Erie County has no countywide dark-sky or outdoor-lighting ordinance. Any shielding, fixture-height, or lumen limits for residential lighting are adopted (or not) by your individual town, city, or village.
Dark-sky and outdoor-lighting regulation in New York is a municipal, not a county, function. Erie County imposes no countywide light-pollution or full-cutoff fixture requirements on residential property. Whether your area has dark-sky rules, such as requirements that exterior fixtures be fully shielded (downward-directed), caps on mounting height, or limits on lumens or color temperature, depends on your local zoning code. Many New York municipalities include outdoor-lighting standards in their site-plan or zoning regulations, often requiring shielded fixtures to reduce glare and spillover, but these apply only where locally enacted. New York's Energy Code sets exterior-lighting rules for certain new construction, but that is an energy standard, not a dark-sky mandate. Contact your local building or planning department to confirm.
Non-compliant outdoor lighting is addressed under whatever local zoning or site-plan standards your municipality adopted, and is enforced by the municipal code-enforcement officer, typically through a notice to shield, aim, or replace fixtures.
Other ordinances people look up for this city. Green dot = verified primary-source excerpt.
Erie County, NY
Animal hoarding in Erie County is investigated by the SPCA Serving Erie County and prosecuted as cruelty by the Erie County District Attorney's Animal Cruelt...
Erie County, NY
The Erie County Department of Health treats improper bird and wildlife feeding as a rodent attractant and public-health nuisance and investigates complaints ...
Erie County, NY
Erie County does not license cats, but New York law requires every cat to be rabies-vaccinated, and the county Health Department runs free rabies clinics for...
Erie County, NY
Erie County sets no numeric limit on household pets. Any cap on the number of dogs or cats comes from a town, city, or village ordinance, while state law req...
Erie County, NY
Erie County imposes no countywide livestock ordinance. Keeping cattle, horses, goats, pigs, or other farm animals is controlled by each town, city, or villag...
Clarence, NY
Clarence Town Code prohibits keeping chickens in the Residential Single-Family (R-SF) zone unless the parcel is at least 5 acres or is located in the Agricul...
Side-by-side rule comparisons with other cities in Erie County.
See how Clarence's dark sky rules rules stack up against other locations.
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