Town of Shalimar

A city address is usually permitted by the city, not the county — but not always, and some authorities keep building and hand electrical to someone else. Getting this wrong costs the whole submittal, because every requirement below belongs to whoever actually holds jurisdiction. Check the overlays in the same pass: an HOA, a historic district, a windstorm certification or a system-size cap can reshape the design, and all of them are cheaper to find now than after the array is laid out.

• Is this authority the AHJ for residential solar at this address? No. The Town of Shalimar is not the AHJ for residential-solar building/electrical permitting. Its own Land Development Code says so in terms: LDC §9.00.11(A) — “The Okaloosa County Building Official is hereby authorized and directed to enforce the building code provisions for the Town of Shalimar consistent with agreement between the Town of Shalimar and Okaloosa County” — and §9.00.11(B) has the County Building Official “receive applications, review construction documents and issue permits for the erections, alterations, demolition, and moving of buildings and structures…and enforce compliance.’ The Town's own FAQ page confirms this in plain language: “Except in some minor instances, the Town's permit requirements mirror Okaloosa County's requirements.” The Town is not simply silent — it retains a real, separate gate: LDC §9.00.07/9.00.08 make the Certificate of Occupancy AND the Certificate of Completion (used for “renovations, additions, and alterations” — the bucket a PV retrofit falls in) issuable by the County Building Official “after approval of the Town Administrator,” and every contractor working in town limits must separately buy a Town-issued Contractor's Tracking Certificate (CTC). 90% · town land development code
• What does this authority permit itself, and what does it delegate? Delegated — to the Okaloosa County Building Official, for both Building AND Electrical (LDC §9.00.11 folds “electrical, gas, mechanical, or plumbing systems” into the single building-permit/enforcement chain it hands to the County). The Town keeps a parallel track of its own: it administers its own Land Development Code (zoning, site plan, sign and tree ordinances), issues its own Development Orders, requires a Town-only Contractor's Tracking Certificate, and inserts a Town Administrator approval step before the County-issued Certificate of Occupancy/Completion can be released (LDC §9.00.07–9.00.09). 90% · town land development code
• Is a permit required for a residential rooftop PV system? Yes. LDC §9.00.03(C) lists the activities that require a building permit, and item 5 explicitly includes “Installation of utilities, streets, driveways and driveway connections, drainage systems and connections, building systems (electrical, gas, mechanical, or plumbing)…for a single-family home”; item 8 separately covers “Alteration…of any structure according to the requirements of the current Florida Building Code.” A rooftop PV retrofit is squarely both: an electrical building-system installation and a structural alteration. The Town's own FAQ backs this up in plain language: “Do I need a permit to…? The answer is probably yes!…In summary, for most construction, you will need a permit.” 90% · town land development code
• Is there a separate electrical permit, or is it combined? Not stated as a single rule by the Town — LDC §9.00.03(C)(5) treats “building systems (electrical, gas, mechanical, or plumbing)” as one undifferentiated category needing “a building permit,” with no town-level split into trade permits. In actual county practice (the office that executes these permits under the §9.00.11 delegation), Okaloosa County issues per-trade permits and fees — its published fee schedule prices “Residential Electrical Permit Fees” as a distinct table from the building valuation table — which points to Electrical normally being its own permit for a straightforward PV retrofit, with a companion Building permit only if there is a distinct structural/roofing scope. No PV-specific “combined permit” type was found in either the Town's or the County's documents. 55% · county fee schedule (delegated processing office)
• Is a HOA or architectural approval required first? Not by the Town or County — no HOA/architectural-review step appears anywhere in Shalimar's LDC, and F.S. 163.04(2) voids any deed restriction or covenant that prohibits solar collectors outright, limiting a private association to “determine the specific location where solar collectors may be installed on the roof within an orientation to the south or within 45 degrees east or west of due south if such determination does not impair the effective operation of the solar collectors.” Whether any of Shalimar's private subdivisions carry their own deed-restriction ARC clauses subject to that statute is outside what either government document can answer. 65% · state statute
• Is there a historic-district review? No historic-district review applies. Shalimar's LDC has no designated historic district and no historic-preservation review board; its only historic-resource language is generic definitional text (“Cultural or historic resource,” “Historic resource,” “Historic structure”) used for the flood-management chapter's exception language, not a standalone review process reachable by a building permit application. 60% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a wind or windstorm certification required? No windstorm certification requirement specific to Shalimar was found. Design wind speed and product-approval requirements flow from the current Florida Building Code and ASCE 7/24, which the LDC repeatedly cross-references without adding a local wind-speed-line ordinance of its own (unlike, for example, neighbouring Washington County's Town of Ebro, whose county code names a specific state-road wind-speed line running through that town — Shalimar's own LDC and Code of Ordinances contain no equivalent local wind-speed section). 50% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a Specific Use Permit or Council approval ever required? Not for a routine rooftop retrofit. LDC §9.01.01 defines “major developments” (requiring Council/Board of Adjustment-level review) as those exceeding the Eglin AFB Tall Structures Analysis height limits, subject to a development agreement, in a PUD, requiring a special exception, or requiring plat approval — none of which a like-for-like rooftop PV installation on an existing single-family home ordinarily trips. The one real local overlay that COULD reach an unusually tall installation is the Eglin Air Force Base Tall Structures Analysis Map itself (LDC §4.02.01(C) and §9.01.01(A)): “building heights are proposed to exceed the height limits established on the Eglin AFB Tall Structures Analysis for the Town of Shalimar map” is one of the LDC's own triggers for “major development” review, and any structure exceeding that map's limit “shall only be granted after determination by the appropriate Eglin AFB representative that the proposed height has no negative impact on Eglin AFB” (§4.06.xx-area text). A ground-mounted or elevated array tall enough to matter would fall under this, not a standard flush roof-mount. 65% · town land development code
• Is there a system-size cap on residential generation? No town- or county-level kW cap on residential generation was found in either LDC or Code of Ordinances (control-checked, zero “solar”/“photovoltaic” hits). The binding cap comes from the state interconnection rule that governs FPL: Rule 25-6.065(4)(a) sets expedited-interconnection tiers — Tier 1 ≤10 kW, Tier 2 >10–100 kW, Tier 3 >100 kW–2 MW — each with escalating review, and caps gross power rating at “not…exceed 90% of the customer's utility distribution service rating” regardless of tier. This is a tiered-review threshold rather than a hard ceiling on residential systems. 70% · state administrative rule

Several authorities require the electrical permit to be pulled by a licensed electrician, or require the contractor to be registered with them BEFORE applying. Registration is not same-day. This is second on the list rather than fourth because it is the step most likely to stop the job before the drawings matter.

• Who is allowed to pull the electrical permit? Either. Under LDC §9.00.11(F), “any owner or authorized agent” may apply; Florida's statutory owner-builder exemption, F.S. 489.103(7)(a)1, separately preserves the right of an owner to act as their own contractor on “one-family or two-family residences…for the occupancy or use of such owners and not offered for sale or lease,” with direct on-site supervision of unlicensed work. Otherwise, per Okaloosa County's own Article VII Sec. 6-241 (the county being the office that actually issues the permit under the Town's delegation), the applicant must be a state-certified electrical contractor holding a county certificate of competency. 75% · town land development code + state statute
• Must the contractor be registered with this authority before applying? Yes — but the registration is with the Town, and it is separate from and additional to whatever the County requires for the license itself. The Town's own FAQ states: “All contractors who are doing work in the Town limits must contact Town Hall to purchase a Contractor's Tracking Certificate (CTC). We will collect the contractor's Liability Insurance, Worker's Compensation, a copy of their State of Florida License and a copy of their County Business Tax Certificate.” As of the FAQ page's 2025 capture the CTC fee is $30 (Oct 1–Mar 31) or $15 (Apr 1–Sep 30); the Town's own 2017 fee chart (Resolution 2017-015) priced the same certificate at $20.00 cash/$21.00 by card, so the fee has been revised upward since — report both rather than picking one. 90% · town FAQ page
• Is a homeowner permitted to self-install and self-permit? Yes, with conditions — via the state owner-builder exemption, F.S. 489.103(7)(a)1: an owner may build or improve a one- or two-family residence “for the occupancy or use of such owners and not offered for sale or lease,” must provide “direct, onsite supervision…of all work not performed by licensed contractors,” and may not delegate that supervision to anyone not registered or certified. Selling or leasing the property within one year of completion “creates a presumption that the construction was undertaken for purposes of sale or lease,” which defeats the exemption. Nothing in Shalimar's own LDC or Code of Ordinances bars an owner-builder application; §9.00.11(F) speaks generically of “any owner or authorized agent.” 75% · state statute

Almost everywhere wants a site plan, a one-line or three-line electrical diagram, equipment cut sheets with listings, and a structural attachment detail. Build it against the published checklist rather than the last jurisdiction you worked in — the checklist is what the reviewer marks against.

• What documents make up a complete submittal? No solar-specific checklist is published by the Town or by the County office that actually processes its applications. What Shalimar's own LDC requires generically (§9.02.12(A)): “An application for a building permit and building permit shall include documentation as required by the current Florida Building Code, this LDC, and other documents identified during a pre-application conference,” and §9.01.10(A) requires a pre-application conference before submission. §9.00.03(F) additionally requires that any applicable Development Order be recorded with the Town Administrator before a building permit issues. Beyond that, the submittal content defaults to whatever the County Building Official (the delegated enforcing office) requires under the current FBC. 55% · town land development code
• Is a site plan required, and what must it show? Likely yes for anything beyond a pure rooftop retrofit, but the LDC's site-plan trigger is written for site development generally, not for PV specifically. §9.00.03(B)(1) requires a Development Order (which in turn needs Planning and Zoning/Town review) for a “site development plan” before a building permit; §9.01.01 defines expedited vs. major developments, with single-family residential normally routed as “expedited.” No Town document states that a like-for-like rooftop PV installation on an existing single-family home itself triggers a new site plan or Development Order — §9.00.03(C)(5) treats installation of a home's own “building systems (electrical…)” as building-permit-level work, not site-development-level work. 55% · town land development code
• Is a one-line / three-line diagram required? Not published anywhere in the Town's own documents. A control-checked search of both the full 218-page Land Development Code and the 88-page Code of Ordinances found zero hits for “one-line,” “one line,” “three-line,” “riser diagram,” “photovoltaic,” or “solar” of any kind — against 31 combined hits for the positive control “electrical” and 0 for the fabricated control “zzqqx.” 70% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Are string and conductor calculations required? Not published. Same control-checked absence as Q11 — no string-sizing, conductor, or voltage-drop calculation language anywhere in either Town document, against the same passed positive/fabricated controls. 70% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a structural PE stamp required, and at what threshold? No local threshold is published by the Town. What governs is the current Florida Building Code (adopted by reference and auto-updating under LDC §9.00.11) together with ASCE 7/24, which the LDC cites repeatedly (e.g. “current Florida Building Code or ASCE 24 [also defined in FBC]”) without adding a Shalimar-specific kW or structural threshold for when a PE stamp is required. Distinct from a nearby wind-speed-line ordinance (as found in Washington County's town code), Shalimar's own LDC sets no local wind-speed figure — wind design falls to the FBC/ASCE 7 maps directly. A genuine local overlay does exist, however: the Eglin AFB Tall Structures Analysis Map, which the LDC applies to “Proposed building height, including appurtenances and building attachments” (LDC §4.02.01(C), setting an overall Mixed-Use height limit at 75 feet). This is a height overlay, not a structural-engineering threshold, and would only bind an unusually tall elevated or ground-mounted array. 55% · town land development code
• Is an electrical PE stamp required, and at what threshold? No local threshold is published. At state level, F.S. 471.003(2)(h) exempts a ch. 489-licensed electrical contractor from engineering licensure where the job “requires an electrical…system with a value of $125,000 or less” and requires “600 amperes (240 volts) or less on a residential electrical system” (800 amperes for commercial/industrial) — a threshold essentially every residential rooftop PV job falls under. 68% · state statute

Most authorities now take the whole application through a portal, and several states cap or constrain what a residential solar permit may cost. Check whether plan check is billed separately before you quote the job.

• Which permit portal does this authority use? Not separately branded by the Town. Because LDC §9.00.11(B) routes applications directly “to the Okaloosa County Building Official,” the operative portal is the County's: Tyler EnerGov, branded by the county as its “Customer Service Support (CSS)” / Citizen Self Service portal at energovweb.myokaloosa.com — mandatory for building-permit and licensing applications since 3 Nov 2025. No document on shalimarflorida.org names or links a portal of its own; the Town's own FAQ page directs contractor registration (CTC) to “Town Hall” in person/by mail rather than through any online system. 60% · county permitting page (delegated processing office)
• Can the whole application be completed online? Effectively yes, on the County side, since 3 Nov 2025 — the County's CSS/EnerGov portal is now the mandatory application route (“applicants seeking licensing, building permits and development-related approvals must apply online…without in-person visits to the office”), which covers permits processed for Shalimar under the §9.00.11 delegation. The Town-only step — buying the Contractor's Tracking Certificate — is NOT online: the FAQ directs contractors to “contact Town Hall to purchase” it in person, and the CTC form itself is a download, not an online submission. 55% · county permitting page + town FAQ
• What does a residential solar permit cost? No single solar line exists; the total is assembled from three separate fee sources across two governments. (a) Okaloosa County (the delegated processing office) prices the BUILDING permit on its valuation table: e.g. for $15,001–$50,000 of work, “$75.00 for the first $15,000.00 plus $4.00 for each additional thousand” (so a $20,000 system is roughly $95); a base fee of $70 applies to “all building permits and each sub-permit.” (b) The County's residential ELECTRICAL permit fee table is banded by square footage rather than valuation (e.g. “1,001 to 2,000 square feet: $45.00”) — no solar-specific electrical line was found, so which band a PV retrofit falls under is not stated. (c) The Town itself separately charges its own “ZONING COMPLIANCE/DEVELOPMENT PERMIT FEE (Building Permits)” on the SAME valuation ladder — its 2017 fee chart prices $5,000–$24,999.99 of work at “$30.00 / $32.00 (CC)” — so a $20,000 system would add roughly another $30–$32 in Town fees on top of the County's. This 2017 Town chart is dated; only its Contractor's Tracking Certificate line is independently confirmed superseded (Q6), so the building-fee brackets are reported as the best evidence available rather than assumed current. 60% · county fee schedule + town fee resolution
• How is the fee calculated? Valuation, on both sides of the delegated split. The County's building permit fee is expressly valuation-tiered (see Q15); the Town's own separate Zoning Compliance/Development Permit fee is also valuation-tiered on its own five-bracket table ($200–$999.99 up to $100,000+). The County's electrical fee is the one exception — it is banded by square footage, not valuation. 70% · county fee schedule + town fee resolution
• Is there a separate plan-check fee? Yes, on the County side. Okaloosa County's fee schedule prices plan review for “Residential permit applications” at “$25.00 or 20 percent of the total permit cost, whichever is greater,” separate from the permit fee itself. No separate plan-review fee is stated in any Town document — the Town's own Zoning Compliance/Development Permit fee (Q15) appears to be a single flat-by-valuation charge with no review-fee component broken out. 72% · county fee schedule

Interconnection is a separate process from the permit and usually the longer pole. Where the utility does not depend on the permit being issued, running both at once is the single biggest saving available on a residential job.

• What is the stated plan-review turnaround? The Town publishes no plan-review turnaround of its own. What binds is F.S. 553.792(1)(a)-(b): 5 business days after a complete application for an electrical permit on an EXISTING single-family dwelling valued under $15,000; 30 business days otherwise for a residential structure under 7,500 sq ft — a floor the County (the delegated processor) must meet “unless the timeframes set by local ordinance are more stringent,” and neither the Town's nor the County's own documents set a stricter local figure. Separately, the County's current permitting page states that “all trade permits…are processed in the Fast Lane and issued next day,” though that appears to describe routine trade/reroof permits rather than a full plan-reviewed PV job specifically. 65% · state statute
• How long is an issued permit valid before it expires? The Town's OWN Land Development Code sets this directly, and it conflicts with the state floor. LDC §9.00.04(C): “A building permit shall expire if work does not commence within one (1) year from the date” of issuance. §9.00.04(D): “Where activity toward completion of a project under a building permit ceases for a period exceeding six (6) months, the building permit shall be considered void.” Separately, F.S. 553.79(1)(c) sets a statewide floor of “1 year after the issuance of the permit or…the effective date of the next edition of the Florida Building Code, whichever is later” for a single-family dwelling permit. The Town's own 6-month inactivity-void rule is stricter than anything the state statute requires and is reported as written rather than resolved against the statute. 85% · town land development code
• Which utility handles interconnection here? Florida Power & Light (FPL). The Town's own FAQ page names it directly among the utilities/offices residents are told to contact: “Florida Power & Light Customer Service – 1-800-226-5885” and “To report a street light outage or power outage concerns https://www.fpl.com/support/contact.” 90% · town FAQ page
• Where does the utility sit in the sequence? Parallel, with the AHJ's inspection as a hard gate before FPL will operate the system in parallel. Florida's Rule 25-6.065(5)(a), F.A.C. — which binds every investor-owned utility, including FPL, and which each IOU's own Standard Interconnection Agreement must contain — requires “a requirement that customer-owned renewable generation must be inspected and approved by local code officials prior to its operation in parallel with the investor-owned utility to ensure compliance with applicable local codes.” Rule 25-6.065(7) sets the utility's own clock: written notice of a complete application within 10 business days, Standard Interconnection Agreement executed within 30 calendar days of a complete Tier 1/2 application, and the customer must return the executed agreement at least 30 calendar days before beginning parallel operation. 85% · state administrative rule

The NEC edition a jurisdiction enforces is often a cycle behind the newest one published, and local amendments sit on top of it. Rapid shutdown, conductor sizing and labelling all change between editions, so the edition in force is the first thing to establish, not the last.

• Which NEC edition is in force? NEC 2020 (NFPA 70, 2020 edition). Shalimar's LDC does not name an NEC edition itself — it adopts “the current Florida Building Code…as amended from time to time” by reference (§9.00.11), which pulls in the state-adopted NEC edition. The Florida Administrative Code incorporates NFPA 70, 2020 edition by reference at 69A-60.005(2)(qq) (“(qq) NFPA 70, 2020 edition, National Electrical Code®”), effective 31 Dec 2023. 75% · state administrative rule
• Which building code edition is in force? Florida Building Code, 8th Edition (2023), and it auto-updates: LDC §9.00.11 adopts “The current Florida Building Code, as adopted by rule of the Florida Building Commission as required by state statute…as amended from time to time…is hereby adopted and incorporated into this LDC by reference.” FAC rule 61G20-1.001 currently names the 8th Edition (2023), most recently amended effective 18 Mar 2026; a draft 9th Edition (2026) exists but is not yet in force. 88% · town land development code
• Which fire code edition is in force? Locally, the Ocean City-Wright Fire Control District's own Ordinance No. 81-08 (as amended) — Code of Ordinances §8.01.00: “The Ocean City-Wright Fire Control District Ordinance No. 81-08, as amended, a copy of which is on file in the Town Administrator's office…is…adopted by the Town Commission as the fire prevention code and standards in force in the Town,” with the current Florida Building Code/Florida law prevailing over any conflict. Ordinance 81-08 itself is NOT published online anywhere this run could find — the Town's own code says it exists only “on file in the Town Administrator's office.” At the state floor, the Florida Fire Prevention Code currently in force is NFPA 1, Florida 2021 Edition (FAC 69A-60.003), effective 31 Dec 2023. 60% · town code of ordinances
• Are there local amendments to any of the above? Yes, in one real respect and not another. The Town DOES locally amend/adopt its own fire code by cross-reference to a district ordinance not otherwise codified (Code of Ordinances §8.01.00, Q31) — a genuine local layer. It does NOT carry a separate town-level building or electrical amendment ordinance of its own (unlike, e.g., a county with its own Article III electrical chapter): LDC §9.00.11 adopts the current FBC wholesale, with enforcement delegated entirely to the County Building Official, and no Shalimar-specific building/electrical amendment section was found anywhere in either Town document (control-checked). 72% · town land development code + code of ordinances
• What is the installation judged against? The installation is judged against: the current Florida Building Code (auto-adopted by reference, LDC §9.00.11, currently 8th Edition 2023) and the state-adopted NEC 2020 that comes in through it; the Ocean City-Wright Fire Control District's Ordinance 81-08 as the local fire standard, with FBC/Florida law prevailing on conflict (Code of Ordinances §8.01.00); and Okaloosa County's own Administrative Construction Code procedures, since the County Building Official is the office that actually receives, reviews and enforces under the §9.00.11 delegation. 75% · town land development code

Ridge setbacks and roof access pathways are fire-service requirements and they constrain the array layout. They are the most common cause of a redesign after the fire department comments on a plan set.

Nothing recorded for Town of Shalimar on this step yet — 1 question checked and found unpublished. The guidance above is general.

Which rapid-shutdown rule applies follows directly from the NEC edition in force, and the initiation device has to be at a location the fire service can reach and identify. This is inspected, and it is labelled.

• Is rapid shutdown required, and to which NEC edition? Rapid shutdown is required, to NEC 2020 — i.e., §690.12 as it stands in the 2020 edition — because Shalimar's LDC adopts the current FBC by reference (§9.00.11) and the state-incorporated NEC edition is 2020 (FAC 69A-60.005(2)(qq)). Neither the Town nor Okaloosa County adds or subtracts anything Shalimar-specific. 75% · state administrative rule

The NEC sets a baseline for permanent markings at the service equipment and the disconnecting means. On top of that, an authority may specify its own wording, and the utility may specify more again. Where any of them writes its own text, a generic off-the-shelf label set will not pass — this is the detail most often fixed on a return visit.

• Which placards does this authority require at the service equipment? No AHJ-specific placard set is published by the Town. What would apply comes from two other places: the NEC 2020 Article 690/705 marking requirements (via §9.00.11's FBC adoption), and FPL's own hardware spec under Rule 25-6.065(6)(a) — a manual disconnect switch “mounted separate from, but adjacent to, the meter socket…readily accessible…and capable of being locked in the open position with a single investor-owned utility padlock,” which is itself a marking/accessibility requirement rather than a printed placard. 60% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Does the authority specify placard wording of its own? No. Neither Shalimar's Land Development Code nor its Code of Ordinances specifies placard wording of its own. 70% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Does it specify letter height, colour or material? Not published — no letter-height, colour, or material specification for any electrical/solar placard appears anywhere in either Town document. 70% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a site plan / facility map placard required, and what must it show? Not published locally — the baseline is the national NEC §705.10 site-plan/placard requirement, which Shalimar's own documents neither restate nor add to. No Shalimar-specific facility-map or site-plan placard rule was found. 55% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Does the UTILITY specify placards beyond the AHJ's? Yes, in hardware terms rather than signage wording: FPL's Standard Interconnection Agreement, under Rule 25-6.065(6)(a), F.A.C., requires (where applicable) a manual disconnect switch “of the visible load break type,” mounted “separate from, but adjacent to, the meter socket,” “readily accessible to the investor-owned utility,” and “capable of being locked in the open position with a single investor-owned utility padlock.” Inverter-based Tier 1 (≤10 kW) systems are exempt from this switch requirement unless the utility installs it at its own expense. No printed placard wording specific to FPL was located. 62% · state administrative rule

Where the AC disconnect must sit relative to the meter is usually the utility's rule, not the building department's. Battery storage frequently carries its own permit, its own inspection and its own fire conditions.

• Where must the AC disconnect be, relative to the meter? Per Rule 25-6.065(6)(a), F.A.C. — which binds FPL's Standard Interconnection Agreement — a customer's manual AC disconnect switch (where required) must be “mounted separate from, but adjacent to, the meter socket” and readily accessible to the utility. Neither the Town nor Okaloosa County adds a local rule on top of this. 75% · state administrative rule
• Must equipment be on a specific approved list? Not a Town/County-published “list,” but the state rule that governs FPL functions the same way: Rule 25-6.065(4)(b) requires customer-owned renewable generation to be “submitted by a manufacturer to a nationally recognized testing and certification laboratory…tested and listed by the laboratory for continuous interactive operation” (i.e., UL/nationally-recognized-lab listing) rather than a jurisdiction-maintained equipment list. 58% · state administrative rule
• Are batteries permitted, and under what conditions? Not addressed at all by the Town. A control-checked full-text search of both the Land Development Code and Code of Ordinances for “battery,” “energy storage,” “ESS,” and “inverter” returned zero hits in every case. 68% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is there a separate ESS permit or inspection? Not addressed — same zero-hit absence as Q45; no ESS-specific permit or inspection step exists anywhere in either Town document. 68% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a ground mount treated as a structure? Probably yes, by inference from the LDC's general “Structure” definition rather than any solar-specific rule: “Structure: Anything constructed, installed, or portable, the use of which requires a location on a parcel of land…includes fences, billboards, swimming pools, poles, pipelines, transmission lines…” (LDC Chapter 1 definitions). A ground-mounted PV rack reasonably fits this broad definition and so would be subject to the LDC's normal accessory-structure setback and permit rules, but no LDC text names photovoltaic ground mounts specifically. 60% · town land development code
• Is there a local rule on service upgrades or busbar sizing? Not published by the Town — Shalimar carries no electrical-code chapter of its own (unlike, for example, a county with a standalone Article III electrical ordinance setting service-conductor, meter-height, or panel-indexing rules). Any busbar/service-upgrade rule would come from the current NEC 2020 §705.12 as administered by the delegated County Building Official, not from a Shalimar-specific provision. 68% · town land development code — control-proven absence
• Is a specific mounting system or attachment spacing required? Not published. Zero mentions of mounting systems, racking, attachment spacing, or roof standoffs in either Town document — the same control-checked absence that covers “solar” and “photovoltaic” generally (Q11). 68% · town land development code — control-proven absence

Booking is a portal, a phone call or an email depending on the authority, and the notice required is rarely zero. Book before the work is finished rather than after — the lead time, not the work, is usually what sets the date.

• How is an inspection booked? Not stated by the Town itself; since the County Building Official performs the inspections under LDC §9.00.11(E), the operative route is the County's own Tyler EnerGov self-service portal (“inspection requests are submitted through the county's EnerGov self-service portal” per the county's current permitting page), which also handles virtual inspections. 60% · county permitting page (delegated processing office)

Some authorities inspect their own solar work; some delegate it, and a few do not inspect the PV equipment itself at all. Who is coming determines what they will look at.

• Does this AHJ perform its own final solar inspection? Delegated — to the Okaloosa County Building Official. LDC §9.00.11(E): “The building official, or a designee who may include any competent and properly licensed or certified individual or agency, shall make all of the required inspections.” 85% · town land development code
• If delegated, to whom? Okaloosa County Building Official (Growth Management Department, Building & Inspections Division). 88% · town land development code

A rough-in or mid-roof inspection, where one is required, has to happen before the work it covers is closed up. Missing a stage means opening something back up, and it is the most expensive kind of correction.

• Which inspections are required, and in what order? Not itemized for PV specifically by either government. What the LDC frames generally: a building permit issues (§9.00.03), the County Building Official performs “all of the required inspections” during construction (§9.00.11(E)), and on completion a Certificate of Occupancy (new construction) or Certificate of Completion (renovations/additions/alterations — the bucket a PV retrofit falls in) issues “after approval of the Town Administrator” (§9.00.07/9.00.08). No document names a specific sequence of rough-in/final/other named inspection stages for an electrical or PV job. 55% · town land development code

The approved plan set, the permit, and the equipment listings should be on site and reachable. Inspectors routinely verify that installed equipment matches what was approved, and that the labels are the ones the plan set promised.

• Is there a published inspection checklist? Not published by the Town — the LDC's inspection language (§9.00.11(E)) is procedural/administrative rather than a checklist, and no dedicated inspection checklist for building, electrical, or solar work was found anywhere on shalimarflorida.org (full CDX enumeration of the site, ~1,570 URLs, produced none). Whether the delegated County office maintains its own inspection checklist inside its EnerGov portal was not independently verified for Shalimar this run. 58% · town land development code — absence proven for the Town's own site

Passing gives you a final or an equivalent sign-off. That is not the same as permission to operate: PTO comes from the utility, and who tells the utility the inspection passed varies. A system left switched off for weeks is usually waiting on this handover.

• What is issued on pass? Final. On a PV retrofit specifically, LDC §9.00.08 (“Certificate of Completion”) is the operative document: “A Certificate of Completion issued by the Okaloosa County Building Official after approval of the Town Administrator is the only demonstration that the use or occupancy of land or buildings is in compliance…for renovations, additions, and alterations” — exactly the category a rooftop PV installation on an existing home falls into. New construction instead gets a Certificate of Occupancy under the twin §9.00.07 clause, issued the same two-signature way. This is the clearest direct answer in this file to whether the Town's retained gate reaches a retrofit: it does, by name, in the Town's own code. 88% · town land development code
• Who notifies the utility for PTO? Not stated by either government in writing; by the structure of Rule 25-6.065(7), the customer/installer is the one who submits the interconnection application, receives the utility's written notice and inspection dates, and executes the Standard Interconnection Agreement — the applicant-driven pattern used by every Florida investor-owned utility including FPL, rather than the AHJ notifying the utility on the customer's behalf. 55% · state administrative rule
• Is there a re-inspection fee? Not set by the Town; the office that performs inspections under the §9.00.11 delegation (Okaloosa County) prices re-inspections progressively: “First reinspection - $50.00 per trip per trade,” “Second reinspection - $100.00 per trip per trade,” “Third and subsequent reinspections - $150.00 per trip per trade.” 70% · county fee schedule (delegated processing office)