Licensed General Contractor in Orinda Since 2007

Orinda incorporated in 1985 but never opened a building department. Planning at 22 Orinda Way reviews zoning, design and trees; only then does Contra Costa County plan-check, issue the building permit and inspect. Skip the order and the county hands the file back. Permit history for any address is public via the county ePermits centre. One more legacy of 1985: pre-1985 homes were permitted by the county, so the original drawings sit in county records and the city keeps no copies. We file that records request before design, which surfaces unpermitted county-era work early rather than at final inspection.

Official info: Orinda building permits

Change the exterior and Planning approval is near certain; a new second story always triggers design review. Interior work like moving a wall or relocating plumbing typically does not. Smaller additions can be decided by the Zoning Administrator, but a lot in the Ridgeline and Environmental Preservation Overlay, or a development footprint averaging twenty percent slope or steeper, goes to the Planning Commission for special design review against the hillside and ridgeline guidelines. The standards make sense once you know their origin: the post-Caldecott boom filled these hills with long, low ranch houses, so the code now asks for recessed upper floors and roof forms that de-emphasise height.

Official info: Orinda design review code (Chapter 17.30) 

A single-family property in Orinda may add one ADU and one junior ADU. Streamlined units require no parking space, and tearing out or converting a garage triggers no obligation to replace the spaces lost. Sprinklers are only required if the main house has them, and Moraga-Orinda Fire District assigns the new address. Short-term letting of a streamlined ADU is off the table; leases of thirty days or more are not restricted.

Official info: Orinda ADU requirements

Any residential alteration valued at $50,000 or more, or touching 1,000 square feet, or adding conditioned space, must divert at least 65 percent of its debris to an approved facility. Planning places a WMP Hold on the permit until the plan is filed and reconciled through Green Halo, and hauling to an unapproved facility carries a $1,000 non-compliance citation. Nearly every real remodel here crosses that line. We open the plan at permit application and close it before final.

Official info: Orinda Waste Management Plan handout 

The State Fire Marshal released new Fire Hazard Severity Zone maps in February 2025 and large parts of Orinda now carry a high or very high rating. The whole Moraga-Orinda Fire District is a designated wildland urban interface community, sitting in a Critical Fire Weather Class III area with steep terrain and heavy fuel. Inside a mapped zone, new construction needs ignition-resistant assemblies, and MOFD limits on driveway grade and hose-lay distance can move where a structure is allowed to sit.

Official info: Orinda fire hazard severity zones

Orinda contains roughly 30 miles of privately maintained road, of varying width and condition. On incorporation the city adopted only the roads the county had been maintaining; the rest stayed private. These were often not built to city standards and are kept up by the adjoining owners, through an association or an informal arrangement. That is a practical constraint, not a footnote: narrow width and tight radii govern what can reach your site, which decides concrete trucks, lumber deliveries, dumpster placement and crane access. Surface damage is a private matter. We walk the access route before pricing any job on a private road.

Official info: Orinda private road information 

Orinda bars parking on several hillside evacuation routes whenever the National Weather Service declares a Red Flag Warning. It began on El Toyonal and Loma Vista Drive at residents' request, expanded in 2022, and was modified in 2024, adding Monte Vista Road among others. Restricted stretches are treated as the equivalent of a fire lane, and the city moved from warnings to citations. Service vehicles get five minutes of active loading, and that is the whole allowance. A crew of five in five vehicles cannot park there on a Red Flag day, so we plan off-site staging into the autumn schedule.

Official info: Orinda red flag parking restrictions