Jacksonville Beach, FL HOA Rules: CC&R Enforcement (2026)

The only place the Jacksonville Beach Code addresses how city rules sit alongside recorded deed restrictions is the backyard hen article in Chapter 5. Sec. 5-80 states the article's purpose, which is to authorize and regulate backyard hens in specified residential zones, and then closes with a limit: nothing in the article supersedes any effective, recorded deed restriction prohibiting backyard hens on property within the corporate limits. A city permit therefore answers only the municipal question. Where a recorded restriction forbids hens, the permit does not cancel it.

The permit process builds that limit into the paperwork. Under Sec. 5-82(2)(a)(v), the application must include an oath that no deed restrictions apply to the property, or proof that any deed restrictions do not prohibit keeping hens. The same application lists the applicant's name, the property address, the maximum number of hens, and the owner's authorization if the applicant is not the owner of record. It also requires a certificate from the backyard poultry seminar offered by the Duval County Agricultural Extension Office and a fee of twenty-five dollars ($25.00). Sec. 5-82(5) conditions the permit on consent to a city inspection of the property upon receiving a complaint related to hens.

The city side of enforcement is separate. Sec. 5-85 sends violations of the hen article to the City of Jacksonville Beach special magistrate under F.S. ch. 162 and Chapter 2, Article VI. A finding of illegal slaughter or neglect revokes the permit, and the city can seek an injunction, with the violator and property owner jointly and severally liable for the city's attorneys' fees and costs. Those remedies belong to the city's own code. The section does not describe any enforcement of a private deed restriction.