Scott County, Iowa - Planning & Development Department

Unincorporated Scott County, Iowa, plus the Cities of Dixon, Donahue, LeClaire, Long Grove, McCausland, Panorama Park, Princeton, and Riverdale under a 28E intergovernmental agreement. Davenport and Bettendorf are explicitly excluded — those two cities issue their own building permits.

county

600 W. 4th St., Davenport, IA 52801

Required

Required

Per Scott County Ordinance No. 24-07 Sec. 5-6(E) (amending IRC Section R105.5), a permit becomes invalid unless work is commenced within 180 days of issuance or is suspended/abandoned for 180 days after work begins; all permits expire 12 months from the date of issue unless extended by the building official (extension fee: half the original permit fee, or a fee set by the building official based on remaining work). Under the county's fee schedule (Sec. 5-14(i)), work begun without a required permit triggers a special investigation, with an investigation fee equal to the amount of the permit fee that would otherwise apply.

Scott County has adopted the 2021 International Building Code, 2021 International Existing Building Code, 2021 International Residential Code, 2021 International Mechanical Code, 2021 International Property Maintenance Code, and 2021 International Swimming Pool and Spa Code, together with the 2015 International Energy Conservation Code, the 2020 National Electrical Code, and the 2021 Uniform Plumbing Code, by Scott County Ordinance No. 24-07 (recorded 11/22/2024, published 11/27/2024), effective January 1, 2025, applicable to unincorporated Scott County and, by the 28E agreement, the eight contract cities.

Required — Scott County adopts the 2021 International Residential Code by Ordinance No. 24-07. That ordinance's own amendment section, Sec. 5-6 (19 lettered items, read in full), does not touch drip edge or the IRC roof-covering underlayment provisions, so the base 2021 IRC drip-edge provision applies unmodified. About drip edge

Required — Scott County's own Table R301.2 insert, added by Ordinance No. 24-07 Sec. 5-6 item F (applicable to the 2021 IRC as adopted by the same ordinance), lists "Ice Barrier Underlayment Required: Yes" as a filled-in table value for the jurisdiction. About ice & water barrier

Not required — No mid-roof, dry-in, underlayment or in-progress roofing inspection is required, and the finding rests on the two documents Scott County itself puts in a roofer's hands plus the inspection section of the code it has adopted. (1) The County publishes a DEDICATED roofing permit application -- "Roof / Siding Construction Permit Application for Unincorporated Scott County", revised August 2, 2024, a flat 0 fee for roof only and 00 for roof and siding. It is the document a reroofer actually files, and it names NO inspection stage. Its single use of the word is the contact-preference line, "Please indicate preferred contact for payment, permit inquiries, and inspections". (2) The County's "Building Permits and Inspections Policies", adopted February 11, 2022, is the governing procedural instrument and it is procedural throughout: inspections must be requested at least twenty-four hours ahead and "shall be submitted by calling and speaking with Department staff. No inspections shall be scheduled via electronic communication"; a permit goes Inactive if no inspection occurs within six months; and a permit closes when "the permitted work is completed and a final inspection has been performed". Measured across that whole document, the anchored terms roof, shingle, sheathing, underlayment, dry-in, ice and framing occur ZERO times. It creates no inspection types at all. (3) So the inspection scheme is the one in the adopted code. Scott County adopted the 2021 International Residential Code by Ordinance No. 24-07, effective January 1, 2025, and 2021 IRC Section R109 was read directly. It enumerates foundation, plumbing/mechanical/gas/electrical rough, floodplain, frame and masonry, other, fire-resistance-rated construction, and final -- no roof-covering stage. Across the whole of Section R109 the word "roof" occurs exactly once, and it runs the other way: R109.1.4 requires that framing inspection "shall be made after the roof, masonry, framing, firestopping, draftstopping and bracing are in place." ⚠️ SCOPE: this record covers unincorporated Scott County and the eight cities under its 28E agreement. Davenport and Bettendorf issue their own building permits and are outside it, so nothing here speaks to a job in either city. NOTE the residual discretion: IRC R109.1.5 lets the building official require "any other inspections to ascertain compliance", which is authority to look at a given roof, not a scheduled mid-roof stage.

Not required — Scott County Ordinance No. 24-07, read in full — its International Building Code amendments and its International Residential Code amendments (19 lettered items, including the Table R301.2 insert) — together with the county's other in-force Chapter 5 provisions, contain no "UL 2218" or "Class 4" impact-resistance requirement and no windborne-debris/impact-rating provision of any kind.

Scott County's own fee schedule (Code of Ordinances Sec. 5-14(e)) sets a flat $50 residential roofing permit fee ($100 if combined with a siding permit), and the county's own "Roof / Siding Construction Permit Application for Unincorporated Scott County" (revised 8/2/2024) confirms the same flat fee. Neither document states a minimum job value or square-footage below which a residential reroof is exempt from a permit.

Table R301.2 (Climatic and Geographic Design Criteria) as filled in by Scott County Ordinance No. 24-07 Sec. 5-6 item F, applicable to the 2021 IRC: ground snow load 30 psf (moderate-to-heavy additional drift loads calculated using a 25 psf ground snow load where applicable); ultimate design wind speed 115 mph; no topographic wind effects; no special wind region; no windborne debris zone; seismic design category A; weathering (concrete masonry) Severe; frost line depth 42 inches; termite damage Moderate to Heavy; ice barrier underlayment required Yes; flood hazard — initial FHBM effective 6/1/1977, NFIP community #190239, effective FIS 3/23/2021, effective FIRMs 3/23/2021 and 4/11/2024; air freezing index 2000; mean annual temperature 50.5 F.

Scott County adopts the 2021 International Residential Code by Ordinance No. 24-07. That ordinance's own amendment section, Sec. 5-6 (19 lettered items, read in full), does not touch roof-recovering or roof-layer-limit provisions, so the base 2021 IRC provisions apply unmodified. Base-code rule, read at 2021 IRC Section R908.3.1.1 (Roof recover not allowed) and quoted here rather than left behind the ICC paywall: a roof recover "shall not be permitted" where "the existing roof has two or more applications of any type of roof covering" (nor where the existing covering is water soaked or deteriorated, or is slate, clay, cement or asbestos-cement tile). One existing layer may therefore be recovered; a second existing layer forces tear-off to the deck.

Scott County adopts the 2021 International Residential Code by Ordinance No. 24-07. That ordinance's own amendment section, Sec. 5-6 (19 lettered items, read in full), does not touch roof deck sheathing provisions, so the base 2021 IRC provisions apply unmodified.

7% combined rate — Iowa's 6% state sales tax plus a 1% local option sales tax in effect since 1/1/1989 — per the Iowa Department of Revenue's own "LOST by County" workbook (effective 7/1/2026). This 7% rate applies uniformly across unincorporated Scott County and all eight 28E-contract cities the county permits for (Dixon, Donahue, LeClaire, Long Grove, McCausland, Panorama Park, Princeton, Riverdale); Davenport and Bettendorf are also listed at 7% on the same DOR workbook, though those two cities are outside the county's own permitting authority. HOW IOWA TAXES A ROOF IS UNUSUAL, AND IT CUTS BOTH WAYS. Iowa Code section 423.2(6) makes a list of enumerated services taxable at the state rate, and paragraph (l) of that list reads, in its entirety, "Roof, shingle, and glass repair." Against that, section 423.3(37) exempts "the sales price of services on or connected with new construction, reconstruction, alteration, expansion, remodeling." The materials side flips with the labour side. Under section 423.2(1)(b)(1), materials sold to a contractor "for the erection of buildings and other structures or for the reconstruction, alteration, expansion, or remodeling of buildings and other structures are retail sales of tangible personal property," on which the contractor pays the tax as consumer, while materials sold "for use in repairs to or for installation in existing buildings and other structures are purchases for resale." So a job characterised as a repair carries taxable labour and resale-purchased materials, and a job characterised as reconstruction or remodeling carries exempt labour and taxed materials. Which branch a particular tear-off and replacement falls into is a fact-specific question the statute does not answer, and it changes who owes the tax rather than only how much, so settle it with an accountant rather than assume it.