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San Diego County

County of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division

In short

County of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division issues 7 permits we publish for San Diego County, last verified 2026-09-27. Each carries the fee as the agency publishes it, with a link to the schedule it was read from.

What this agency issues

Permits required, with issuing agency, fee, renewal term and the date each record was last verified against its source
Retail Food Facility Annual PermitCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$208–$2,087 a year, by facility type and, for restaurants, employee count (FY2026-27, County Code §65.107(a)): Restaurant Annual Permit $842 (1-10 employees), $987 (11-25), $1,170 (26-100), $2,087 (100+), plus $649 per food-prep area beyond three at one location; Low-Risk/Restricted Food Service Facility $587; Miscellaneous Food Facility $208; Prepackaged Retail Market $255; Retail Market with up to three delicatessens/prep areas $946 (1-10 employees) or $1,267 (11+), plus $562 per extra prep area; Retail Food Processing Facility $763; Full Service/Direct Sales Catering $715annual, renews yearly2026-09-27
Body Art Facility Annual Permit and Practitioner Registrationonly if it applies to youCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$469 a year for the Body Art Facility Annual Permit (§65.107(f)(2)); Body Art Practitioner Registration $179/year; Body Art Temporary Event Sponsor $814, Temporary Event Booth $95, Late/Modified Application $302; Facility Plan Review $648, Office Consultation $206, Field Consultation $413 (§65.107(e)(15)(a), (21), (22)); single-use-needle mechanical ear-piercing-only facility notification $51 (all FY2026-27)annual; practitioner registration renews annually with bloodborne-pathogen training2026-09-27
Massage Establishment Annual Permitonly if it applies to youCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$270 a year per establishment (§65.107(f)(1), FY2026-27); Massage Facility Plan Review $628, Office Consultation $209, Field Consultation $417 (§65.107(e)(15)(b), (23)-(24))annual2026-09-27
Public Swimming Pool / Spa Annual Permitonly if it applies to youCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$179–$1,190 a year, by body-of-water count (FY2026-27, §65.107(c)(1)-(8)): one $480, two $638, three $930, four $1,070, five $1,190, plus $210 for each body of water beyond five; a dormant (not-in-use) body of water $179; an activity pool, spray ground or other interactive feature $621 per featureannual2026-09-27
Mobile Food Facility / Mobile Support Unit Annual PermitCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$228–$760 a year per unit, by sub-type (FY2026-27, §65.107(a)(21)): Carts/vehicles (prepackaged foods/ice cream/produce/tamale carts) $228; Packaged Lunch Truck (may include commissary-made coffee) $253; Mobile Support Unit $266; Limited Food Preparation (one cart plus one auxiliary unit) $516; Single Operating Site with up to two limited-prep carts $624; three to four carts $757; full food preparation $760; Boat Annual Permit $388 (§65.107(a)(23)); plus a required Commissary Agreement paid by the commissary operator: $406 (vending/prepackaged) or $481 (unpackaged food), §65.107(a)(19)-(20)annual, renews yearly; pre-operational inspection required before issuance2026-09-27
Temporary Food Facility Permit (single event, farmers market, event organizer)only if it applies to youCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$111–$1,113 by category (FY2026-27, §65.107(a)(14)-(16)): Single Location Swap Meet Vendor annual $111; Prepackaged Foods single event $148, annual $360; Unpackaged Foods single event $251, annual $685; Event Organizer single event $376, annual (identical event, same location) $664; Certified Farmers Market annual $479, or $792 with adjacent temporary food facilities under the same organizer; Fisherman's Market annual $1,113per event, or a calendar-year package for a recurring identical event2026-09-27
Cottage Food Operation / Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation (MEHKO) Permitonly if it applies to youCounty of San Diego Department of Environmental Health and Quality (DEHQ), Food and Housing Division$92–$673 by tier (FY2026-27, California Homemade Food Act / AB 626): Cottage Food Class A (up to 10 labels) $231 initial registration, $92 renewal; Class B $526 initial permit, $361 renewal; MEHKO $673 initial annual permit, $335 renewal; additional label review billed hourlyannual2026-09-27

Fees shown as a range or formula are set that way by the issuing agency — we do not average them into a single number.

About each permit

Retail Food Facility Annual Permit

Any person operating a retail food facility must obtain a valid public health permit from DEHQ, and this applies inside every one of the county's 18 incorporated cities as well as the unincorporated area, because DEHQ is San Diego County's countywide food-safety regulator — its own page describes 'more than 13,800 permanent retail food facilities in San Diego County, including over 8,100 restaurants,' all under this program. A restaurant's or coffee shop's exact tier depends on its DEHQ plan-check risk classification: espresso and prepackaged pastries alone can fall into the $208 Miscellaneous or $587 Low-Risk tier, while on-site hot-food preparation moves it into the Restaurant tier priced by employee count. A retail store selling prepackaged deli food, or operating one to three delicatessen/prep counters, falls under the Retail Market tiers ($255 prepackaged-only, up to $1,267 with delis) rather than the Restaurant tiers. Which tier applies to a specific location is set at DEHQ plan check, not assumed from the business type alone.

Body Art Facility Annual Permit and Practitioner Registration

A salon offering tattooing, piercing, branding or permanent cosmetics/microblading needs a DEHQ Body Art Facility Annual Permit, $469/year, and every practitioner working there needs an annual $179 Body Art Practitioner Registration with current bloodborne-pathogen training, unlike massage this program has no city carve-out and applies the same way countywide. A facility being newly built or altered pays a $648 plan review; a modest question can instead be handled as a $206 office consultation or $413 field consultation. A business offering only single-use-needle mechanical ear piercing, with no other body-art service, files a $51 notification instead of the full facility permit.

Massage Establishment Annual Permit

DEHQ still issues and actively administers a $270/year Massage Establishment Annual Permit, but ONLY for a salon or spa located in one of the county's incorporated cities OTHER than Carlsbad, Chula Vista or the City of San Diego. DEHQ's own program page dates its exit from each of those three cities individually — Carlsbad (2/11/2025), Chula Vista (10/1/2024), City of San Diego (10/1/2021) — and each now runs its own city massage program instead; contact that city directly. DEHQ also stopped administering this permit in the unincorporated area on 10/1/2021, where a massage practitioner instead needs state CAMTC (California Massage Therapy Council) certification rather than a county establishment permit. Do not read either of those four exits as DEHQ exiting massage regulation everywhere: the same page links a plan-check checklist explicitly labeled 'for use in all Incorporated cities, except the City of San Diego, Carlsbad, and Chula Vista,' confirming DEHQ still permits massage establishments in the roughly 14 other incorporated cities (for example Escondido, Oceanside, Vista, El Cajon, Santee, Poway and National City) at this $270/year fee.

Public Swimming Pool / Spa Annual Permit

A gym or fitness studio with a swimming pool, spa or hot tub needs an annual DEHQ water-recreation permit, priced by how many bodies of water the facility has rather than a flat per-location fee, and this applies countywide because DEHQ regulates pools the same way in every city and the unincorporated area. Taking a pool out of service does not end the fee obligation: a dormant pool still pays $179 a year rather than nothing. A studio with no pool, spa or hot tub needs no permit under this program at all.

Mobile Food Facility / Mobile Support Unit Annual Permit

Every food truck, cart, trailer, kiosk or vending boat needs its own DEHQ mobile food facility permit, valid anywhere in the county because DEHQ regulates food countywide, and the fee is set by which of the sub-types above the unit falls into rather than a single flat mobile-food fee. Every mobile unit also needs a commissary agreement with an approved base of operations, priced separately from the unit's own permit and paid by the commissary operator rather than always by the truck itself. A vending machine dispensing potentially hazardous food or drink is billed hourly rather than a flat fee, at half an hour per ten units. Do not use the $874-$1,162 mobile-food range that circulates on some vendor and blog sites: it does not match DEHQ's current fee table, which runs $228 to $760 by sub-type.

Temporary Food Facility Permit (single event, farmers market, event organizer)

A food truck, restaurant or coffee shop selling food at a one-off community event, swap meet or farmers market — rather than from its own permanent or mobile-unit location — uses this permit family instead of its regular annual permit, and it applies the same way at an event anywhere in the county. An event organizer coordinating multiple vendors at one recurring location can hold a single annual Event Organizer permit instead of each vendor filing separately. A vendor already holding a mobile food facility permit that simply attends a certified farmers market with an organizer-held Temporary Food Facility Event Organizer permit for mobile food facility vendors pays a lower, separate fee for that scenario ($102 single event, $204 annual) rather than the general Event Organizer rate.

Cottage Food Operation / Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation (MEHKO) Permit

A person making packaged food for sale from a home kitchen, or operating a Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation under AB 626, registers or permits with DEHQ under this program rather than the standard retail food facility permit, and the requirement applies the same way regardless of which city or the unincorporated area the home sits in. A Cottage Food Operation is conducted only within a dwelling that contains the dwelling's actual kitchen, not in a garage or other accessory structure, per PDS's own home-occupation conditions (see the home-occupation record). A retail store, coffee shop or food-truck operator sourcing product from an approved cottage-food or MEHKO producer does not itself need this permit; it is the home-kitchen operator's own registration.

Contact

Jurisdiction
San Diego County
Phone
(858) 505-6900

Contact details are taken from the agency’s own site or its published fee schedule. Where we have not verified a phone number we leave it blank rather than guess.

Sources

Every fee and term above was read from one of these government pages on the date shown.

  1. Body Art Program page — states the four jurisdictions (Carlsbad, Chula Vista, City of San Diego, unincorporated area) where DEHQ no longer administers massage-facility permitting, and links the plan-check checklist for 'all Incorporated cities, except' those threeDEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27
  2. Food & Housing Division — retail food facility permit requirement, countywide across all 18 citiesDEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27
  3. Food Facility Fees, FY2026-27 Approved Fee schedule (§65.107(a)) — restaurant, mobile food, temporary food, cottage food/MEHKO tiersDEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27
  4. Miscellaneous Program Fees, FY2026-27 Approved Fee (§65.107(f)) — Massage Establishment Annual Permit $270; Body Art Facility Annual Permit $469; Body Art Practitioner Registration $179; temporary-event and ear-piercing-notification feesDEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27
  5. Plan Check Fees, FY2026-27 Approved Fee (§65.107(e)) — Body Art Facility Plan Review $648, Massage Establishment Plan Review $628, and the office/field consultation fees for bothDEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27
  6. Public Pool Permit Fees, FY2026-27 Approved Fee (§65.107(c))DEHQ, County of San Diego · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-27

Other offices serving San Diego County

The full permit list for this jurisdiction

Industry permit lists that include this agency

California jurisdictions

Commercial Compliance Hub publishes information, not legal advice. Requirements change — confirm anything you rely on with the issuing agency before you file.