Volusia County, FL Animal Ordinances: Pet Store Rules (2026)

Adopted by Ordinance No. 2022-12 on June 7, 2022, Sec. 14-64 makes it unlawful for a 'commercial animal establishment', defined in Sec. 14-31 to include pet shops, flea markets, department stores, and kennels selling animals as part of a business, to display, sell, deliver, barter, auction, or otherwise transfer a dog or cat for resale anywhere in unincorporated Volusia County. A store operating before the ordinance's effective date had only thirty days to consummate any sale already in progress; after that window, retail sales of dogs and cats stopped entirely.

The ban carves out four narrow paths: an owner surrendering a pet they can no longer care for, publicly operated animal control facilities and shelters, private nonprofit humane societies and rescue organizations, and any of those nonprofit groups running a satellite adoption program out of a commercial establishment's space. A store can still host a shelter's adoption event on its floor, it just cannot buy and resell animals itself. The rule sits alongside Sec. 14-56's hobby-breeder permit, which lets a licensed individual breeder sell no more than two litters or twenty puppies or kittens a year directly to the public, and Sec. 14-65's separate ban on pet-leasing and collateral-financing contracts. Enforcement runs through Animal Services Division officers under the penalty scheme in Sec. 14-32.