City
Santa Clara
Santa Clara is a city record. City or town offices may handle local rules inside their limits, while county offices still handle records, taxes, courts, and many services.
Starting point
Confirm the address is inside local limits first.
If the address is inside Santa Clara, city or town offices may handle local permits, code, and services. If it is outside limits, county routing may be the better first stop.
A mailing city is not always the same as city government jurisdiction.
2025 population
133,446
Land area
18.277 sq mi
Water area
0 sq mi
Directory notes
Local layers to keep on the same page.
Confirm city or town limits.
A mailing address can use a nearby place name. If the address is outside limits, county offices may handle permits, code, and land-use routes.
County still matters.
Santa Clara County can still matter for assessor, tax collector, recorder, court, public health, social service, and election records.
Some layers are separate.
Water, sewer, fire, school, utilities, coast, earthquake maps, wildfire zones, parks, and trails may point outside city hall.
County layer
County shown for Santa Clara
Practical notes
Office, map, permit, and paperwork notes for Santa Clara
Place note · Home and property · Reviewed July 4, 2026
Santa Clara debris boxes are not a pick-any-hauler job
Santa Clara has an exclusive waste-hauling franchise for most debris box service, so remodel and cleanup projects should use the city waste rules before ordering a bin.
Place note · Home and property · Reviewed July 4, 2026
Santa Clara emergency prep has AlertSCC and local resources
Santa Clara's emergency pages connect AlertSCC, emergency shelters, earthquake safety, flooding and storm-drain help, CERT, and household planning resources.
Place note · Rules and licenses · Reviewed July 3, 2026
MySantaClara is the city service request hub
Santa Clara residents can use MySantaClara by app or web to submit, track, and view city service requests, with photos, locations, and status updates built into the process.
Place note · Home and property · Reviewed July 3, 2026
Santa Clara has city-owned utilities behind the tech skyline
Santa Clara owns and operates electric, water, and sewer utilities, with Silicon Valley Power serving as the city's municipal electric utility.
Place note · Home and property · Reviewed July 3, 2026
Santa Clara permit work runs through POP
Santa Clara's Permitting Online Portal supports permit lookup, applications, revisions, fee payments, service requests, building permit information, simple permits, and status checks.
County layer · History and culture · Reviewed July 7, 2026
History Park keeps old San Jose in walking distance
History Park in Kelley Park gathers historic buildings, small museums, streetscapes, and everyday objects that help San Jose feel older than Silicon Valley.
Almanac notes
Stories and local context near Santa Clara
Place note · History and culture
The Triton Museum gives Santa Clara a local art room
Santa Clara's Triton Museum of Art focuses on accessible exhibitions, education, community programs, and California artists near the city's civic center.
Place note · History and culture
Santa Clara keeps the tiny-chip story close to home
Intel's 4004 began as a calculator project and became an early microprocessor story tied closely to Santa Clara and Silicon Valley.
Place note · History and culture
Mission Santa Clara sits inside a working university campus
Mission Santa Clara is on the Santa Clara University campus, where Ohlone history, mission-era change, rebuilding, worship, campus life, and California's first college overlap.
County layer · History and culture
Murphy Avenue shows Sunnyvale learning to linger downtown
Historic Murphy Avenue is being reshaped as a pedestrian mall after a temporary 2020 outdoor-dining closure showed how much people liked a slower downtown street.
County layer · History and culture
Sunnyvale's fruit-cocktail tower keeps the cannery years visible
The Libby Water Tower in Sunnyvale keeps a playful fruit-cocktail label in view while pointing back to the city's cannery jobs, orchards, and office-park change.
County layer · Outdoors
McClellan Ranch gives Cupertino a quiet creekside history
McClellan Ranch Preserve is an 18-acre former horse ranch in Cupertino with a nature trail, creekside habitat, an environmental education center, and blacksmith shop history.
County layer · History and culture
The Jose Higuera Adobe gives Milpitas a foothill history stop
Jose Higuera Adobe Park connects Milpitas to Rancho Los Tularcitos, Calera Creek, old crops, cactus hedges, and a neighborhood park at the foothill edge.
County layer · History and culture
Computer History Museum turns Silicon Valley into a walkable story
Computer History Museum in Mountain View connects Silicon Valley to computing history through artifacts, exhibits, demos, software stories, and a former SGI building.