Questions, asked enough times to answer up front.

What are Avery 5160 labels?

The industry-standard format for mailing address labels. Each sheet contains 30 labels in a 3×10 grid; individual labels measure 1″ × 2-5/8″ (25.4 mm × 66.7 mm).

They’re sold at office supply stores, Amazon, and Avery’s site. Generic equivalents marked “5160-compatible” work the same.

Which printers handle them?

Both inkjet and laser, but the labels themselves are type-specific. Buy:

• Inkjet printers — inkjet-compatible labels (Avery 5160 or 8160).
• Laser printers — laser-compatible labels (Avery 5160).

Mismatching causes smearing or jams. The package always says which.

How do I print the PDF correctly?

1. Download the PDF generated by the tool.
2. Open in Adobe Reader (not the browser’s built-in viewer).
3. Print at “Actual Size” — never “Fit to Page.”
4. Load sheets correctly — check your printer’s tray orientation.
5. Test on plain paper first; hold it against a label sheet to verify alignment.

Why are my labels misaligned?

• Scaling enabled — switch to “Actual Size” / 100%.
• Wrong paper size — use US Letter (8.5″ × 11″).
• Printer margins — disable “shrink to fit.”
• Sheet orientation — labels facing the right way per your printer.

Always run a plain-paper test first.

Can I use non-Avery brands?

Yes. Any “5160-compatible” or “30-up” mailing label works. Staples, Office Depot, Amazon Basics, and MFLABEL all make them. Match the 1″ × 2-5/8″, 30-per-sheet format.

What is a public notice radius requirement?

A statutory requirement that property owners within a defined distance of a proposed project be notified of upcoming hearings or decisions, so affected neighbors can participate.

Typically applies to:

• Zoning changes and variances
• Conditional use permits
• Subdivision applications
• Environmental reviews
• Historic preservation decisions

What is a typical notification distance?

• 200 feet — common for minor variances.
• 300 feet — standard in many jurisdictions.
• 500 feet — larger projects, rezonings.
• 1,000+ feet — major developments, industrial uses.

Always check the local municipal code. Some jurisdictions measure from property lines, others from the project boundary.

Who needs to be notified?

• Property owners of record — per county tax/assessor data.
• Adjacent properties — abutters, even outside the radius.
• Registered neighborhood associations — where applicable.
• The applicant — the project proponent.

Some jurisdictions also require notifying tenants or posting on-site signs.

What must a notice letter include?

• Project address and/or parcel number.
• Nature of the request (variance, rezoning, etc.).
• Current and proposed zoning/use.
• Hearing date, time, and location.
• How to submit written comments.
• Contact information for questions.
• Legal description or map (sometimes required).

How far in advance must notices be mailed?

• 10 days — minimum for many routine hearings.
• 15 days — common for zoning actions.
• 20–30 days — major rezonings or comprehensive plan changes.

Some jurisdictions count calendar days; others business days. Verify with your planning department, and allow buffer time for postal delivery.

Where can I get parcel GeoJSON?

• County Assessor / GIS — most counties offer free parcel downloads.
• State GIS clearinghouses — aggregated statewide datasets.
• Open data portals — search “[County Name] open data parcels.”
• Regrid (formerly Loveland) — nationwide parcel data, partly free.

Often delivered as Shapefile (.shp) — convert to GeoJSON via QGIS or mapshaper.org.

What is GeoJSON, exactly?

An open JSON-based standard for encoding geographic data. Supports:

• Points — addresses, POIs.
• Lines — roads, rivers, paths.
• Polygons — parcels, boundaries, zones.
• Properties — attributes attached to each feature.

The radius tool expects a FeatureCollection of Polygon or MultiPolygon parcels.

How do I convert Shapefile to GeoJSON?

• mapshaper.org — drag and drop .shp / .dbf / .prj, export GeoJSON.
• QGIS — right-click layer → Export → Save as GeoJSON.
• ogr2ogr — ogr2ogr -f GeoJSON output.geojson input.shp

Use WGS84 (EPSG:4326) coordinates for web-mapping compatibility.

What fields does my parcel data need?

For mailing list generation, at minimum:

• Owner name — property owner or taxpayer.
• Mailing address — street, city, state, ZIP (often split fields).

Common field names: owner, owner_name, mail_addr, mailing1, mailing2, mailing3. The tool lets you map whatever names your data uses.

Is my data uploaded to a server?

No. All processing happens in your browser. Your CSV files, GeoJSON data, and generated PDFs never leave your computer. We don’t store, transmit, or have access to anything.

Once the page loads, processing works offline. Geocoding still needs internet for address lookups.

What is address deduplication?

The tool removes duplicate mailing addresses from your list, saving postage and paper.

It normalizes addresses first (trimming whitespace, standardizing case) so “123 MAIN ST” and “123 Main St” are recognized as the same.

How does the geocoding work?

We use the U.S. Census Bureau’s free geocoding service:

• U.S. addresses only.
• Free; no API key.
• Census TIGER/Line address data.

Include full city, state, and ZIP for best results.

Can I manually adjust selected parcels?

Yes. After the initial buffer selection, click any parcel on the map to toggle it. Useful when you need to:

• Include parcels just outside the buffer your code requires.
• Exclude the subject property itself.
• Add adjacent properties not within buffer distance.
• Remove parcels that are public right-of-way.

What is a parcel REST API?

A parcel REST API is a web service that returns parcel records as JSON in response to HTTP queries. Most county GIS portals run on Esri’s ArcGIS Server, which follows a standard endpoint pattern:

/arcgis/rest/services/.../FeatureServer/0/query?where=APN=‘12345’&f=json

The response includes the parcel geometry and attributes — owner, address, acreage, assessed value — whatever the county publishes. No GIS software required; a browser URL or curl call works.

Why don't all counties expose owner names on their public REST layer?

County policies vary. Some states let property owners request confidentiality for their home address under state privacy statutes, and counties apply that exemption to the public REST layer. Others gate owner data behind a paid portal or a county-issued login.

When the free API lacks owner names, try the county assessor’s public search page, a public-records request, or a licensed parcel data vendor.

How do I find my county's parcel REST URL?

Start at the county GIS or assessor website and look for an ArcGIS REST Services directory — the path contains /rest/services/ somewhere in the URL. UrbanKit Studio’s parcel atlas indexes endpoints for 50+ counties. The article How to Find Your County’s ArcGIS Parcel Layer URL walks through locating and testing a URL for any county not yet in the atlas.

Is the parcel data on UrbanKit Studio real-time?

No. UrbanKit Studio indexes REST endpoint URLs, not the underlying parcel records. When you query a county endpoint through our tools, you get the county’s current data — but counties update parcel attributes on their own schedule.

Cook County, Illinois reassesses on a triennial-by-triad cycle, meaning some neighborhoods go three years between full reassessments. Check the county assessor’s site for the most recent assessment date.

Does UrbanKit Studio store parcel records?

No. UrbanKit Studio stores only REST endpoint metadata — the URL, field names, and example queries that make up the parcel atlas. When you query a county through one of our tools, your browser contacts the county’s server. No parcel records, owner names, or addresses pass through or are stored on our servers.

Do I need to notify renters or only property owners?

Most public notice codes require notification to property owners of record, not tenants — but some jurisdictions extend the requirement. California state law requires tenant notification for certain rent control hearings; some cities require it for discretionary permits affecting residential properties.

Check the section of your municipal code that governs the specific permit type. When in doubt, your planning department can confirm what the notice package must include.

What if the radius crosses into another jurisdiction?

Notify in both. A radius that crosses a city limit, county line, or special district boundary does not eliminate the notice requirement for affected properties on the other side. Gather parcel data from each jurisdiction — they maintain their own assessor databases.

Document which notices went to properties in each jurisdiction. Multi-jurisdictional projects face appeals on notice adequacy more often than single-jurisdiction ones, and a clean mailing log protects the record.