St. Louis County, MN Ordinances (2026)

St. Louis County Ordinance No. 45 makes it unlawful to dump, throw, or deposit solid waste on any roadway, waterway, or public or private property outside an MPCA-permitted facility's…

Ordinance No. 45 keeps yard waste out of the trash: Article VI, Section 8.1 bars placing yard waste, garden waste, leaves, grass clippings, and prunings in containers collected as…

Ordinance No. 45 requires every property owner, lessee, or occupant within the county's Solid Waste Management Area to arrange lawful collection, transportation, and disposal of all…

Ordinance No. 45 bars anyone from placing materials separated for recycling into containers meant for collection or disposal as mixed municipal solid waste. A hauler who finds…

Under St. Louis County's Food and Beverage Establishment Ordinance, a rodent or insect infestation counts as an imminent health hazard that lets the county Administrator order a food…

St. Louis County's Food and Beverage Establishment Ordinance (No. 59) adopts Minnesota's Food Manager Certification rule and makes compliance with it a condition of getting a county…

Used needles and other sharps count as Infectious Waste under St. Louis County's Solid Waste Ordinance, and Article VI bars putting Infectious Waste in the same container as regular…

St. Louis County requires an Operating Permit for any graywater recycle or re-use system that falls outside the standard Type I and Type II categories under its Subsurface Sewage…

Unincorporated St. Louis County requires anyone operating a hotel, lodging house, boarding house or resort, including cabin or cottage rentals to recreational guests, to hold a written…

St. Louis County no longer fixes a dollar license fee in Ordinance No. 16 itself. A 1974 amendment, effective January 1, 1975, rewrote Section 3(f) to hand fee-setting to the St. Louis…

St. Louis County does not set fixed quiet hours by ordinance, but the Planning and Zoning Director can impose quiet hours as a condition on any short-term rental permit. Zoning…

Every short-term rental permit holder in unincorporated St. Louis County must carry general liability insurance covering the property's use as a rental. Zoning Ordinance 62 requires…

Short-term rental hosts in unincorporated St. Louis County must provide enough on-site parking for their guests. Zoning Ordinance 62 flatly bans parking on any road or road…

St. Louis County's Mesabi Trail Ordinance (No. 56) bans bringing a pet onto the trail unless it's on a leash no longer than six feet. The rule covers only the trail's right-of-way, not…

St. Louis County regulates chickens and livestock through an animal-unit table in Zoning Ordinance 62. Chickens count as 0.01 animal units and swine as 0.40, and a lot of two acres or…

A veterinary clinic in unincorporated St. Louis County falls under "clinics and other medical facilities," a Commercial Class II use grouped with dog kennels and pet services, and…

In unincorporated St. Louis County, Zoning Ordinance 62 caps household pets by lot size. On a parcel of two acres or less you may keep only domesticated dogs and cats as pets, totaling…

St. Louis County makes it a petty misdemeanor to use cannabis flower, cannabis products, lower-potency hemp edibles, or hemp-derived consumer products in any public place, including…

Ordinance No. 45 bars open burning of food waste, rubber, plastics, chemically treated materials, hazardous and industrial waste, demolition debris, motor vehicles, and household or…

Residential propane tanks get a double break in St. Louis County's zoning ordinance: they are classified as a no-permit Utility Facility Class I use, and the code's own definition of…

On the Mesabi Trail Corridor, St. Louis County Ordinance No. 56 requires a written permit from a Ranger before anyone holds a parade, meeting, speech, or demonstration that would…

St. Louis County Ordinance No. 51 makes it unlawful to sell tobacco, tobacco-related devices, or run compliance checks tied to electronic delivery devices without a county license…

St. Louis County Floodplain Ordinance No. 69 requires a permit from the Director before any building, fence, pool, fill, excavation, or utility work occurs within a mapped Special…

St. Louis County sets its Regulatory Flood Protection Elevation (RFPE) at one foot above the base flood elevation, plus any rise from floodway encroachment, and requires the lowest…

Any land alteration within 300 feet of a lake or river in unincorporated St. Louis County, whether or not it needs a permit, must follow Section 6.16's erosion-control minimums: expose…

Countywide, Section 6.19 of Zoning Ordinance 62 lets stormwater management proceed without a separate permit only if a property stays under the zone district's maximum impervious lot…

Within St. Louis County's Flood Fringe District, an accessory structure such as a shed, garage, or storage building cannot exceed 576 square feet or one story, and may be used only for…

An accessory dwelling in unincorporated St. Louis County always needs a land use permit, and its allowed size and height depend on the lot: up to 700 square feet and 20 feet tall on a…

St. Louis County's zoning code bars renting an accessory dwelling on its own: Section 6.11 says the unit cannot be used for commercial or rental purposes separate from the main…

St. Louis County's zoning ordinance names tiny homes directly: a detached tiny home qualifies as a Principal Dwelling, Single-family the same as a stick-built house, mobile home or…

St. Louis County Cannabis Ordinance No. 68 keeps any licensed cannabis business at least 1,000 feet from a school and at least 500 feet from a licensed day care, a residential…

St. Louis County Cannabis Ordinance No. 68 confines retail cannabis and hemp businesses to commercial (COM) zoning districts with a land-use permit, and restricts cultivation…

In unincorporated St. Louis County, a recreational vehicle or camper can sit on a residential parcel without a permit only if it is the sole RV on the lot, carries a current motor…

St. Louis County's zoning code does not set snow-emergency routes; instead it requires every driveway, road and parking area to leave enough room to store plowed snow so meltwater does…

Driveways in unincorporated St. Louis County must sit at least 10 feet from property lines under Zoning Ordinance 62, though a written agreement between neighbors or a road-authority…

Unincorporated St. Louis County allows up to five unlicensed or inoperable vehicles on a property without any permit, as long as they meet setback and environmental standards. Store…

St. Louis County skips the permit process entirely for small residential solar installations. A ground-mount system of 160 square feet or less needs no land use permit at all under…

A ground-mount solar array larger than 160 square feet in unincorporated St. Louis County needs a land use permit and must meet the same setback, height and impervious-surface limits…

On the Mesabi Trail in St. Louis County, bicycles must stay on the designated bikeways and roadways within the Trail Corridor and ride as close to the right-hand side as conditions…

St. Louis County's Environmental Services Director is charged with investigating complaints of Solid Waste Ordinance violations and inspecting properties, then escalating through a…

In unincorporated St. Louis County, the Environmental Services Department most often cites residents for tipping over trash and recycling containers, hoarding more than 50 waste tires…

St. Louis County's Forest Agricultural Management (FAM) zone district makes farming the preferred use of the land. Zoning Ordinance 62 states that livestock keeping and related farming…

In unincorporated St. Louis County, a billboard is any freestanding outdoor sign over 128 square feet, and Zoning Ordinance 62 treats it as a principal use that needs its own land use…

Zoning Ordinance 62 defines "Dark Sky Compliant" lighting as illumination that restricts upward-directed light, avoids glare and over-lighting, uses dimming controls, and minimizes…

St. Louis County zones a home business as a commercial use tied to the owner's residence, capped at five employees who don't live there and required to stay compatible with the rural…

A home business permit in St. Louis County isn't automatic once traffic picks up: Section 6.20.B.3 requires the operator to get the appropriate road authority's approval to address…

A home business in unincorporated St. Louis County gets no separate sign allowance: Section 6.20.B.6 requires all signs to conform to outdoor sign standards found in Article VI…

St. Louis County's zoning districts cap total lot coverage, meaning every structure plus every constructed impervious surface, at 10 to 35 percent of lot area depending on the…

In unincorporated St. Louis County, structures in Residential and Shoreland areas cannot rise above 35 feet, measured from the lower of the highest adjoining grade or 10 feet above the…

Away from the shoreline, St. Louis County's baseline zoning setback is 10 feet from the property line for principal structures and 5 feet for accessory structures, plus a road…

St. Louis County's zoning ordinance bars any structure or use within 50 feet of a cemetery, platted or not, unless the State Archaeologist approves, and bars building on any…