Outagamie County, WI Noise Ordinances: Amplified Music & Outdoor Sound (2026)

Section 34-28, titled Regulation of noise, is the county's general noise ordinance, and subsection (b)(1) is the provision that reaches amplified music. It says no person shall intentionally operate or cause to be operated on private or public property any source of sound in such a manner as to create a noise disturbance. The section never uses the words music, speaker or amplifier, and it prints no decibel limit, so the working test is the definition in subsection (a)(4): any noise which tends to annoy or disturb a reasonable person. That is an objective standard tied to a reasonable listener, and it applies on a private lot and on public property alike. The word intentionally matters, because the person must operate the sound source, or cause it to be operated, on purpose.

The code does define two clocks. Daytime hours run between 5:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m., and nighttime hours run between 11:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. Elsewhere in § 34-28 those hours limit the testing of alarms, sirens and similar signaling devices to daytime and cap exempt bell and chime signals at no longer than 15 minutes in any given hour. The amplified-sound prohibition in (b)(1) carries no separate quiet-hours threshold, so the same reasonable-person test applies in daytime and nighttime hours alike.

Subsection (c) lists exemptions, each conditioned on reasonable steps being taken to minimize the noise emitted: government operations, emergency operations, noises required by law, snow removal equipment, aircraft and railroad operations controlled by federal law, bells and chimes, warning devices, farming equipment used in an area zoned for agricultural use, sports events conducted at reasonable times, and any noise type and volume level allowed by Outagamie County Ordinance section 54, division 5. Concerts, parties and backyard speakers are not on that list.

Subsection (d) creates a special variance permit for an event or circumstance of limited duration, including special community events. The application goes to the local governing municipality or its designee, and the fee, scope and grounds are left to that municipality's discretion as to issuance, scope and duration. Section 34-28(a)(5) defines municipality as any town, village, or city within Outagamie County, so the permit decision sits with the town, village or city, not with a county office.