpful to anyone. The hours are mon-​thurs 9−11am. Get there early because 4 – 10 people are always in line. Plan on 1 – 1 ½ hrs for permits.

If you live in the City of Novato, and you plan to do any remodeling or repairs to your home, you will need to go to The Department of Community Development. What items need a permit, you ask? Here’s a complete list:
As you can see, pretty much ANY type of remodeling or repair requires a permit, even a trivial thing like adding a new garbage disposal. This can add up very quickly, especially if you’re doing major renovations.
The office has limited hours, and you can only pull a permit between Monday and Thursday from 9 am to 11 am. The office is broken down into three sections: the Planning Division, the Building Division, and Code Enforcement. In all of my times going there, they’ve only had one person working behind each counter. If you need to get a permit, I recommend going earlier in the morning since it’s usually less crowded.
My first visit went fairly smoothly. I needed to pull one permit to get a few things up to code, and a second permit to do the remodeling and repairs. (Depending on how extensive your remodeling is, you may have to submit engineering plans or floor plans for approval). In my case, I needed to provide a top-​down view of the areas of the house that needed dry rot repair.
After filling out the forms and getting the approval from one of the building inspectors, one of the receptionists took care of my payment. However, she was rather brusque and downright rude. Whenever I’d ask a question, she’d cut me off. She even walked away from me before I finished asking my questions and came back five minutes later. When I asked her about all the fees listed on the receipt, she blitzed through the items so quickly, I didn’t even have a chance to write everything down.
My problems with The Department of Community Development came about a month later when I wanted to make an adjustment to one of my permits. The City of Novato charged $ 93.73 to replace 1 – 8 windows, and $ 127.61 to change 9 or more windows. Originally, I only wanted to change 4 windows, but a few weeks later, I realized that I had the budget to change 8. I had already paid $ 93.73 for 1 – 8 windows.
I went to the Department of Community Development again, and one of the building inspectors made an addendum to permit, indicating 8 window replacements instead of 4.
A few weeks later, my contractor suggested changing the remaining 3 windows in the house (for a total of 11) to make them look consistent and to make the street view of the house more appealing. I agreed with him, and decided to change the total number of windows on my permit to 11, and pay the difference between $ 127.61 and $ 93.73 ($ 33.88).
Well, guess what? The Department of Community Development would not allow me to pay the difference or modify the permit. Instead, they required me to get a NEW permit for the 3 additional windows and pay ANOTHER $ 93.73!
I asked them to provide me with written documentation of why they could not simply modify the permit, and none of the receptionists were able to answer that question. Finally, I spoke to the Senior Building Inspector, and he gave me a copy of the 2007 California Building Code, Section 105.3, regarding the application for permit. However, it did not state anything about changes or addendums to permits. After debating with him for several minutes, I could see that he wasn’t going to budge, so I bit the bullet and paid $ 93.73 for the new permit.
Of course, this upset me for a while. I had the honesty and integrity to tell them that the total number of windows I wanted to change was 11. And for them to charge me an additional $ 93.73 instead of the difference ($ 33.88) was dishonest and wrong.