Nash County, NC Right to Farm: Agricultural Zoning Protection (2026)

' The same section goes further than the bare cross-reference, spelling out what the county will not touch: it does not impose or exercise controls over croplands, timberlands, pasturelands, orchards, idle farmland, or other farmlands, and it does not exercise control over any farmhouse, barn, poultry house or other farm building, including tenant or other houses for people working on the farm, as long as those houses sit on the farm itself. That carve-out has a limit: a residence built for a family member or for non-farm use is still subject to the ordinance even if it sits on farmland.

The exemption carries through to permitting. 1(A) lists farm buildings, other than residences, used for bona fide farm purposes among the uses exempt from the zoning permit requirement in § 4-1, alongside small accessory buildings of 12 feet or less and certain public utility facilities. A farmer building a new barn, poultry house or equipment shed therefore needs no zoning permit from the county, while a house built on that same farmland, for a family member or otherwise unrelated to the farming operation, still has to go through the ordinance's normal permit process under § 4-1.