Boise, ID Right to Farm: Agricultural Zoning Protection (2026)

Boise City Code Section 11-02-05 creates the A-1 Open Land: Very Low Density district specifically to hold farmland and other large-lot uses inside city limits. 33 sets the dimensional envelope that makes working land viable: minimum lot area of one acre, average lot width of 50 feet, minimum street frontage of 30 feet, and a maximum density of one dwelling unit per acre. Building setbacks are a 20 foot front yard, 20 foot street side yard, 10 foot interior side yard and 30 foot rear yard, with parking setbacks running slightly larger on the rear (30 feet) and against Interstate 84 or 184 (also 30 feet).

Maximum building height is 45 feet, dropping to 35 feet where the A-1 lot abuts a residential zoning district or residential use. Boise City Code Section 11-06-03 separately defines "Agricultural Uses or Stables" as the tilling of soil, aquaculture, raising crops, livestock, farming, dairying, and animal husbandry, including customarily accessory and incidental uses, and it folds in boarding or care of riding horses under the same definition. That same definition draws the line on what is not protected as ordinary agriculture within the city: hogs, slaughterhouses, fertilizer works, bone yards, and commercial feedlots are carved out of the definition entirely, so those uses cannot rely on A-1's agricultural purpose and instead need their own zoning review.

1, the Table of Allowed Uses, cross-references use-specific standards in Chapter 11-03 for related categories such as accessory livestock and animals, beekeeping, and urban farms, which are regulated as distinct uses layered on top of, not substituting for, the A-1 agricultural purpose.