Fresno | Permits and Fees

Fresno Permits and Fees: Who Decides, Review Deadlines, 2026 Application Fees and Impact Fees

A Fresno housing project passes through a planning approval, a map if the lot is divided, and a building permit. Each step has its own decision maker, deadline and fee. This page lists them from the Development Code and the City's Master Fee Schedule, the Council-adopted list of every City fee, in the sections that took effect July 1, 2026. An impact fee is a one-time charge on new homes that pays for parks, fire stations and roads. The California impact fees page explains the state rules on those fees.

Who Decides Each Project

Table 15-4907 lists every planning permit and its decision maker. A ministerial decision applies fixed written rules, with no judgment and no hearing. A discretionary decision lets the official weigh the project and attach conditions.

Sources: Fresno Municipal Code Table 15-4907, Sections 15-906, 15-5102 and 15-5203; City SB 9 checklist.

The zone clearance is the City's quickest approval. Section 15-5102(B) requires it "to confirm that the construction of one single-unit house or one duplex is permitted as a matter of right" and is proposed "without any deviations from, all applicable development standards." A project that does not meet that threshold "shall be required to secure a Development Permit." The Development Permit is decided by the Director, who may refer it to the Planning Commission; Section 15-5205 says "Public notice shall not be required."

Small departures from a standard have their own permit. A Minor Deviation covers "relief from property development standards of 10% or less in conjunction with a Development Permit," and a Variance covers larger relief "due to unique conditions." Both go with a Development Permit, so a project that needs either one leaves the zone clearance route.

Review Deadlines

• Completeness, 30 days. Section 15-5004: "within 30 days upon receipt of an application for a development project, the Director shall determine and notify the applicant in writing as to whether an application is complete." The applicant gets at least 30 days to supply missing items, with one extension of up to 90 days, and the Director answers within 30 days of the new materials. An appeal of an incompleteness finding gets a final answer within 60 days.
• Tentative parcel maps, 50 days. Section 15-3308 gives the Director 50 days after the application is complete and any environmental document is adopted.
• ADUs, 15 business days and 60 days. Government Code 66317 requires a completeness answer "not later than 15 business days" after the application arrives, and approval or denial "within 60 days" of a complete application when a home already stands on the lot.
• SB 9, 60 days. Government Code 65852.21 requires a decision within 60 days of a complete application, or it "shall be deemed approved." The City SB 9 checklist adds that "Fees must be paid within 3 days of fees being invoiced," and that the application is not complete until they are paid.
• SB 684 maps, 60 days. Government Code 66499.41 sets the same 60-day limit for small-lot maps of 10 or fewer parcels.
• Life of a permit, 3 years. Under Section 15-5013, a permit "shall automatically expire if it is not exercised or extended within three years of its issuance." One extension of up to a year is possible, and "In no case shall the expiration period extend more than four years from the date of final approval." A Development Permit is exercised when a building or grading permit is issued and construction has lawfully started.

2026 Application Fees

Source: City of Fresno Master Fee Schedule, Planning and Development Fees, Amendment 590, all fees effective July 1, 2026.

Most application fees carry a mark meaning they are "Adjusted on July 1 annually" by the consumer price index for urban wage earners in the San Francisco-Oakland-Hayward area. Review fees from other departments are added to the planning fee: fire prevention review of a Development Permit is $247.00, police site plan review $210.00, and traffic engineering review $31.00, $275.00, $518.00 or $1,036.00 by level. "A single review fee for traffic and fire will be charged for multiple concurrent applications," and "All application fees do not include environmental assessments."

The fee schedule names the staff check a "Zoning Clearance" with minor, moderate and major tiers, while the code calls it a "Zone Clearance." The schedule does not say which tier an SB 9 or RM project falls in; ask when the invoice arrives. For building services not listed elsewhere, the schedule sets a blended hourly rate of $149.07, and a 10 percent General Plan update surcharge is added to all building permits.

The Inner City Discount

The Master Fee Schedule cuts many planning fees in half for "inner city" projects. "IC INNER CITY shall mean the 21 square mile area" bounded by Shields Avenue on the north, Chestnut Avenue on the east, California Avenue on the south, and West Avenue and State Highway 99 on the west. Parcels on the boundary streets count as inside. Three smaller areas also qualify: Inner City-Highway City (640 acres), Inner City-Pinedale and Inner City-Herndon Townsite.

Fees marked "**" get the 50 percent cut, including the Conditional Use Permit ($14,544.30 becomes $7,272.15), the Development Permit ($13,247.71 becomes $6,623.86), the tentative parcel map ($7,009.06 becomes $3,504.53), the rezone, most variance types and environmental assessments. In the building fee section, permit fees marked "**" are cut 50 percent "for the inner-city areas and limited to inner-city residential use." The halved amounts are VanPlex arithmetic, rounded to the cent.

Impact Fees per Home

Source: City of Fresno Master Fee Schedule, pages 128 to 133, effective July 1, 2026. The multi-family rates apply above 7.5 homes per acre.

VanPlex arithmetic: the three per-home fees for a new single-family home total $8,159.07 ($5,110.55 + $2,286.13 + $762.39). For a home in a multi-family project they total $6,189.08 ($3,853.92 + $1,743.86 + $591.30). The street fees are charged per gross acre, excluding the area of major streets, so a project on a quarter acre at the higher-density rate would owe a quarter of $17,062.49. The new growth area street fee applies to lots created by maps accepted for filing after January 23, 2007, and to building permits after July 1, 2007, outside vesting map protection. These fees rise each July 1 with the 20-City Construction Cost Index, a building cost index published by the trade magazine Engineering News Record.

The VMT Mitigation Fee is new. VMT means vehicle miles traveled, the total miles that a project's residents or users drive. Article 4.17, added by Ordinance 2025-043 effective January 17, 2026, funds projects that cut vehicle miles traveled. The schedule sets $295.00 per unit of VMT "generated above threshold of significance," and projects that screen out under the City's thresholds pay nothing. Residential projects pay "on the date of final inspection, or the date the certificate of occupancy is issued, whichever occurs first."

Some fees do not appear in the Planning and Development fee section read for this page: the police facilities fee amount, and sewer and water connection charges. For the Fresno Metropolitan Flood Control District drainage fees, that section says "See Exhibit 'C'." School fees are set by each school district, up to the state's 2026 maximum Level I fee of $5.38 per square foot of residential space.

Waivers, Exemptions and Deferral

• Residential infill waiver. Article 4.16 waives park facilities, police facilities, fire facilities and street facilities fees for new single-family or multifamily projects "on sites no greater than 6.5 net acres in size" that are surrounded by urban uses and sit in an Infill Opportunity Zone, a Bus Rapid Transit Corridor or the Downtown Planning Area on General Plan Figure IM-1. The South Industrial Priority Area is excluded. Eligible projects may also get "up to 50% reimbursement of the cost of curb, gutter, and sidewalk improvements," if the Council funds it. Apply to the Director of Public Works after planning approvals and by the time of building permit.
• Rebuilding the same homes. The B.U.I.L.D. Ordinance in Article 4.12 exempts "any replacement or reconstruction" of an existing house, duplex, triplex or fourplex of "not more than four residential units" from development impact fees, when the new building has the same number of units and "does not significantly expand or intensify the use."
• ADUs. Government Code 66311.5 bars impact fees on an ADU of "750 square feet of interior livable space or less," and requires fees on a larger ADU to be "charged proportionately in relation to the square footage of the primary dwelling unit." The Fresno schedule's footnotes say larger ADUs pay the multi-family rate, and two footnotes misprint the threshold as "70 sq. ft." and "705 sq. ft."; the statute controls.
• Deferral. Article 4.6 lets a developer defer a fee "until the issuance by the city of a certificate of occupancy," through a recorded agreement that "shall establish a lien on the property," with the fee "payable at the rate in effect at the time of payment."
• Small subdivisions. Fees marked "SS" may be absorbed by the City Manager "to encourage small subdivisions on infill parcels."

Where to Go Next

Related on VanPlex: the Fresno overview, California impact fees and CEQA and permit streamlining.

Frequently Asked Questions

Official sources (checked October 2026)