City of Westfield, Indiana - Community Development Department, Building Division

City of Westfield, Indiana

city

2728 East 171st Street, Westfield, IN 46074

Not required

Everything is filed and scheduled through the Citizens Portal. The Building Division states that "All permit applications and required documents must be submitted through the City's Citizens Portal" and that applications "will not be considered complete until all required information, plans, and supporting documents have been submitted." The office is at 2728 East 171st Street, Westfield, IN 46074, open Monday to Friday 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. and closed 12 to 1 p.m., on (317) 804-3150 option 5, and the Division prefers email at [email protected]. TJ Wertenberger is Building Commissioner and Brent Cline is Assistant Building Commissioner. For any job that does need a permit, the scheduling rules are strict and they cost money when missed. Inspections run Monday to Friday 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.; there are no same-day inspections; a request submitted after 4 p.m. is not eligible for next-business-day scheduling; and a request is not scheduled until a confirmation email arrives, so a pending request is not an appointment. Footing is the only inspection that can be booked for a specific time. The permit card must be posted in a front window visible from the street or on a construction sign board, and an unposted card is recorded as a failed inspection with a fee. Same-day cancellation inside the inspection window is charged at the failed inspection rate, except on footings. Residential inspection fees run 75 dollars a stage, a missed residential inspection is 350 dollars, and residential re-inspections escalate 75, 150, 300 then 600 dollars. Two site facts worth knowing before quoting Westfield work generally. Occupying a residential structure before the Certificate of Occupancy is issued draws a 2,500 dollar fee, 5,000 dollars for a non-residential one. And the City publishes a construction-site burning prohibition on the face of its residential permit packet, so roofing tear-off debris is hauled, never burned, unless a written variance has been obtained in advance. Two links the City itself publishes on its General FAQs page, "Do I Need a Permit?" and "Inspections Page", resolved to the City's own custom 404 page when checked, so use the Residential Permit Guide and the Request a Building Inspection page instead.

STATE-SET, NOT CITY-SET, AND THERE IS NO WESTFIELD EDITION YEAR TO TRACK. One- and two-family dwellings in Westfield are built to the 2020 Indiana Residential Code, 675 IAC 14-4.4, which incorporates 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 ... save and except those revisions made in this rule" (675 IAC 14-4.4-1). That rule was filed November 26, 2019 and formally readopted November 18, 2025 under Indiana Register document 20251210-IR-675240566RFA, and it is the newest rule in Article 14. The City states the same thing from its own side: its Building Codes page lists, as the Residential Code it reviews and inspects against, the "2020 Indiana Residential Code", described as "Based on the 2018 International Residential Code (IRC) with Indiana Amendments." IC 22-13-2-3(b) provides that a local reference to the commission's rules by citation to the Indiana Administrative Code "shall be construed to include all amendments as of the date that the reference is written and any later amendments to that provision, unless accompanied by a reference to a specific edition or supplement to the Indiana Administrative Code," so an Indiana local adoption tracks the current state rule rather than freezing at its adoption date. For commercial work the City publishes a separate and older list on the same page, headed by the "Indiana Building Code, 2014 Edition", based on the 2012 International Building Code, together with the Indiana Fuel Gas, Fire, Mechanical and Plumbing Codes on 2012 editions, ANSI A117.1-2009 and the 2009 Indiana Electrical Code. The residential and commercial codes are separate Indiana rules on separate editions and should never be conflated on a mixed job.

Required — REQUIRED, STATEWIDE AND UNCONDITIONAL, AT BOTH EAVES AND RAKES. The Indiana State Building Commissioner reproduces the governing provision in full, on Indiana Department of Homeland Security letterhead, in the guidance document headed Ice/Water Shield & Metal Drip Edge in Class 2 Construction with Asphalt Shingles: "R905.2.8.5 Drip edge. 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." The word "rood" in the fourth sentence is a typographical error in the State's own published document and is quoted here exactly as printed; it means the roof deck. Westfield neither adds to this nor may subtract from it, because IC 22-13-2-3(c) bars a city from an ordinance more stringent or more detailed than the commission's rules and (a)(2) gives those rules precedence over any local ordinance on the same subject. The State Building Commissioner states the reach of the code in terms in the same document: "The 2020 Indiana Residential Code is in full force and effect statewide. 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." Note that a Westfield reroof needs no City permit and therefore gets no City inspection. That does not make the drip edge optional, and the City says as much on its own Roofing FAQ page: "Even when a permit is not required, all work must still comply with applicable building codes and manufacturer installation requirements." About drip edge

Not required — NOT CATEGORICALLY REQUIRED HERE, AND IN INDIANA THIS IS A COUNTY-BY-COUNTY ANSWER RATHER THAN A STATE ONE. Indiana throws out the model climatic table and substitutes its own: 675 IAC 14-4.4-5 directs "Delete TABLE R301.2(1) and the corresponding footnotes and substitute to read as follows," and the substituted table then runs one row per county for all 92. Westfield is in Hamilton County, whose row is number 29, and that row carries "No" in the column headed "Ice Shield Underlayment Required". Only 27 of the 92 Indiana counties carry "Yes" in that column, and they are the northern tier; the other 65 carry "No". So a rule of thumb carried down from Fort Wayne or across from a lake-effect county is wrong in Westfield, and so is any assumption that Indiana has a single statewide answer. An ice barrier can still be mandatory on a particular Westfield job by a second and independent route, which the Indiana State Building Commissioner sets out on Department of Homeland Security letterhead: because Sections R903.1, R904.1 and R905.1 require roofing materials to be installed in accordance with the manufacturer's installation instructions, "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)." Hamilton County sits in that second group, so read the printed installation instructions for the shingle you are actually installing before deciding. Westfield has published exactly this answer for itself. Its Roofing FAQ asks "Does Westfield require ice and water shield if the manufacturer does not?" and answers "Westfield does not impose additional ice and water shield requirements beyond what is required by the current Indiana Residential Code," then asks "If the manufacturer requires ice and water shield, does Westfield require it to be installed?" and answers "Yes. Manufacturer installation instructions must be followed." It closes the loop with "Is failure to follow manufacturer installation instructions considered a code violation? Yes." About ice & water barrier

Not required — NO MID-ROOF, TEAR-OFF, DECK OR DRY-IN STAGE EXISTS IN WESTFIELD, AND USUALLY THERE IS NO CITY INSPECTION OF A REROOF AT ALL. A roof replacement in Westfield needs no permit, and with no permit there is no City inspection. Where a roofing job does cross into permit territory because it changes the roof area or the structure, the City publishes a complete enumeration of the inspections it performs, permit type by permit type, on its Request a Building Inspection page. Residential Building Permits require Footing, Foundation and Underslab, Rough-In, Drywall and Final, with Porch and Insulation as possible additions. Townhome permits carry the same five and the same two. Residential Addition and Accessory Structure permits, the category a roof-area change would normally fall into, require only Footing and Final, with Foundation and Underslab, Rough-In, Insulation and Drywall as possible additions. Deck permits require Footing, Rough-In and Final; Swimming Pool permits require Lower Bonding, Grid Bonding and Final; Demolition permits require a Final only; and the four commercial categories run Footing, Foundation Only, Underslab Only, Rough-In, Insulation, Final, Fire Marshal Final and Zoning Final, with Drywall and Above Ceiling as possible additions. No roof, tear-off, dry-in or mid-roof stage appears in any of the nine lists. The City's residential permit packet and its fee schedule agree: the packet's required list is Erosion and Infrastructure Prior, Footing, Foundation and Underslab, Rough-In, Drywall, Sump, Pre-Pour Sidewalk, Final Building and Erosion and Infrastructure Final, with Insulation and Energy, Porch and Pre-Final optional, and the fee schedule prices Footing, Foundation and Underslab Plumbing, Rough-In, Drywall and Final plus Above Ceiling, Porch, Pre-Final, Energy and Insulation, Trunk Line and Deck. The only roof condition anywhere in the packet is attached to the Rough-In stage on a new house, where the requirement is that the "House should be weather-tight" with "Roof must be installed" listed under it. That is a framing-stage condition on new construction, not a roofing inspection. Nothing in the state code creates one either: 675 IAC 14-4.4 says nothing about inspection staging, which in Indiana is entirely a local administrative matter.

Not required — NO IMPACT-RESISTANCE MANDATE APPLIES IN WESTFIELD, AND THE CITY HAS NO POWER TO CREATE ONE. The 2020 Indiana Residential Code, 675 IAC 14-4.4, was read in full and contains no occurrence of UL 2218, Class 4, Class IV or FM 4473, which are the standards and class designations that answer this question. Its only roof-covering amendments delete the word "approved" from an asphalt-shingle attachment section and from a flashing section, delete the word "printed" from a second flashing section, and delete one sentence from the rooftop photovoltaic section. Because IC 22-13-2-3(a)(2) gives the commission's rules precedence over any local ordinance covering the same subject matter, and IC 22-13-2-3(c) bars a city, town or county from an ordinance that conflicts with or includes more stringent or more detailed requirements than those rules, a Westfield ordinance could not impose an impact-resistance requirement on a roof covering even if the City wanted one. Be careful with the word "class" on Indiana paperwork: the State Building Commissioner's roofing guidance is headed "Class 2 Construction", and a Class 2 structure in Indiana is a statutory building category under IC 22-12-1-5, not a hail rating. An insurance discount for an impact-rated shingle is a matter between the homeowner and their carrier and should never be quoted as a code requirement.

THE TRIGGER IS A CHANGE TO THE ROOF AREA OR THE STRUCTURE, NOT A DOLLAR FIGURE, A SQUARE COUNT OR A LAYER COUNT. Westfield answers the roofing question twice on its own site and both answers agree. Its Roofing FAQ asks "Is a permit required to replace roof shingles?" and answers "No. The City of Westfield does not require a permit for roof replacement." Its Residential FAQ asks "Does roof replacement require a permit?" and answers "No. Roof replacement does not require a building permit. All work must comply with current Indiana Residential Code requirements." The City's one-page Residential Permit Guide sorts the whole question with a single test: "Is your project adding to or changing the structure or size of your home? Examples: new structure, addition, deck, pool, patio enclosure, covered porch, changes to roof area, adding square footage." Answer yes and a permit is required, and the column the Guide heads Additions and Exterior Expansions lists "Room additions", "Patio enclosures", "Covered porches", "Changes to roof area" and "Adding square footage to the home". Answer no and the column it heads Exterior Work puts "Replacing shingles" alongside "Replacing siding" and "Fences", all of it under the branch heading You Do Not Need A Permit. Read those two lists together and the line is clear: changing the roof COVERING is exempt, changing the roof AREA is not. A dormer, an addition, a covered porch, a patio enclosure or anything else that makes the roof bigger puts the job back inside the permit requirement. The City's fee schedule carries no roofing or re-roofing line at all, residential or commercial; a job that does cross into permit territory is priced as a residential addition at 250 dollars plus 11 cents per square foot. Note what the fee schedule charges for getting that judgement wrong: "Commencing Construction without Required Permit(s)" is 500 dollars residential and 1,500 dollars non-residential. The Guide also tells you in terms to call first if you are not sure, so on any roof job with a structural or framing element, call the Building Division on (317) 804-3150, option 5 before starting.

115 mph. Indiana replaces the model International Residential Code Table R301.2(1) with its own county-by-county table at 675 IAC 14-4.4-5, and the Hamilton County row, number 29, reads across as: Wind Speed 115 MPH; Seismic Design Category A; Ground Snow 20 PSF; Foundation 30 inches; Winter Design Temp 2 degrees F; Decay Slight to Moderate; Termite Moderate to Heavy; Weathering Severe; Ice Shield Underlayment Required No; Air Freezing Index 1500 or less; Mean Annual Temp 51.5 degrees F. All 92 Indiana counties carry the same 115 mph figure, so wind speed is not a Westfield or a Hamilton County variable and there is nothing local to look up. Exposure category is not a state or city lever either. It is determined site by site under Section R301.2.1.4, whose fourth sentence Indiana substitutes at 675 IAC 14-4.4-4 to provide that on a subdivision or master-planned site the exposure category for an individual structure is based on the site conditions that will exist once all adjacent structures have been built, where that construction is expected to begin within 2 years. On a partly built subdivision, in other words, the exposure category is read off the finished neighbourhood rather than off the open ground in front of you today.

NO CITY RULE AND NO STATE AMENDMENT, SO THE BASE CODE GOVERNS UNMODIFIED. Roofing in Westfield runs on the 2020 Indiana Residential Code, 675 IAC 14-4.4, which incorporates the 2018 International Residential Code. That rule was read in full, all 245 sections. The International Residential Code reroofing section, R908, does not appear in it at any point, so Indiana leaves reroofing and recovering an existing roof exactly as the base code writes them. Indiana does amend four sections of the roof assemblies chapter, and it is worth knowing which, because the rule is sometimes described as leaving Chapter 9 untouched and that is not accurate: 675 IAC 14-4.4-84 deletes the last sentence of Section R902.4 on rooftop-mounted photovoltaic panel systems, 14-4.4-85 deletes the word "approved" from Section R905.2.6 Attachment, 14-4.4-86 deletes the word "approved" from Section R905.2.8 Flashing, and 14-4.4-87 deletes the word "printed" from Section R905.2.8.4 Other flashing. Not one of the four touches layer counts, overlays or recovering. Westfield could not add a layer rule of its own in any event: IC 22-13-2-3(c) bars a city, town or county from adopting an ordinance that conflicts with or includes more stringent or more detailed requirements than the commission's rules, and (a)(2) gives those rules precedence over any local ordinance covering the same subject matter. So the answer on a Westfield job is the base International Residential Code rule on recovering an existing roof, in the 2018 edition, unchanged by Indiana and unavailable to the City to change. Read that rule out of the adopted edition rather than carrying an overlay allowance across from another state, and note that because Westfield issues no permit for a reroof, nobody at the City will check it for you.

7% statewide. Indiana levies a single state sales tax rate with no county or municipal add-on, so there is nothing extra on a Westfield or Hamilton County invoice. The Department of Revenue says so on the very page that enumerates the county-level taxes Indiana does levy: "The sales tax for the entire State of Indiana is 7%." Those county taxes are a local income tax, a county innkeeper's tax and a food and beverage tax, none of which reaches roofing materials, and the local income tax is the one most often mistaken for a county sales tax. Where the 7% falls depends on the shape of the contract rather than on the trade, and the Department's Sales Tax Information Bulletin number 60, which names roofing in its own list of examples of contractors, turns on one definition: a "Time and Material Contract" is "a contract in which the cost of construction material and the cost of labor or other charges are stated separately." A roofer working under a time and material contract "is a retail merchant that is selling the construction material that it incorporates into real property, and must be registered with the department and collect sales tax on the material portion of their contracts", and may buy that material exempt under the sale for resale exemption by giving the supplier their own completed Form ST-105. A roofer working under any other kind of contract, a lump sum contract for example, is not reselling the material, cannot buy it exempt for resale, and "will not charge their customers sales tax"; instead they either pay sales tax when they buy the material or self-assess and remit use tax when it is converted into real property. One line worth reading twice on a time and material job: "Installation charges separately stated on an invoice are not included in gross retail income. Labor incurred as part of on-site installation may be exempt." Which form your own contracts take, and how to invoice them, is a question for your accountant rather than for this record.