Tamarac, FL Animal Ordinances: Veterinary Clinic Zoning (2026)

Tamarac's Land Development Code does not carve out a dedicated zoning-standards subsection for veterinary offices the way it does for kennels or medical marijuana dispensaries; instead, LDC § 10-6.2(C)(1)(e) defines 'Veterinary Office/Clinic' as a place where animals are given medical care, and confines any boarding at that address to short-term care incidental to the hospital use. That single sentence does real regulatory work: because a veterinary clinic's use-type definition itself limits boarding to short-term, treatment-related stays, a clinic that starts keeping animals overnight as a standalone boarding service, rather than as an incident of medical care, is functioning as a different use, an Animal Boarding Kennel under LDC § 10-6.2(C)(1)(b), which the Code defines separately as any establishment where animals are lodged and cared for, exclusive of veterinary care.

The city's use table cross-references LDC § 10-3.3(D)(3) for kennel-specific standards, meaning a veterinary practice that wants to add general boarding, rather than post-surgical or in-treatment stays, has to qualify and permit that second use on its own, in whatever zoning districts allow kennels, rather than simply operating it under its veterinary clinic approval. Community Development applies these use-type definitions from Article 6 whenever it reviews a business tax receipt or building permit application, since LDC § 10-3.4(B)(2) provides that a use's typical accessory activities, described in § 10-6.2, ride along with the principal use unless the Code specifically prohibits them, so the short-term-incidental limit on boarding travels with every veterinary office approval in the city.