One office in Rio Grande City handles permits, addresses, and weedy lots

Build, remodel, or open a business inside Rio Grande City and you'll deal with the Planning & Code Enforcement Department. Its reach extends out into the five-mile extraterritorial jurisdiction beyond the city line, so even some 'just outside town' projects land here. Inspectors check work against the International Code Council standards, and the document center carries the whole stack: building, electrical, mechanical, plumbing, roofing, sign, and mobile food vendor permits among them.

The same department covers a lot more than you'd guess under one roof. It assigns your 911 address, runs restaurant health inspections, reviews subdivisions, and collects park-land dedication fees on new development.

It's also the office to call when a neighbor's lot has gone to weeds, a junked car has been rotting in a yard, or someone's dumping where they shouldn't. Code enforcement handles all of that, on up to citations and the raw-sewage nuisance calls nobody wants to make but somebody has to.