Omaha, NE Right to Farm: Agricultural Zoning Protection (2026)

The AG district sits at the outer edge of Omaha's zoning jurisdiction, and its purpose sections do the work a right-to-farm ordinance would do elsewhere: Sec. 55-81 commits the city to 'encourage a vigorous agricultural industry' and to 'prevent premature urban development in areas which are not adequately served by public facilities,' while Sec. 55-83 specifically bars 'premature and "leapfrog" development into rural areas not fully served by public facilities' and requires new development to occur 'adjacent to previously urbanized or urbanizing areas.' Permitted uses under Sec. 55-84 include horticulture, crop production and animal production outright, alongside kennels, stables, a single-family detached home, and wind energy conservation systems; commercial feedlots and single-family homes on parcels under 20 acres need a conditional use permit under Sec. 55-85, and resource extraction needs a special permit under Sec. 55-86.

Site development standards in Sec. 55-87 set the district's minimums: a 20-acre minimum lot, 300-foot minimum lot width, a 35-foot height cap, a 50-foot front yard, and coverage capped at 5 percent building and 10 percent impervious. Because a working farm often needs a house on a smaller carved-out parcel, Sec. 55-88(d) creates a 'farmstead lot' exception: a conditional use permit can put a single-family residence on as little as one acre if the remaining parcel stays over 20 acres, the house is at least five years old, and it functions as 'the primary residence associated with crop production, animal production or commercial feedlot use.' The same section lets the planning board or city council waive the building- and impervious-coverage limits for qualifying conditional or special permit uses, and it allows cluster subdivisions down to one-acre lots, minimum 20-acre total and minimum three lots, where the health department approves the water supply and septic system.