Saint Paul, MN Fence Regulations: Material Restrictions (2026)

Saint Paul Legislative Code Sec. 07(f) prohibits any barbed wire fence within city limits except at police and correction facilities, and it bars barbed wire outright from being built in or abutting a residentially zoned district or a residentially occupied lot. Where barbed wire is permitted at all, non-residential and non-police/correctional sites, it may run no more than three strands along the top of an otherwise conforming fence, the arms cannot project over public property, and the bottom strand must sit at least six feet above finished grade.

Anyone requesting a barbed wire fence must apply to the building official, submit a certificate of insurance indemnifying the City of Saint Paul in an amount set under Minn. 00) annual registration fee each time the insurance certificate is renewed. Sec. 07(g) goes further for electric fencing: no aboveground electric fence may be built anywhere in the city, with a single carve-out for Como Zoo's animal-containment fencing. Both restrictions sit inside the same fence chapter that caps ordinary residential fence height at seven feet, four feet in a front yard, and requires a fence plan review from the department of safety and inspections before construction, per Sec.

07(a)-(c). Cross-referenced zoning-code fence standards in Chapter 66 can add further material and screening conditions in specific districts, but the barbed wire and electric fence prohibitions apply city-wide regardless of zoning district. Violating either subsection is enforced the same way as any other Chapter 33 fence violation.