Calvert County, MD Right to Farm: Farm Nuisance Protection (2026)

Calvert County Code Chapter 99, adopted by the Board of County Commissioners in 1996, declares it county policy to preserve and protect agricultural land by limiting when farming and forestry operations can be treated as a nuisance, trespass or interference with the use of land, including smoke, odors, dust, noise, chemicals or vibration, per § 99-1. Section 99-3 bars a private nuisance action against an agricultural or forestry operation on agricultural land if the operation, or a change to it, has run for one year or more without having constituted a nuisance from the date it began, and if it is conducted substantially in accordance with generally accepted agricultural or forestry practices as defined in § 99-2.

Before any nuisance claim over interference with property use or personal well-being can proceed, § 99-3B requires the complaining party to first seek arbitration through the county's Agricultural Reconciliation Committee. Under § 99-4, health-related complaints go to the Calvert County Health Department, whose health officer investigates and reports findings to the Committee; other disputes go directly to the five-member Committee, appointed by the County Commissioners for three-year terms, which conducts informal, nonbinding arbitration and mediation. If the Committee or a court finds a complaint was brought in bad faith or without substantial justification, § 99-4B(5) lets it order the losing party to pay the farm operation's costs and reasonable attorney's fees.

Section 99-5 additionally requires sellers of real property to give purchasers a right-to-farm disclosure statement in the form set out in Appendix A, though the chapter still applies even if that disclosure was not made.