Passaic, NJ Public Health Rules: Rodent Control (2026)

Section 227-2 requires all buildings or structures where foodstuffs are prepared, stored, handled, sold, or offered for sale to comply with the chapter's ratproofing regulations, and bars the city from issuing any business license until that compliance is shown. Maintaining a building or premises in an unsanitary condition that becomes infested or liable to become infested with vermin or rodents is separately declared a nuisance and unlawful. The Director of Public Affairs may take whatever additional regulatory steps are deemed necessary and may make unannounced, periodic inspections of any building or premises to check compliance; where a property is found not ratproof or infested, a written notice or order goes to the owner or occupant requiring abatement.

Section 227-5 then lists specific prohibited acts that create rat harborage: dumping putrid substances, filth, garbage, or refuse on any lot, street, or waterway; accumulating junk, lumber, or scrap without elevating it at least 18 inches off the ground on open racks; dumping dead animals or offal in any land or water; storing pet or poultry feed other than in ratproof containers; leaving food out for domesticated animals except in scatter-proof containers; feeding wild birds other than in elevated containers at least 48 inches off the ground; and letting garbage or manure accumulate so as to offer rats food or harborage.

Section 227-6 further requires every building to be ratproofed and freed of rats within three months of the chapter's 1945 origin date and kept that way permanently, and § 227-3 and § 227-4 set out the correction and enforcement sequence once a notice issues.