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No More Old MacDonald in Urban Michigan

By Cindy M. Huss posted 07-21-2014 09:27

  

Cows no longer roam the pasture that is surrounded by houses and businesses north of Ford Road and west of Lilley Road in Canton Township. They were there last summer. As a farmer’s daughter, I was always tickled that cows were chewing cud a block from IKEA. Now the cows are gone, and a residential developer’s sign sits in the middle of the pasture.

Those cows were living in the middle of this urban community, I assumed, in part because of the Right to Farm Act. This act was adopted in 1981 to create a defense to nuisance lawsuits brought against farmers by suburban/urban neighbors. If a farmer follows the Generally Accepted Agricultural and Management Practices (GAAMPs) issued by the Michigan Commission on Agriculture, he or she can use the Act as a defense in a nuisance lawsuit. According to FAQ’s on the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development website, local zoning ordinances may not restrict established farms operated in accordance with GAAMPs. You can view the various GAAMPs here.

The department’s 2013 report states that complaints about farms typically involve cows and horses on small acreage.  This may have led to changes in April to the GAAMP on Site Selection and Odor Control for Livestock Production Facilities that imposed more requirements on small rural farmers and completely removed the protection of the Right to Farm Act to urban farmers.

Livestock Production Facilities was previously defined as 50 or more animal units. It did not impose any requirements, therefore, on most small farmers in rural areas. The definition of Livestock Production Facilities now applies to rural farms with any number of animals, including even one chicken or one cow.

More significantly for urban farmers, the GAAMP now prohibits new or expanded Livestock Production Facilities in locations that are primarily residential and not zoned to allow agricultural uses by right.  “However, the possession and raising of animals may be authorized in [these] areas pursuant to a local ordinance designed for that purpose.” An area is considered primarily residential if there are more than 13 homes within 1/8 of a mile of the site or there is any home within 250 feet.

Opposition to these changes was strong from small rural farmers and from urban farmers. While recognizing the urban farming trend, the Michigan Department of Agriculture and Rural Development has clearly indicated that it wants to leave this trend to local zoning authorities. My IKEA cows may have moved for other reasons, but it will be interesting to see how local communities respond to these changes.

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