West Virginia Ordinances (2026)

A tiny home built on a permanent chassis and used as a dwelling becomes a "manufactured home" under W. Va. Code §21-9-2(j) once it reaches 320 square feet on site or eight feet in…

West Virginia's Apiary Law requires all beekeepers to register their colonies with the Department of Agriculture and authorizes the state apiarist to inspect hives, quarantine diseased…

West Virginia requires dogs over six months old to be registered and vaccinated against rabies, and makes owners liable for damage caused by a dog running at large under W. Va. Code…

West Virginia's Dangerous Wild Animal Act prohibits private possession, breeding, sale, and transfer of listed dangerous wild animals including big cats, bears, primates, and certain…

West Virginia does not have a dedicated animal hoarding statute, but its general animal cruelty law criminalizes failure to provide adequate food, water, shelter, and veterinary care…

West Virginia Division of Natural Resources regulations prohibit intentionally feeding black bears statewide and restrict baiting of deer and other wildlife. These rules apply…

Retailers selling electronic cigarettes and vapor products in West Virginia must comply with tax, age verification, and licensing rules administered by state law.

A West Virginia medical cannabis dispensary may not be located within 1,000 feet of a school or daycare property line under W. Va. Code §16A-8-2. Applicants must obtain municipal…

West Virginia Code §16A and Chapter 60A categorically prohibit home cultivation of cannabis, even by registered medical patients, preempting any local rule that would attempt to…

West Virginia Code §7-1-12 authorizes counties and municipalities to enact juvenile curfews for persons under 18. State law caps municipal court juvenile jurisdiction and bars…

Commercial drone operations in West Virginia require FAA Part 107 remote pilot certification, with state criminal limits in W. Va. Code §61-16-2 covering weaponization…

Recreational drone flight in West Virginia is governed primarily by FAA rules for recreational flyers, with state criminal limits in W. Va. Code §61-16-2 covering weaponized drones…

West Virginia sets a uniform minimum wage and overtime framework under W. Va. Code 21-5C, leaving little room for higher local minimum wages.

West Virginia regulates land grading and drainage through DEP construction stormwater rules in WV Code §22-11, surface mining and oil-and-gas earthwork rules in §22-3 and §22-6A, and…

West Virginia has no single 'Floodplain Management Act'; floodplain rules are administered locally. Counties may adopt floodplain ordinances under W. Va. Code §7-1-3u, communities…

West Virginia Code §22-11 and Department of Environmental Protection rules administer the federal NPDES stormwater program statewide, requiring permits for construction, industrial…

Under WV Code 19-17-5, owners of adjoining agricultural, horticultural, grazing, or livestock lands each pay a just proportion of building, repairing, and maintaining the partition…

West Virginia regulates outdoor recreational fires through forest fire season restrictions in Code Section 20-3-5 and the State Fire Code adopted by the State Fire Commission, which…

West Virginia legalized consumer fireworks statewide in 2016 under Code Chapter 29 Article 3E, establishing licensing requirements for retailers, an annual safety fee, and uniform…

West Virginia prohibits outdoor burning during designated spring and fall forest fire seasons under Code Chapter 20 Article 3 Section 5, applying uniformly statewide between specified…

West Virginia regulates propane storage, handling, and installation through the State Fire Code adopted by the State Fire Commission under Code Section 29-3-5b, incorporating NFPA 58…

West Virginia Code Chapter 20 Article 3 establishes Division of Forestry authority over wildfire protection statewide, imposing strict liability for fire suppression costs and uniform…

West Virginia allows permitless concealed carry for adults aged 21 and older and issues optional shall-issue permits for reciprocity and federal purposes.

West Virginia broadly preempts municipal and county firearm regulation under W. Va. Code 8-12-5a, leaving most lawmaking authority to the Legislature.

West Virginia allows lawful adults to carry firearms in their motor vehicles without a permit, consistent with the state's permitless carry law and broad preemption of local rules.

West Virginia requires every mobile food unit to hold a permit from a local health department under Bureau for Public Health rules. Under W. Va. Code §16-2-18, a valid permit from one…

West Virginia casinos are not zoned in locally -- they are switched on by a county vote. A pari-mutuel racetrack can add West Virginia Lottery video lottery games only after the county…

West Virginia bans commercial bingo and raffles but licenses both for charities. Under the Bingo Act and Charitable Raffles Act, Chapter 47, Articles 20 and 21, the Tax Commissioner…

West Virginia's gaming statute draws no line between a casino floor and a kitchen table: betting money on any game of chance "at any place, public or private" is a misdemeanor under W…

West Virginia legalized sports wagering in 2018 under W. Va. Code §29-22D-2, but only through the state's five licensed racetrack casinos and the Greenbrier resort hotel. Under…

Under West Virginia's Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, W. Va. Code § 36B-3-116, an association has an automatic lien on a unit for unpaid assessments and fines from the time they…

Under West Virginia's Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act, § 36B-3-108 requires at least one association meeting a year with 10-60 days' agenda notice; it does not impose a general…

West Virginia protects solar access: under W. Va. Code § 36-4-19, housing-association covenants that prohibit or restrict installing a solar energy system are void and unenforceable…

West Virginia puts no dollar ceiling on a homeowners association fine. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-102(a)(11), part of the Uniform Common Interest Ownership Act adopted at Chapter 36B, lets a…

A West Virginia association's assessment lien does not last indefinitely. W. Va. Code § 36B-3-116(d) extinguishes it unless proceedings to enforce the lien are instituted within three…

West Virginia Code §19-35 establishes statewide cottage food rules allowing home producers to sell non-potentially hazardous foods directly to consumers without commercial kitchen…

West Virginia licenses in-home child care by size: an informal home cares for three or fewer children, a registered family child care home for four to six children, and a licensed…

West Virginia has never created a microenterprise home kitchen permit. Searching the Code for "home kitchen" and for "microenterprise" returns nothing at all, so there is no licence a…

The West Virginia Code neither authorises nor regulates sobriety checkpoints. The word checkpoint appears in a single section, §17G-1-2, and that entire chapter is of no force or…

West Virginia has no statute granting a right to record law enforcement. What it has instead is a one-party consent wiretap law: W. Va. Code §62-1D-3(e) makes it lawful to intercept a…

West Virginia never enacted a stop-and-identify statute. There is no offence in the Code of refusing to give a police officer your name while on foot, and no provision requiring a…

West Virginia is one of a small number of states that put consent to a vehicle search into a statute rather than leaving it to case law. W. Va. Code §62-1A-10 says an officer who stops…

West Virginia Code §22-15 and 45CSR6 set statewide composting and open burning standards. Residential backyard composting is exempt from solid waste permits, but open burning is…

West Virginia imposes treble (triple) damages for cutting, damaging, or carrying away trees, timber, or growing plants from another person's land without written permission, under the…

A golf cart cannot be made street legal in West Virginia. W. Va. Code § 17A-3-2(c) tells the Division of Motor Vehicles to title and register a low-speed vehicle only where the…

West Virginia Code §17-24A governs abandoned motor vehicles. A vehicle is 'abandoned' after five days on public property, or after 48 hours on private property without the owner's…

A tow you did not ask for is regulated in West Virginia as common carriage. W. Va. Code § 24A-2-2a makes it unlawful to tow wrecked or disabled vehicles for hire without registering…

West Virginia requires no pre-suit notice before filing to evict for nonpayment of rent. Under W. Va. Code § 55-3A-1 a landlord may file a verified wrongful-occupation petition in…

West Virginia statutorily requires landlords to deliver and maintain rental dwellings in a fit and habitable condition under W. Va. Code § 37-6-30, and Teller v. McCoy recognizes a…

West Virginia has no statute setting an advance-notice period for landlord entry. Chapter 37, Article 6 is silent on routine access, so entry is governed by the lease and the tenant's…

To end a month-to-month tenancy in West Virginia, either party must give written notice of one full rental period before the end of a period under W. Va. Code § 37-6-5. A year-to-year…

West Virginia sets no cap on the amount of a residential security deposit. After a tenancy ends, the landlord must return the deposit, with a written itemization of any damages or…

West Virginia requires ten years of adverse possession to claim title to land under W. Va. Code § 55-2-1. The possession must run continuously for the full statutory period, and a…

West Virginia limits local zoning that would restrict bona fide agricultural uses, working alongside the Right to Farm Act in W. Va. Code 19-19.

The West Virginia Right to Farm Act in W. Va. Code 19-19 protects established agricultural operations from nuisance lawsuits brought by neighbors.

West Virginia imposes a statewide hotel occupancy tax framework that applies to short-term rentals offered for fewer than thirty consecutive days, with consumer sales tax and…

West Virginia Code 17-19-1 prohibits any sign, including campaign signs, on or over state highway right-of-way. WVDOH right-of-way generally extends 20 feet from a road centerline…

West Virginia has no statewide plastic bag ban or fee and no statute expressly preempting local bag ordinances, leaving the area lightly regulated.

West Virginia Code §36-4-19 makes any HOA covenant that prohibits or restricts a homeowner's solar energy system void and unenforceable, so a housing association cannot block rooftop…

West Virginia has no statewide rooftop-solar permit, but W. Va. Code §24-2F-8 requires every electric utility to offer net metering to solar customer-generators and routes grid…

Door-to-door sellers and temporary vendors must register as transient vendors with the West Virginia State Tax Commissioner under W. Va. Code §11-12-20 and post a $500 security bond…

West Virginia prohibits the sale of tobacco, vapor, and alternative nicotine products to anyone under 21 under W. Va. Code 16-9A-3.

West Virginia Code Chapter 22C Article 4 requires every household and business in the state to subscribe to or use approved solid waste disposal services, with statewide enforcement…

West Virginia Code Chapter 22 Article 15A Section 18 establishes statewide recycling goals and authorizes the Recycling Assistance Program, with mandatory municipal recycling for…

West Virginia counts and positions each class of add-on lamp separately in W. Va. Code §17C-15-17. A car may carry one spot lamp, two fog lamps mounted 12 to 30 inches high, two…

West Virginia never publishes a list of objects allowed on a windshield, so a dash cam is not measured against one. W. Va. Code §17C-15-36(a) forbids driving with any sign, poster or…

West Virginia has written no lane-splitting law in either direction. The Code contains no permission for a motorcycle to ride between lanes and no section that names the practice to…

West Virginia never wrote a statute that names a licence plate cover, a shield or a frame. The rule that decides the question is W. Va. Code § 17A-3-15(b), which requires every…

Nothing in the West Virginia Code prohibits a radar detector in a private car. The ban is in an administrative rule and it reaches only commercial vehicles: 150 CSR 9-4.25, the Public…

West Virginia lets drivers run studded tires from November 1 of each year until April 15 of the following year. W. Va. Code § 17C-15-37(c) otherwise forbids any block, stud, flange…

West Virginia sets one light transmission number for almost every window on a passenger car: 35 percent. W. Va. Code §17C-15-36a requires the front side wings and the side windows…