Zoning in rural areas (farmland, acres, houses, chickens)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
What is your take on zoning in rural areas? Is it good, bad or a little of both. For instance here zoning controls large livestock placement and non-farm buildings. Zoning varies form county to county, but now most of the counties in Nebraska have it. I am interested in your opinions.
What attracted me for the most part to NE was that they have very little zoning. Where I came from, I was happily growing my vegetable gardens, fruit trees, and flowers, and creating a wildlife habitat for birds and bees and butterflies. I had chickens in a fully fenced yard and coop that provided not only our family of 5 with fresh eggs, but all of the neighbors as well.
Then the "city people" moved in. They zoned out my chickens (no grandfather clause). They told me I had to pull up my blackberry vines, roses, wildflowers, and daylilies, and chop down my fruit trees, because they wanted all of the front yards to only have grass - and it could only be so high. They disapproved my long-standing greenhouse in the backyard (but we could keep the workshop and toolshed).They told me that the meandering paths between my gardens were unsightly. Everything had to look the same as everyone else.
Here I find a lot more freedom and a lot less zoning - I have 14 acres 'in town' and 46 in the county, and as long as I do not encroach on my neighbor's property or his property rights, I can do as I please. I can put up a new garage and use the old decrepit one to build a chicken coop. I have no permits to aquire, and no size or encroachment specifications (although I prefer everything to be set back from my neighbors' property lines as far as possible, due to my own access and to keep from bothering them).
I am devoutly opposed to zoning or building codes, simply because people have the right to do as they please on their own property - as long as they are not causing problems (like runoff or deficiencies) to their neighbors. While I might think it foolish to put up something that could become easily destroyed in a NE wind or storm, and scattered over the neighbors'; yards, I think that legal protections and solutions are already in place, and city, county, or state governments should not attempt to nannyize them. JMHO.
We have zoning in the county I live in central MN.
My small dairy farm is in an area zoned A-40 , which means if I wanted to sell a parcel off to a person building a house, I would have to sell 40+ acres. (Some areas of our county are zoned A-80 ( 80+ acres)
I don't like it.
The intent is --"to save farmland", but the way I see it, if I sold 5 acres to a guy building a house I still have 35 acres to keep in farmland.
If I sell 40 acres, the guy building his house many times plants trees on 35 acres or lets it grow up in "nature"
We have zoning in the county I live in central MN.
My small dairy farm is in an area zoned A-40 , which means if I wanted to sell a parcel off to a person building a house, I would have to sell 40+ acres. (Some areas of our county are zoned A-80 ( 80+ acres)
I don't like it.
The intent is --"to save farmland", but the way I see it, if I sold 5 acres to a guy building a house I still have 35 acres to keep in farmland.
If I sell 40 acres, the guy building his house many times plants trees on 35 acres or lets it grow up in "nature"
Does that --save farmland-- ??????????
In my county the 40 acre minimum was changed to 3 acres just for your reason. The farmland preservation was enhanced by limiting the number of houses that could be built in a 160 acre quarter section.
Zoning is an abomination. I bought land with no zoning, building codes, permits, etc, and I intend to stay that way (woe to anyone who tries to bring that control freak garbage to me, they will find me to be one miserable neighbor).
There's a minimal amount of zoning where I live. If you want to build and have a tract under 40 acres, you would need to rezone the property to get a building permit. Above 40, no required building permit and no rezoning needed. There is also no code enforcement (inspections) which was a plus when I was building my place and not having to wait for some pinhead to give me a yay or nay and paying a fee every time.
Everything is still up to code for safety and resale though,
We don't have zoning in most rural Missouri counties, but I see a growing need for it in some areas. You can click here to read a posting in the Missouri forum.
Our township was the last one to require building permits.
One of the reason given for building permits was so the property assessor would know about buildings going up (aka increased valuation)
Without building permits being required, the assessor only stops at each person once every three or 4 years.
A parcel that was secluded and listed as "hunting property" was getting by for 3-4 years on not paying property taxes on that "log mansion" that was built there but never reported.
The county tax assessor asked if I thought it was fair that I was paying HIGH property taxes to school,county, and township---------while that person who built the "log mansion" got by w/o for 3-4 years.
I could see her point.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
