Long Beach, CA Animal Ordinances: Chickens & Livestock (2026)

Section 6.20.150 makes the permit the gate for every goat. No one can have, keep, maintain, or possess a live goat on residential property in Long Beach without first applying to and receiving a permit from the Animal Care Services Bureau. The Director decides whether to issue it. The test in the code is whether the goats can be kept without menacing the safety of any person or property, and the permit is issued subject to an identifiable microchip requirement, so each animal has to carry a chip that identifies it.

The Director also holds rulemaking and enforcement power over the permit. The Director can issue additional rules and regulations on how goats are kept, and can deny, suspend, revoke or deny renewal of a permit for a violation of Chapter 6.20, for a violation of any other provision of the Long Beach Municipal Code, for a breach of the Director's own rules, or when, in the Director's opinion, the keeping of the goats menaces the safety of any person or property.

A permit runs for a period not to exceed one year. The Director renews it automatically every year when the permit holder complied with the chapter and applicable laws during the preceding permit term and pays the annual fee set by City Council resolution.

Section 6.20.170 fixes the herd at exactly two live goats on residential property, no more and no less. Offspring are the only exception: kids can stay on the property for up to six months from birth, after which the household is back to two. Section 6.20.180 requires male goats to be neutered. Section 6.20.190 sets the buffer: no live goat within ten feet of any other person's dwelling.

Neighboring sections add duties. Section 6.20.160 restricts food produced by the goats to personal consumption by members of the permittee's household, with no sale, donation or other distribution to anyone else. Section 6.20.200 requires enclosure or fencing that contains the goats and sets a minimum permeable-land area, smaller for two miniature goats such as pygmy and dwarf goats than for any other combination, plus shelter against weather and predators. Sections 6.20.210 and 6.20.220 require enclosures kept clean with manure and debris removed daily, and bar goats and their enclosures from the front yard. Chickens sit under separate sections of the same chapter, 6.20.120 through 6.20.140, with their own permit trigger and distance table.