Brooklyn Park, MN Right to Farm: Agricultural Zoning Protection (2026)

Brooklyn Park's zoning code does not include a right-to-farm ordinance protecting agricultural operations from nuisance claims; instead, it confines farming to a single overlay-style district. Under § 152.500, the UR Urban Reserve District exists for the orderly phasing of land until sanitary sewer, storm sewer, and water service are extended into the area consistent with the Comprehensive Plan. Within that district, the code permits three categories of use: uses that need large amounts of open acreage, such as athletic and cultural facilities, country clubs, government buildings, educational uses, and land reclamation; short-term agriculture uses; and very low-density residential uses, along with accessory uses customarily incidental to any of them.

Division (B) limits where this district can even be mapped: it may be applied only to areas the Comprehensive Land Use Plan guides as an urban reserve area, meaning the City Council controls agricultural zoning through the comprehensive planning process rather than a blanket property right. Table 152.506.1 sets the UR District's minimum lot size at 20 acres with a 330-foot lot width, the largest dimensional requirement of any residential district in the code, which functions as a practical limit on how much land in the city can carry an agricultural use under this section. Because UR is explicitly a transitional, phase-out district rather than a permanent agricultural zone, uses approved there face no separate right-to-farm defense once the area is reguided for full urban development and city services extend into it.