Permits

The City of Great Bend issues permits for building, plumbing, electrical and mechanical work, demolition, mobile homes, signs, fences, etc. Permits are issued to licensed contractors and to homeowners performing work in the residence they occupy. Rental and commercial properties require work to be performed by licensed contractors in order to protect the owners and occupants.

Prior to permits being issued applicants need to complete the appropriate permit application (see below) for the work being performed and review the Submittal Requirements (PDF) to ensure all necessary documents have been provided. Projects such as fences, sheds, accessory structures, new construction, etc. will require a site plan (pdf) to be provided along with the permit application.

Once all permits are issued and inspections are completed a Certificate of Occupancy may be issued.

Please contact our office at (620) 793-4106 for questions regarding if a permit is required, building regulations and fees.

**It is also important for applicants to contact Dig Safe by dialing 811 prior to applying for permits or starting work. Dig Safe will indicate placement of utility lines on the property. Utility lines need to be indicated on the plot plan submitted for approval by the Building Inspection’s department.

**Permits for curb cuts, sidewalks and other work done in the public right-of-way are issued through the Engineering Department at (620) 793-4111.

Permit Fees

City of Great Bend Building Inspection staff recently completed an extensive review of our current permit, licensing, and meeting fees. This process consisted of reviewing our current fees and analyzing those fees against the fees of other Kansas cities of similar size and evaluating these fees based upon the services provided by our department. The result of this review indicated that our fees have not been updated since 1994 and the fees being assessed do not accurately reflect the services being provided as part of our licensing and inspection processes. Several public hearings and work sessions were conducted at City Council meetings prior to the members of the City Council voting to adopt the new fees. The Great Bend City Council voted to pass Ordinance Number 4382 on March 7, 2022, to create a Master Fee Schedule where all the fees utilized by the City of Great Bend could be found in one document. The current Master Fee Schedule was adopted by the Great Bend City Council on March 21, 2022, by Resolution Number 032122-H.

What does this mean for our contractors and citizens applying for permits? Individuals applying for permits will notice some changes in the permit fees themselves but also how permit fees are being calculated. With the new fee schedule new construction permits, remodels, plumbing, electrical and mechanical permits will all be calculated based upon the estimated labor and material costs of the project. Projects such as fences, demolitions, moving permits, mobile homes and signs will still have specific fees. Projects requiring a plan review will also see a difference. New residential construction or residential dwellings being used for commercial purposes will be charged a plan review fee. Any commercial project requiring document submittal will also be charged a plan review fee. The plan review fees will now be calculated based upon a percentage of the assessed permit fees for the project.

The complete City of Great Bend Master Fee Schedule can be found here.

Online Permit Applications:

Permit applications can now be submitted online through the City of Great Bend Citizen Portal. Submitted applications will be reviewed by our office and we will make contact via the provided email address if further information is needed and to process permit fees. Some permit applications do allow for payment at time of submission; however, this does not mean that a permit is issued. Our department will still complete a final review of all submitted permit applications and will issue the official permit. Applicants can begin work after they have received their official issued permit.

Permit Applications:

Fillable Applications

If your software is not able to accommodate Fillable Applications please contact our office for PDF versions of the documents listed above.

Inspection Forms:

Current Adopted Codes

The City of Great Bend currently has the following codes adopted:

2018 International Building Code
2018 International Residential Code
2018 International Fire Code
2018 International Existing Building Code
2018 Uniform Plumbing Code
2018 Uniform Mechanical Code
2017 National Electrical Code

To see Building Inspector Burns’ letter regarding the recent code adoption click here. Inspector Burns also created a presentation addressing the significant changes that will be seen with the recent code adoption. This presentation is available by clicking here.