Black Hawk County, IA Right to Farm: Agricultural Zoning Protection (2026)

75, Right to Farm, and it draws the line between land that is protected by the chapter's nuisance-suit limitation and land that is not. An agricultural district means land in the unincorporated areas of the county classified as A agricultural district, A-L agricultural-limited district, or A-R agricultural-residential district on the official Black Hawk County zoning maps adopted June 27, 1980, and amended since. Only operations sited within one of these three zoning classifications can claim the chapter's protection; land zoned commercial, industrial or residential outside those three categories falls outside it entirely, as does any property inside an incorporated city.

The section also defines agricultural operation broadly: it covers marketing at roadside stands or farm markets, machinery noise, odor, dust and fumes, irrigation pumping, aerial and ground seeding and spraying, fertilizer, pesticide and herbicide application, livestock grazing and confinement subject to county health and zoning rules and state requirements, and the use of farm labor. Accepted agricultural practices are further defined as methods that do not endanger public health, safety or welfare and that conform to applicable county, state and federal pollution laws. The Board of Supervisors adopted this chapter in 1982 under Ordinance 10, finding that nonagricultural land uses encroaching into rural areas invite unnecessary local regulation and private nuisance litigation against farmers, and that farmers' production rights must be balanced against the rights of nonfarming landowners nearby.