Date each Rochester property field before linking it to an old permit. Open the City’s Property Information page. Treat each displayed field as its own dated record, and get any parcel split or merge from the Assessor rather than the page.
Keep three timelines separate
- Assessment and billing: refreshed nightly and showing the prior day’s data; a new property can take a day to appear. Save the date you viewed it beside the amount.
- Property boundary: an edit can take longer to appear. Keep the map date separate from the billing date.
- Zoning, overlay and preservation layers: updated as rezonings occur. Record the displayed district and the day you viewed it.
Do not treat these as one timestamp. A later-looking value in one row cannot date a different row or establish a permit milestone.
The page searches by address, owner name or SBL (section-block-lot) number, or by clicking the map. Confirm City jurisdiction first: it sends properties in Brighton, Chili, Gates, Greece, Irondequoit and Penfield to the Monroe County Real Property Portal.
Trace an old permit through a parcel change
Begin with the old permit itself. Preserve its permit number, address, parcel identifier, issue date and source. The Property Information page shows current data, not a parcel’s split or merge history, so the parcel change has to come from another record: the City Assessor’s file on the SBL change, a recorded map or a deed. A similar address is a clue, not a cross-reference.
Build a small lineage note:
- Old record: copy the permit number, original parcel identifier and record date.
- Parcel change: write down the split or merge event exactly as the Assessor record or map shows it.
- Current candidates: list every successor identifier without choosing one yet.
- Required bridge: name the map, deed reference, permit annotation or other record that actually connects the old file to a current parcel.
Use the Rochester building-permit records guide when the missing item is the permit, inspection or occupancy file. Use the old-building permit lookup guide when the permit predates the most obvious online record path. Those are permit-record routes; they do not document a parcel change.
Work through a fictional two-parcel mismatch
Imagine a fictional 1998 permit that names parcel A-100. An Assessor record shows B-200 and C-300 as successors of A-100. The old street address resembles the address on B-200, but the permit contains no successor notation.
Keep the 1998 permit under A-100. Add B-200 and C-300 as candidates, each with the date and source that shows it. Do not assign the permit to B-200 merely because its address looks closer. First look for a record-specific bridge that identifies the affected land or work.
If the Assessor record supplies only the change event, record exactly that. If a later map or permit annotation names one successor, attach the cross-reference and its date. If no bridge appears, leave the assignment unresolved and ask for the named missing record. This keeps a plausible match from becoming a false parcel history.
Send the right missing-record question
If a City property doesn’t come up, the page suggests trying the owner name or the map, then calling the City Assessor at 585-428-7221. That handles property-display and parcel-change questions, separate from the permit-copy route in the Rochester permit guide.
When the property is visible but the old permit is missing, ask for the permit by its known number, date, address and original parcel identifier. When the permit is present but the successor parcel is uncertain, ask for the record that documents the parcel transition. Do not turn a missing property display into a permit-record conclusion, or a missing permit into a claim that no work occurred.
For a permit, plan or parcel record that isn’t online, use the City’s FOIL page. Requests go through the online FOIL app or to the Law Department, City Hall Room 400A, 30 Church St. (585-428-6991). Describe the records specifically and say whether you want to inspect them, get copies or both. Copies are $0.25 a page; maps, plans and blueprints are $5.00 to $10.25. If a request is denied, you can appeal to the Corporation Counsel within 30 days.
The page gives no historical floor or completion time for parcel edits. A parcel-change record does not prove title, final billing, current zoning compliance, permit completion or which successor parcel carries an old permit without record-specific evidence.
Sources: City of Rochester Property Information page and FOIL page, checked October 20, 2026.