Board removes acreage minimum and coop permit fee for small-scale agriculture in agricultural districts

Spotsylvania County supervisors voted on Tuesday to amend zoning rules governing small-scale agriculture and accessory domestic laying hens, removing the five-acre minimum for keeping livestock in the county’s agricultural zoning districts and abolishing the county’s administrative coop-certificate and $65 application fee.

Planning staff presented the ordinance package—identified as CA25-3 and listed in the meeting materials as ordinance number 203-191—explaining the change is deregulatory in nature for A2, A3 and RA zoning districts where agriculture is an allowable use. Under the amendment, those agricultural districts will no longer be subject to a five-acre livestock minimum; crop-farming minimums tied to two acres in the existing definition would also be removed. The RU (Rural) and PRR (Planned Residential Rural) districts, which are more residential in character, will retain a five-acre standard for keeping livestock.

Jack Hill, planning staff, told the board the change is intended to align county code with the Virginia Right to Farm Act and to reduce the number of small legally nonconforming parcels that cannot practice small-scale agriculture. He recommended the board adopt the amendments and also directed staff to prepare a nonbinding best-management-practices guide (stocking sheets, setback reminders and references to Virginia Department of Health well setbacks) to educate owners who keep animals on small lots.

Under the change, enforcement of animals and fowl standards will be chiefly complaint driven and handled through existing animal-control and nuisance code provisions in chapter 4. Staff noted animal-control and zoning representatives are available to refine enforcement language later if the board wishes.

Public speakers at the hearing spoke in favor of the change, saying homesteading and backyard egg production are common in parts of the county and that existing nuisance and animal-welfare language in county code provides enforceable tools. Planning staff provided historical program data showing 223 coop certificates and associated inspections had been issued since the certification process began on Feb. 12, 2013—an average of about 1.5 certificates per month.

The board voted to adopt the amendments as proposed; the motion passed 7–0. Staff said the coop certificate and fee would be removed immediately and that any formal fee schedule cleanup would take effect with the next fiscal update. Staff also confirmed the zoning change does not expand eligibility for state land-use tax classification; parcels under five acres remain ineligible per state code and commissioner of the revenue guidance.

As part of implementing the change, planning staff said they will work with Cooperative Extension and animal-control staff to publish the suggested best-practices materials and will monitor enforcement load and any needed clarifications to the county's animal-nuisance provisions.