Jonesboro, AR Animal Ordinances: Exotic Pets (2026)

Section 10-11 defines a lion as a large carnivorous mammal of the cat family and then flatly makes it unlawful for any person to keep or harbor a lion within the city; no permit or exception is written into the section. The ban dates to Ordinance No. 02. A companion rule in Section 10-2 reaches wider than lions: it bans letting any dangerous or vicious animal of any kind run at large in the city, and separately requires anyone who wants to exhibit or parade an animal that is ferae naturae, wild by its nature in the eyes of the law, to first secure a permit from the chief of police.

Read together, the two sections mean a private resident cannot keep a lion under any circumstances, and cannot display or parade any other wild animal, think big cats, primates, or venomous reptiles that a court would treat as ferae naturae, without police-chief sign-off first. Chapter 10 backs both sections with Section 10-3, which authorizes police officers and any other person in the city to kill a dangerous animal of any kind when necessary to protect a person or property, and with Section 10-1's general cruelty ban that applies to any animal kept in the city, wild or domestic.