Dearborn Heights, MI Swimming Pools & Spas: Pool Permits (2026)

Sec. 30-3 of the Dearborn Heights City Code, in Chapter 30 (Swimming Pools), requires a permit from the building and engineering department before anyone builds a nonportable swimming pool, meaning any in-ground or other pool that is not a small, easily emptied portable unit under twelve inches deep as defined in Sec. 30-1. The permit application must come with a complete, detailed set of plans and specifications, including the recirculation, filtration and chlorination system, and the plans need sign-off from both the building and engineering department and the health department before the city will issue the permit. A separate final inspection and approval from both departments is required before the pool can be put to use, and the applicant pays a fee set by council resolution to cover processing and inspection.

Sec. 30-3 also sets baseline construction standards that a permitted pool must meet: it has to be built to withstand internal water pressure when full and outside earth pressure when empty if built below grade, the floor needs a nonslip surface, and the floor and walls must have an impervious finish. A walkway of impervious, nonslip material at least three feet wide, sloped away from the pool, must run entirely around it. Sec. 30-4 adds siting rules for the same permit process, placing pools in the rear yard at least four feet from side or rear lot lines and six feet from any house or building, and Sec. 30-6 gives the health officer and building and engineering inspectors the right to inspect a pool at any reasonable hour to confirm ongoing compliance.

Chapter 30 is a Class D chapter under Sec. 1-11, the highest fine tier in the schedule, reflecting the safety stakes of unpermitted pool construction.