Allen County Building Department (building-permit and contractor-licensing authority for the City of Fort Wayne, Indiana)

City of Fort Wayne, Allen County, Indiana

city

200 East Berry Street, Suite 180, Fort Wayne, IN 46802

Required

Required

The permitting authority for the City of Fort Wayne is the ALLEN COUNTY Building Department, not a City of Fort Wayne department -- ACBD administers building permits and contractor licensing for the city and for unincorporated Allen County alike, from 200 East Berry Street, Suite 180, Fort Wayne, IN 46802, (260) 449-7131, with online applications through the Accela citizen-access portal at https://aca-prod.accela.com/ACFW. CORRECTED 2026-09-03: this note previously said a re-roof needed no ACBD permit, which was wrong -- see repair_permit_threshold for how the source flowchart was misread. A residential re-roof DOES require an ACBD building permit, and the Residential Permit Guide states the submittal requirement for that branch as a construction plan. The contractor side applies on top of the permit, not instead of it: the roofer must hold an Allen County contractor licence in a classification that permits roofing work (see registration_details). A property in a Fort Wayne local historic district additionally requires Fort Wayne Historic Preservation approval, and the guide notes that additional permits or approval may be required from another agency such as the Department of Planning Services. The inspection sequence attached to an ACBD roofing permit is NOT established by this record and is no longer asserted; confirm it with ACBD at (260) 449-7131.

STATE-GOVERNED, NOT CITY-SET. Fort Wayne and Allen County both enforce the statewide 2020 Indiana Residential Code, promulgated as 675 IAC 14-4.4 by the Indiana Fire Prevention and Building Safety Commission. The rule adopts the 2018 IRC by reference: "That certain document being titled the 2018 International Residential Code for One and Two Family Dwellings, first printing August 2017, published by the International Code Council ... is hereby incorporated by reference as if fully set out in this rule save and except those revisions made in this rule. (b) This rule shall be known as the 2020 Indiana Residential Code." (675 IAC 14-4.4-1). Filed with the Publisher 2019-11-26, effective 30 days after filing = 2019-12-26; it repealed the prior 675 IAC 14-4.3. Still the edition in force as of 2026-07-25: the commission's September 2025 filing on 675 IAC 14-4.4 (LSA Document #24-566, Indiana Register 20250903-IR-675240566RAA) is a five-year readoption review reaffirming the existing rule, not a new-edition rule superseding it. CURRENCY UPDATE 2026-09-05: that review has since been finalised. The Readopted Final Rule at Indiana Register 20251210-IR-675240566RFA, posted 2025-12-10 under the same LSA Document #24-566, readopts 675 IAC 14-4.4 effective January 1, 2026, so the 2020 Indiana Residential Code remains the edition in force on its own terms rather than by inference from a pending review. Indiana localities have no independent code-adoption power: IC 22-13-2-3(c) provides that "A city, town, or county may not adopt an ordinance that conflicts with or includes more stringent or detailed requirements than the commission's rules," and the only amendment route (IC 22-13-2-5.6, effective 2024-01-01) is an annual petition to the commission that, if carried by a two-thirds vote, changes the STATEWIDE code rather than creating a local variant.

Required — STATE-GOVERNED, unconditional, and applies in Fort Wayne exactly as everywhere else in Indiana -- unlike the ice barrier, drip edge does not depend on the county row of Table R301.2(1). The provision is Section R905.2.8.5 of the 2018 International Residential Code as incorporated by 675 IAC 14-4.4, and the Indiana State Building Commissioner reproduces it in full in the Indiana Department of Homeland Security guidance memo "ICE/WATER SHIELD & METAL DRIP EDGE IN CLASS 2 CONSTRUCTION with ASPHALT SHINGLES" (Craig E. Burgess AIA NCARB CPE CBI LEED AP, February 25, 2020), where it is printed as follows: "A drip edge shall be provided at eaves and rake edges of shingle roofs. Adjacent segments of drip edge shall be overlapped not less than 2 inches (51 mm). Drip edges shall extend not less than ¼ inch (6.4 mm) below the roof sheathing and extend up back onto the roof deck not less than 2 inches (51 mm). Drip edges shall be mechanically fastened to the rood deck at not more than 12 inches (305 mm) o.c. with fasteners as specified in Section R905.2.5 Underlayment shall be installed over the drip edge along eaves and under the drip edge along rake edges." That quotation reproduces two printing errors in the State's own memo exactly as the State prints them: "rood deck" for "roof deck" in the fastening sentence, and the cross-reference to Section R905.2.5 running into the following sentence without a full stop. Indiana does not amend R905.2.8.5. CORRECTED 2026-09-05: this record previously said Indiana's only edits in the roofing chapter were cosmetic word deletions in three adjacent flashing sections. There are four amendments, not three, and one of them is not cosmetic. Read in full across its 245 numbered sections, 675 IAC 14-4.4 deletes the text of the last sentence of Section R902.4 without substitution (675 IAC 14-4.4-84); deletes the words "approved" from Section R905.2.6 (14-4.4-85); deletes the word "approved" from Section R905.2.8 (14-4.4-86); and deletes the word "printed" from Section R905.2.8.4 (14-4.4-87). None of the four reaches the drip edge, so the mandate stands unaltered statewide. That Indiana treats it as an operative, actively enforced requirement rather than dormant boilerplate is confirmed by the State Building Commissioner devoting a dedicated guidance memo to metal drip edge alongside ice/water shield. Allen County cannot waive it (IC 22-13-2-3(c)), and a permit requirement and a code requirement are separate things in any event: the code binds the work whether or not a permit issues. About drip edge

Required — STATE-GOVERNED, and categorically YES for Fort Wayne -- this is one of the places where Allen County's answer differs from central Indiana's. Indiana's replacement TABLE R301.2(1) at 675 IAC 14-4.4-5 pre-fills the "ICE SHIELD UNDERLAYMENT REQUIRED" column as YES for Allen County, which makes the ice barrier a flat requirement for asphalt-shingle re-roofs in Fort Wayne rather than a manufacturer-instruction-dependent one. The Indiana State Building Commissioner's guidance memo "Ice/Water Shield & Metal Drip Edge in Class 2 Construction with Asphalt Shingles" (Craig E. Burgess, AIA NCARB CPE CBI LEED AP, dated 2020-02-25) sets out the two-layer structure explicitly: "there are specific counties in which it is always required (per Table R301.2(1)), and specific counties in which it is required only when the roofing manufacturer's written installation instructions require it (per Sections R903.1, R904.1 and R905.1)." Allen County is in the first group. The governing installation-extent provision is IRC Section R905.1.2, adopted by Indiana without substantive amendment, which requires the ice barrier to consist of not fewer than two layers of underlayment cemented together or a self-adhering polymer-modified bitumen sheet, extending from the lowest edges of all roof surfaces to a point not less than 24 inches inside the exterior wall line of the building, with an exception for detached accessory structures not containing conditioned floor area. Note that this is a state code requirement that no local permit practice can switch off -- Indiana DHS states that the 2020 Indiana Residential Code governs all Class 2 residential construction "[r]egardless of any established local enforcement policies or practices to the contrary." About ice & water barrier

Not required — NO MID-ROOF, ROOF-DECK OR DRY-IN STAGE IS SET FOR FORT WAYNE, BUT A PERMITTED REROOF IS STILL INSPECTED. Fort Wayne has no building department of its own -- the Allen County Building Department issues the permit and runs the inspections for the City, so the schedule that governs a Fort Wayne reroof is the County's. Two things settle the question. First, Indiana has taken inspections out of the residential code altogether: 675 IAC 14-4.4-2, which amends Chapter 1 of the 2020 Indiana Residential Code, provides at item (8): "Delete SECTIONS R108, R109, R110, R111, R112, R113, and R114 in their entirety without substitution." R109 is the code's inspections section. The same amendment sends plans and existing construction to local ordinance in terms. So the only place an inspection requirement can come from in Fort Wayne is the Building Department's own schedule. Second, that schedule was read in full. The Department's Rules and Regulations, Chapter 5, sets no stages itself; it provides that "inspections and the schedule thereof shall be uniform as to time, application and procedure, and the said schedule of inspections as promulgated by the Commissioner shall be made available to all licensees/registrants and permit holders at the Building Department office." It makes it the permit holder's duty to call when the work reaches a stage designated in that schedule. The schedule the Commissioner publishes, headed Inspection Guidelines, carries three building stages and no more -- concrete, framing and final -- with separate electrical, plumbing and HVAC lists. No tear-off, roof-deck, dry-in, in-progress or mid-roof stage appears anywhere in it. Its one mention of a roof is a condition on the framing stage, which is called "after all framing, bracing, fire-stopping, windows, doors, and roof are in place", and that is a new-construction stage rather than a reroofing one. Do not read any of this as no inspection at all. A Fort Wayne reroof requires an Allen County building permit, the Department's fee schedule prices roof and siding replacement as a line of its own, Chapter 5 lets the Commissioner inspect work in progress "at such stages of construction and from time to time as the Commissioner deems proper", and the Department's permit guide says the inspector will tell you approximately how many inspections a project may need. Inspections are attempted within twenty-four hours of the request, Saturdays, Sundays and holidays excluded. Ask which stages your roofing permit carries when it is issued, on (260) 449-7131.

Not required — STATE-GOVERNED, NOT CITY-SET. Neither 675 IAC 14-4.4 (the 2020 Indiana Residential Code, adopting the 2018 IRC) nor its Indiana amendments impose a UL 2218 or Class 4 impact-resistance requirement on roof coverings, and Allen County's own Residential Permit Guide contains no such requirement either. Allen County has no authority to add one by ordinance (IC 22-13-2-3(c)).

CORRECTED 2026-09-03. This record previously published that re-roofing was categorically exempt from an Allen County building permit at any scale. That was WRONG, and it was wrong because of how the source document was read rather than which source was used. The Allen County Building Department's Residential Permit Guide is a FLOWCHART, and a text extraction of it interleaves the two branches, so "Roofing & Siding" appears to fall on the no-permit side. Rendered as an image, the guide is unambiguous: the second decision box asks "Does the work involve any mechanical, electrical, plumbing, HVAC, or structural alteration?", and the YES branch's "PERMIT REQUIRED FOR:" list reads Electrical, Plumbing, "Mechanical, HVAC, structural alterations", and "Roofing & Siding", with the shingle-swatch icon that the guide's own legend labels "ROOFING & SIDING". The NO branch box, which reads "You do not need a permit from the Allen County Building Department", carries only the fence and paint-roller icons. So a residential re-roof in Allen County, Fort Wayne included, DOES require an ACBD building permit; the submittal requirement the guide states for that branch is a construction plan. No dollar or square-foot threshold appears on the guide, so none is asserted here. A property inside a Fort Wayne local historic district additionally needs Historic Preservation approval, and the guide notes that additional permits or approval may be required from another agency such as the Department of Planning Services. Confirm scope and current fees with ACBD at (260) 449-7131.

STATE-GOVERNED, NOT CITY-SET, and fixed at the COUNTY row rather than by municipality. 675 IAC 14-4.4-5 deletes and replaces IRC TABLE R301.2(1) (CLIMATIC AND GEOGRAPHIC DESIGN CRITERIA) with an Indiana table enumerated county by county. The Allen County row -- which is the row that governs the entire City of Fort Wayne -- reads: design wind speed 115 MPH; Seismic Design Category A; ground snow load 20 PSF; frost/foundation depth 36 inches; winter design temperature 1 degree F; ice shield underlayment required: YES. The 115 MPH design wind speed and the 20 PSF ground snow load are both uniform across all 92 Indiana counties in this table, so neither figure is Fort Wayne-specific. What DOES differentiate Allen County from, for example, Marion County / Indianapolis and Hamilton County / Carmel is the foundation/frost depth (36 inches in Allen County versus 30 inches in Marion and Hamilton Counties), the Seismic Design Category (A in Allen County versus B in Marion County), and the Ice Shield Underlayment Required column, which the table marks YES for Allen County and NO for Marion and Hamilton Counties (see ice_water_shield_required). Wind exposure category is not a state or local lever -- it is determined site-specifically under IRC Section R301.2.1.4. Allen County has no authority to substitute different design criteria (IC 22-13-2-3(c)).

STATE-GOVERNED, with no Fort Wayne or Allen County layer rule of its own -- and none is legally possible, because IC 22-13-2-3(c) bars a city, town or county from adopting an ordinance more stringent or more detailed than the commission's rules. The operative provision is the roof recover section of the 2018 International Residential Code as incorporated by 675 IAC 14-4.4. CORRECTED 2026-09-05: this record previously said the Indiana rule leaves the whole roofing chapter unaltered. It does not. Read in full across its 245 numbered sections, 675 IAC 14-4.4 amends four sections of that chapter: it deletes the text of the last sentence of Section R902.4 without substitution (675 IAC 14-4.4-84); deletes the words "approved" from Section R905.2.6 (14-4.4-85); deletes the word "approved" from Section R905.2.8 (14-4.4-86); and deletes the word "printed" from Section R905.2.8.4 (14-4.4-87). What matters for the layer question is that the rule contains no amendment to Section R908, the roof replacement and roof recover section, so Indiana takes that text exactly as the International Code Council published it and the answer is an Indiana-wide one rather than a Fort Wayne one. The base rule, at 2018 IRC Section R908.3.1.1 (Roof recover not allowed): "A roof recover shall not be permitted where any of the following conditions occur", the conditions being that "the existing roof or roof covering is water soaked or has deteriorated to the point that the existing roof or roof covering is not adequate as a base for additional roofing", that "the existing roof covering is slate, clay, cement or asbestos-cement tile", and that "the existing roof has two or more applications of any type of roof covering". One existing layer may therefore be recovered; a second existing layer forces tear-off to the deck. Allen County publishes no re-roof handout restating the rule, so a roofer wanting it in the County's own words should call ACBD at (260) 449-7131 -- but note that a re-roof in Allen County does require an ACBD building permit, so the layer question will be asked at the counter.

STATE-GOVERNED, with no Fort Wayne or Allen County sheathing rule of its own and no local power to create one (IC 22-13-2-3(c)). Asphalt-shingle deck requirements in Fort Wayne come from IRC Section R905.2.1 as incorporated by 675 IAC 14-4.4, and are stated here as an absence rather than as borrowed code text. Read in full across its 245 numbered sections, 675 IAC 14-4.4 amends four sections of the roofing chapter and no others: it deletes the text of the last sentence of Section R902.4 without substitution (675 IAC 14-4.4-84); deletes the words "approved" from Section R905.2.6 (14-4.4-85); deletes the word "approved" from Section R905.2.8 (14-4.4-86); and deletes the word "printed" from Section R905.2.8.4 (14-4.4-87). R905.2.1 is not among them, so it applies in Fort Wayne as the International Code Council published it. CORRECTED 2026-09-05: this record previously stated the substance of that base section, cited only Indiana sources for it, and described Indiana's roofing-chapter edits as three cosmetic word deletions. There are four amendments, the R902.4 one removes a whole sentence, and the base section's wording is not restated here because the ICC text is not published in a form this record has read. Read Section R905.2.1 of the 2018 IRC as incorporated by 675 IAC 14-4.4, or call ACBD at (260) 449-7131. What the State does publish first-hand, and what therefore binds the deck side of a Fort Wayne re-roof, is the Indiana Department of Homeland Security guidance memo of February 25, 2020, which prints IRC Section R903.1 as "Roof decks shall be covered with approved roof coverings secured to the building or structure in accordance with the provisions of this chapter. Roof assemblies shall be designed and installed in accordance with this code and the approved manufacturer's installation instructions such that the roof assembly shall serve to protect the building or structure." So the shingle manufacturer's written instructions for deck preparation and fastening are themselves enforceable code. That memo also states that the 2020 Indiana Residential Code "is in full force and effect statewide" and that "Regardless of any established local enforcement policies or practices to the contrary, or whether a local building authority even exists in any particular jurisdiction or location in the state, the 2020 Indiana Residential Code governs all Class 2 residential construction, and its requirements, by law, must be followed. Local units of government are statutorily mandated to require compliance with the code."

7.00%. Indiana levies a single statewide sales and use tax and authorises no county, municipal or transit local-option add-on to it, so the rate a roofing contractor pays on materials purchased in Fort Wayne is the bare state rate -- there is no Allen County increment and no City of Fort Wayne increment, and the Fort Wayne combined rate is therefore identical to the rate anywhere else in Indiana. This makes Indiana structurally simpler than Minnesota, where state, metro-area, county and city components stack. (Indiana does impose separate narrow excise taxes, e.g. county innkeeper's and food-and-beverage taxes, but these apply to lodging and prepared food, not to general retail purchases of roofing materials, and are not part of the 7.00% a roofer pays at a supply house.)