Fire alarm permits in Mountain View, CA

What needs a permit

Fire alarm work in Mountain View — new systems, modifications, and tenant-improvement fire alarm upgrades — files with the City of Mountain View Fire Department through the city’s ePermitsMV portal (ProjectDox). Our working example: a fire alarm upgrade for a medical office tenant at 2204 Grant Rd (Cuesta Park Medical), drawn by the alarm contractor’s design team (Johnson Controls) for the installing contractor (NexTech), using CSFM-listed equipment.

Fees

Mountain View assesses its plan check and permit fees on the record during prescreen and review; the city’s fee is separate from ours and is confirmed on the record before payment.

The steps

1. File in ProjectDox (ePermitsMV). Application, plans, and cut sheets go up through the city’s ProjectDox portal. The city carries the job under a city project number — ours is MVPS #2026-3432, ProjectDox project 26-287 (Fire Alarm Tenant).
2. Coordinator prescreen. A city coordinator takes the submittal first. The city’s own confirmation allows up to 2 business days for coordinator assignment and prescreen before the file routes to review.
3. Fire plan check. The fire reviewer (a Fire Protection Engineer) issues comments — Mountain View delivers them as a comment sheet and in the portal’s Review Comments screen. Our round carried 7 comments.
4. Resubmittal — answer everything, in the portal. Every comment gets a written response (entered in the Review Comments screen), plus the revised plans and cut sheets. The rule that decides whether your resubmittal lands: rename each new file version to the exact same file name as your original submission. The city’s corrections notice states it plainly — a differently named upload does not become the new version of your file.
5. Coordinator prescreen, again. The resubmittal returns to the coordinator group first; the coordinator prescreens it and routes it back to the fire reviewer for the next round.

What Mountain View’s reviewer actually checks (from our 7 comments)

• Monitoring, point by point. Every initiating point — waterflow, valve tamper, PIV — shown monitored on the plans and the point matrix (our answer: Fire-Lite ES-50X panel with MMF-300 monitor modules).
• The city’s fire alarm handout notes, verbatim, on the title sheet. Not paraphrased — the notes blocks themselves.
• A notification appliance in the main lobby by the elevator/stair, with the voltage-drop calculation updated for it.
• Waterflow signage — the placard note at the test valve / riser, per the signage notes.
• A remote annunciator at the main entrance (our answer: ANN-80), in the equipment list with its CSFM listing number and in the battery calculations (24-hour standby + 5-minute alarm, with the safety factor applied — our set’s requirement: 6.738 Ah).

Inspections & closeout

After issuance, inspections are scheduled with the Fire Department and the permit closes on final sign-off.

Local resources

• ePermitsMV / ProjectDox portal — developmentpermits.mountainview.gov — where Mountain View fire permits are filed and tracked.
• Permit coordinator — Richard Le, the coordinator on our filing; the coordinator group prescreens every submittal and resubmittal.
• Fire reviewer (FPE) — Brian Sackett, the fire protection engineer reviewing our resubmittal ([email protected]).

Written from PermitsPros’ filed Mountain View case FIRE26-20535 (2204 Grant Rd, MVPS #2026-3432), filed and resubmitted in 2026. Processes change — confirm current requirements with the City of Mountain View. Not legal advice.