Grand Forks

City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor)

In short

City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor) issues 4 permits we publish for Grand Forks, last verified 2026-09-14. 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
Permit	Issuing agency	Fee	Renews	Last checked
Fitness Studio — Pool License If a Pool Is Operated (Grand Forks)only if it applies to you	City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor)	No fee	not applicable to the studio itself; a pool license is annual, obtained by January 1	2026-09-14
Food Establishment License	City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor)	Tiered by risk level on the City's 2026 schedule: Level 1 is $150.00, Level 2 is $300.00 and Level 3 or 4 is $400.00, plus $1.00 per seat capped at a $150.00 maximum. Related food categories are priced separately: a grocery store is $150.00, $300.00 or $400.00 by the same levels, retail meat the same, a bakery at Level 1 is $150.00, a school is $180.00, a concession stand is $60.00, and a childcare facility, food pantry or soup kitchen is $25.00. Temporary food service is $40.00 per day with an additional stand at the same event at $10.00. A reinspection fee of $175.00 applies for 2026, up from $150.00 in 2025.	annual, expiring December 31 each year, with no proration for a partial year	2026-09-14
General Business License — City of Grand Forks positiononly if it applies to you	City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor)	No fee	not applicable	2026-09-14
Mobile Food Unit License	City of Grand Forks Finance and Administrative Services (Business Licensing, City Auditor)	Priced by risk level on the City's 2026 schedule: Level 1 is $100.00, Level 2 is $150.00 and Level 3 is $225.00. A unit already licensed by another North Dakota jurisdiction recognised as having equivalent standards pays a $25.00 reciprocity license instead. A pushcart at Level 1 is $100.00, and pushcarts are restricted to Level 1 food.	annual, expiring December 31 each year	2026-09-14

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

Fitness Studio — Pool License If a Pool Is Operated (Grand Forks)

The City's Doing Business in Grand Forks page lists no fitness or gym license, so there is no license fee for the studio itself. A gym appears only as a zoning use, 18-0215 listing 'Health clubs, gyms' among permitted B-2 uses, and Chapter XXI contains no licensing article for the trade. A studio's real city obligations are the building permit, the sign permit, a $60.00 fire permit where its occupancy triggers one, and a conditional use permit where the district requires it. One exception adds a genuine license with a published price and an unusual deadline: a studio operating a pool or spa is licensed under Code 13-0806(1), which provides that 'No person shall operate or maintain a pool facility unless such person has obtained a license to operate such pool. Licenses shall be obtained by January 1 at the office of the city auditor and shall be valid for one (1) year.' The 2026 fee is $250.00 for the first pool plus $40.00 for each additional waterbody or spa. The pool reinspection fee of $175.00 is one of the rows the fee list marks 'Pending Ordinance Adoption,' and is therefore disclosed here rather than recorded as settled.

Food Establishment License

Code 21-0702 carries the requirement: 'No person shall operate a food establishment within the city limits of Grand Forks without first having obtained a license therefore as provided herein.' The structure splits license and inspection — the application goes to the city auditor under 21-0703 while Grand Forks Public Health enforces under 21-0709 and may 'without warning, notice or hearing, suspend any permit, license or certificate to operate a food establishment' for non-compliance. Code 21-0706 names three inspecting bodies: public health, the Fire Department and the Inspections Department. The City's own application confirms the term: 'LICENSE EXPIRES DECEMBER 31ST OF EACH YEAR' and 'There is no proration for partial-year licenses.' The criteria that assign an establishment to Level 1, 2, 3 or 4 are published: 21-0711(9)'s reference to 'Grand Forks Public Health's risk level assessment' points to Annex 5, Table 1 of the FDA Food Code, which the department itself submitted to City Council as 'Risk Level Information' in September 2022 when the 2017 Food Code was adopted. On that table, a coffee shop is squarely Category 1 — the FDA's own example list names 'convenience store operations, hot dog carts, and coffee shops' first — while a fast-casual counter service business is Category 2 and a full-service restaurant is Category 3, with Category 4 reserved for highly susceptible populations (preschools, hospitals, nursing homes) or specialised processes like smoking, curing or reduced-oxygen packaging. A caveat is worth stating plainly: this document shows what Grand Forks presented to its own Council as the operative framework, but it is the FDA's national table verbatim rather than a locally drafted one, and an inspector retains judgement to place a borderline establishment a level up or down based on its documented food safety history. A prospective restaurant or coffee shop can use the table to anticipate its likely fee tier, but the final assignment is still Grand Forks Public Health's determination at inspection. The food establishment application's printed $150.00 reinspection fee is the 2025 rate, superseded by $175.00 for 2026 on the City's own comprehensive fee list, which shows both years side by side under 'Food and Beverage (Continued)' with no 'Pending Ordinance Adoption' qualifier on that line. The $175.00 figure that does carry a 'Pending Ordinance Adoption' label on the same document is a different, unrelated fee — a Swimming Pool reinspection charge listed separately under the Building Inspections section — and does not apply to food establishments at all. $175.00 is accordingly recorded here as the current, adopted reinspection fee for 2026.

General Business License — City of Grand Forks position

The City's Doing Business in Grand Forks page states: 'The City of Grand Forks only requires a business license for the specific types of businesses listed below. There is not a general business license for most businesses.' Because that page names no general license, there is no general license fee. Across the thirty articles of City Code Chapter XXI, the licensed set is alcoholic beverages, taxicabs, handicap transportation, outdoor advertising, residential rentals, food and drink establishments, pawnbrokers, towing, bike sharing, hotels and motels, door-to-door sales, electric scooter rentals, airport limousines, circuses and public exhibitions, commercial pedal cars, franchises, emergency alarm systems, shooting ranges, bed and breakfasts, temporary restaurants, tobacco retailers, general contractors and sexually oriented businesses. None of those articles covers child care, cosmetology, veterinary practice, automotive repair, fitness or retail generally. Of the ten industries covered here, only food businesses and contractors need a city license. Enumerated licenses that could reach a retail operation include a tobacco retail dealer at $100.00 with a vending machine at $50.00, and door-to-door sales at $500.00 annually or $75.00 per day with a $5,000 surety bond.

Mobile Food Unit License

Grand Forks is more accommodating to out-of-town trucks than Fargo or Bismarck, both of which sit outside North Dakota's statewide reciprocity arrangement. Code 21-0705 provides that 'Fees may be waived for mobile food units licensed from another jurisdiction in North Dakota provided the jurisdiction is recognized as having equivalent mobile food unit standards and it passes fire inspection or approval' — in practice a $25.00 reciprocity license rather than the full fee. A fire inspection is a precondition either way: 21-0703(6) requires that 'Mobile food units must provide a copy of the current fire inspection report.' Siting is tightly regulated by 21-0711: no mobile food unit or pushcart may operate on Demers Avenue, Cherry Street, Belmont Road, 17th Avenue South, or any roadway where parking is prohibited or diagonal; none may park within thirty feet of an intersection; and every operator 'must specify and utilize a commissary location.' Pushcarts are limited to serving Level 1 food. One local amendment matters for operators arriving from other states: Grand Forks deleted the International Fire Code's mobile food preparation vehicle section entirely, its fire code amendment at 12-0201(5) reading 'Section 105.5.32 Mobile Food Preparation Vehicles. Delete entire section.'

Contact

Jurisdiction: Grand Forks
Phone: (701) 746-2620
Website: www.grandforksgov.com/i-want-to/apply-for/business-license

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.

Apply for a Business License — the City's own current page stating that Grand Forks requires a license only for specific enumerated business types and that there is no general business license for most businessesCity of Grand Forks · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-14
Areas of Licensing Jurisdiction — North Dakota HHS's own statement that food licensing and inspection is delegated to eight local health units by Memorandum of Understanding, with Fargo Cass Public Health named for the City of FargoNorth Dakota Health and Human Services · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-14
City of Grand Forks 2026 List of Fees, published January 7, 2026 (internally titled 'Proposed 2026 Fee List for budget book') — the consolidated license and permit schedule carrying food establishment, mobile food, contractor, sign, zoning, fire, pool, body art and alcohol fees in prior-year and 2026 columnsCity of Grand Forks · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-14
Environmental Health — Grand Forks Public Health's own current page for food establishment inspection, swimming pools and body art, covering Grand Forks, Griggs, Nelson, Pembina and Walsh countiesGrand Forks Public Health · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-18
Fire Department — the Fire Prevention Division's own current page, stating that a Fire Department license grants permission for an operation, process or activity requiring approval and that a permit is issued for a specific period not exceeding one yearCity of Grand Forks Fire Department · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-14
Grand Forks City Code, codified through Ordinance No. 4934, adopted December 15, 2025 (Supp. No. 34) — Chapter XXI Article 7 (food and drink establishments), Article 29 (general contractors, including the $2,000 threshold at 21-2902), Article 5 (outdoor advertising and sign permits), 21-0106 (fees set by resolution, one-year term expiring December 31) and 18-0507 (certificate of occupancy)City of Grand Forks · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-14
Risk Level Information (as requested at Committee of the Whole) — a one-page document Grand Forks Public Health submitted to the City Council's September 26, 2022 Committee of the Whole as agenda item 5.4(F), alongside the introduction of the ordinance adopting the 2017 FDA Food Code. It reproduces Annex 5, Table 1, 'Risk Categorization of Food Establishments,' from the FDA Food Code, which is what 21-0711(9) refers to as 'Grand Forks Public Health's risk level assessment': Category 1 covers 'most convenience store operations, hot dog carts, and coffee shops' and establishments serving only pre-packaged or non-time/temperature-control-for-safety (non-TCS) foods; Category 2 covers 'retail food store operations, schools not serving a highly susceptible population, and quick service operations' with a limited menu and food mostly prepared and served immediately; Category 3 covers 'a full service restaurant' with an extensive menu, raw ingredient handling and complex cooking, cooling and reheating of many TCS foods; and Category 4 covers 'preschools, hospitals, nursing homes, and establishments conducting processing at retail,' any establishment serving a highly susceptible population, or one conducting a specialized process such as smoking, curing, or reduced oxygen packaging for extended shelf life. Each category also allows an establishment to be assigned one level down from where its menu would otherwise place it, or a newly permitted establishment to be held one level up, on a documented history of active managerial control of foodborne illness risk factors.City of Grand Forks / U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA Food Code, Annex 5, as adopted into the City's own Council record) · primary source · retrieved 2026-09-18

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