Georgetown-Scott County Department of Building Inspection

Scott County, Kentucky (including the cities of Georgetown, Stamping Ground, and Sadieville)

district

125 West Clinton Street, Georgetown, KY 40324

Required

Kentucky's residential building code is mandatory and uniform statewide: 815 KAR 7:125, Section 2(1), makes "the 2015 International Residential Code for One (1) and Two (2) Family Dwellings (IRC)... the mandatory state residential building code for all single-family dwellings, two (2) family dwellings, and townhouses constructed in Kentucky," with the "Kentucky amendments in the 2018 Kentucky Residential Code," Third Edition, August 2024, superseding any conflicting 2015 IRC provision. The code's own text bars any local variation: "Local governments shall not adopt or enforce any other building code for detached single family dwellings, two-family dwellings and townhouses" (KRC R101.3), and "a local ordinance shall not establish any additional or contradictory building construction standard than those adopted in this code" (KRC R102.2). Locally, Scott County Fiscal Court Ordinance 14-02 (2014) adopts the Kentucky Building Code (815 KAR 7:120) and Kentucky Residential Code "as though set forth fully herein" and designates the Georgetown-Scott County Department of Building Inspection as the enforcement agency for all of Scott County. One statewide carve-out applies everywhere in Kentucky: KRS 198B.010(4) excludes from "building" a farm dwelling or farm structure incident to the operation of a farm, located outside a municipality's boundary, that is not used for retail trade, as a workplace for ten or more people, or for timber storage.

Required — Kentucky's own Chapter 9 amendment, KRC R905.2.8.5, requires a drip edge at eaves and gables of shingle roofs, mechanically fastened at a maximum of 12 inches on center, with underlayment installed over the drip edge at eaves and under it at gables. The regulation also states a Kentucky-specific alternate: "Alternate methods to the standard metal drip edge may include site formed coil stock that creates a drip line as intended by the code. Wood, composite, and manufactured trim installed on the fascia shall create a drip line to prevent water from running back under the shingles, which will meet the requirements of the drip edge." About drip edge

Not required — No impact-resistance requirement appears anywhere in Kentucky's statewide residential or commercial construction codes. Neither the Kentucky Residential Code's Chapter 9 amendment packet nor the Kentucky Building Code contains the terms UL 2218, Class 4, Class IV, or "impact" in connection with roof coverings, and KRC R102.2 bars a local ordinance from establishing "any additional or contradictory building construction standard" beyond the statewide code. This closes the question at the local level as well as the state level.

Two Kentucky-level facts point in different directions and neither is adjudicated here. KRS 198B.010(21) defines "ordinary repair" to include "the replacement or installation of nonstructural components of the building such as roofing... that does not alter the structural integrity," and KRS 198B.010(11) excludes ordinary repair from the definition of "construction" to which the state permit requirement attaches. Against that, the Kentucky Residential Code's own scope reaches "alteration... replacement, repair" (R101.2), and Kentucky's own R105.2 exempt-work list (nine items: small sheds, fences, retaining walls, water tanks, sidewalks and driveways, finish work, playground equipment, window awnings, and small decks) does not name roofing. Locally, the Georgetown-Scott County Building Inspection Department states no dollar or scope threshold specific to roof repair: its own fee schedule (effective July 1, 2025) and its "Residential Renovation" permit application, the general category into which a reroof falls, list no roofing-specific line item or exemption, and its department page states its services include plan review and inspection of residential "additions, renovations, and repairs" generally, with a minimum permit fee of $155.

Kentucky's own Table R301.2(1) sets basic ultimate wind speed at 115 mph (51.4 m/s) for all Kentucky counties, including Scott County, with topographic effects to be investigated separately; a footnote directs conversion to nominal design wind speed (V_asd) under Section 301.2.1.3 for methods that use a nominal rather than an ultimate figure. Ground snow load for Scott County is 15 psf (the table's base figure; Scott County is not among the counties listed at the higher 20 psf tier). Weathering is SEVERE and termite hazard is MODERATE TO HEAVY for all Kentucky counties under the same table.

Kentucky's mandatory statewide residential code is the 2015 IRC, and Kentucky's own amendment packet amends nothing in the reroofing section: it touches Chapter 9 only at the drip-edge provision, R905.2.8.5, and contains no reference to R908 at all. The 2015 IRC's own reroofing provision, R908.3.1.1, sets a two-layer maximum on asphalt shingle roof recovering ("Where the existing roof has two or more applications of any type of roof covering"). No classification is asserted here pending a standing project ruling on whether Kentucky's statutory bar on any local building instrument satisfies the project's read-the-local-instrument test for classifying this field; leaving it unset asserts nothing either way.

Kentucky's 2018 Kentucky Residential Code amendment packet touches Chapter 9 (Roof Assemblies) in exactly one place, the drip-edge provision at R905.2.8.5; it amends nothing in IRC Chapter 8 (Roof-Ceiling Construction), which does not appear anywhere in the amendment packet's table of contents. So the base 2015 IRC roof-sheathing provisions apply in Scott County unmodified by any state or local amendment.

Kentucky sales and use tax is 6.00% statewide with no local sales tax component anywhere in the Commonwealth (Ky. Const. Section 181 does not authorize a local sales tax, and KRS Chapter 139 contains no local sales-tax provision). A roofing contractor is treated as the consumer of the materials, not a retailer of the finished job: 103 KAR 26:070, Section 2(1), makes "all sales to contractors, subcontractors, builders, or owners of building materials, fixtures, and supplies which are to be incorporated... into any structure or improvement to real estate by the process of erecting, remodeling, replacing, or repairing" the structure "subject to the sales or use tax at the time of sale to the contractor." Roofing and guttering are named trades and materials in that regulation's own enumerations, and contractors do not hold a retail sales tax permit or execute a resale certificate. Repair and replacement are taxed identically; Kentucky draws no capital-improvement distinction.