Berkeley County, SC Swimming Pools & Spas: Fencing & Safety Requirements (2026)

Sec. ' Rather than writing its own fence-height or gate-latch numbers into the county code, Berkeley County incorporates the barrier standards of the International Building Code, which the county separately adopted by reference, with 2021 amendments, in Sec. 11-31. That means the enforceable barrier standard is whatever edition of the IBC the county has adopted, not a locally drafted height table. In practice, the requirement is enforced at the final-inspection stage: an inspector from the building and codes department will not sign off on the pool until the barrier, whether a fence, wall, or the pool structure itself, satisfies the adopted code.

This final-inspection barrier check applies to both the residential permit track, in-ground pools and aboveground pools four feet or taller, and the commercial track described in the same section, and it sits alongside, but is separate from, the plot-plan setback review that happens earlier in the permitting process. Owners who install a pool but never bring the barrier into compliance can be left holding a permit that never closes out, which blocks the certificate of occupancy tied to the property under Sec. 11-61.