The Environmental Assistance Office provides permit assistance through Permit Specialists located in the Agency of Natural Resources' (ANR) five regional offices. The Permit Specialist’s primary job duty is to serve as the initial state contact for applicants and assist them in identifying all necessary state permits or approvals for any given project (see brochure). This allows applicants to make informed business decisions about the cost and length of time to comply with all state regulations. This also increases the likelihood that projects will meet requirements ensuring environmental and public health protection.

Permit Specialist Locator
The find the Permit Specialist serving your area, select your town from the dropdown list below and click on the "Find My Permit Specialist". Contact information for the Permit Specialist in the Regional Office serving your area is provided.

Hint: If you click on the text box to select it, then press the first letter of your town name, it will scoll down to the start of town names beginning with that letter.

Project Review Sheets
Based upon a technical review of projects and an interpretation of regulations (for about 45 DEC permits and about 66 other state and federal permits), the specialist develops a "project review (PR) sheet" indicating preliminary jurisdiction for all applicable state programs (see sample project review sheet). Through the use of the PR sheet and interaction with DEC and other state programs this jurisdiction is confirmed. The PR sheet also provides a jurisdictional opinion for Act 250.

Permit Specialists also conduct public speaking engagements upon request, to explain DEC permitting to professional groups such as real estate brokers, consultants, and lawyers.

The specialists developed the Permit Handbook as required by the legislature in 1995. This book contains an in-depth compilation of 45 DEC permit programs and more than 50 other Vermont and federal programs, including:

• a description of the permit,
• criteria for jurisdiction,
• staff contacts,
• statutory citations for authority and appeals.

The Handbook also includes a series of small business fact sheets that provide information about permits or other approvals, which will most likely be required prior to operating that business.

The specialists are also responsible for assigning Project Identification Numbers (PINs) for every active DEC permit action. These PINs assist in the production of the Environmental Notice Bulletin required by the legislature to be published each week. The PINs allow a sorting of projects that can show at a glance the DEC programs involved in specific projects and the status of each.

Although the Permit Specialists assist businesses of any size, the vast majority of their clients are individuals or very small businesses. Typically these folks either don’t have or can’t afford consultants, so these services are especially valuable to them. This is the only state department and program providing this type of service to both the public and regulators.

For more information contact:

The permit specialist in the Agency of Natural Resources' Regional office serving your town (see Permit Specialist locator above) or contact,

Jennifer Bryan, Permit Coordinator
Telephone: (802) 241-4228