Support Farms & Gardens: Urban Agriculture Ordinance Updates

The Big Picture Overview

The Planning and Development department and the Office of Environmental Quality have held on-going stakeholder meetings to guide the updates to urban agriculture ordinance text leading up to these proposed changes.

Goals

🥕 Reorganize the code for clarity.

🍓 Be more specific about allowed structures for each use.

🍅 Re-naming the use categories.

88_UrbanAgTextAmend_Draft1.pdf

(176.5 KB)

New Categories

The following new categories are being proposed to better reflect activities that urban growers engage in.

🥦 Garden

Growing food or other horticulture products, associated with a residential, institutional, or commercial use, maintained by one or more individuals who occupy the subject property.

For example: Gardens at your home, apartment complex, neighborhood, or work office

🍠 Urban Farm

Undeveloped land, under 3 acres, managed and maintained by an individual or group of individuals to grow and harvest food and/or horticultural products for sale or donation.

For example: farming is primary use of land, for business or non-profit organization

🥬 Urban Farm Mixed-Use

An Urban Farm (3 acres or more) or an Urban Farm plus one or more uses, see 88-312-02 for more regulations.

For example: multiple uses on a property such as farming, composting, farm stands, wedding/concerts, regularly scheduled events (weekly/monthly)

Contacts

Brooke Freeman

brooke.freeman@kcmo.org

Ahnna Nanoski

ahnna.nanoski@kcmo.org

Katherine Sinclair

katherine.sinclair@kcmo.org

Use Category Zoning Approval Requirements

Background

Timeline of work leading up to this draft ordinance.

In 2021, the Greater KC Food Policy Coalition worked to identify priorities for the ordinance update in the From the Ground Up report.
In 2022, the KCMO Climate Protection & Resilience Plan noted an ordinance update as one of the short-term priorities in the food section.
In 2023, staff from KC Healthy Kids/Greater KC Food Policy Coalition and CKC began meeting with members of City Council looking for a champion for the ordinance update. Also, this year, KC Healthy Kids/Greater KC Food Policy Coalition started holding community engagement sessions with farmers to get input on needed updates to the ordinance.
In 2024, councilwoman Melissa Patterson Hazley started convening monthly meetings of an “urban ag working group” comprised of farmers and representatives from food system non-profits as well as several city government departments. Among other topics, the need for the updated ordinance was identified.
In 2025, councilwoman Melissa Patterson Hazley requested that the planning department start meeting with stakeholders from the “urban ag working group” to learn more about needed updates to the ordinance. Brooke Freeman, Food Systems Coordinator in the Office of Environmental Quality, has facilitated these meetings and assisted in moving the update forward.

Take the Survey!

Open for participation

Phases

Phases overview

Phase 1: Give us your feedback on the proposed Urban Agriculture Codes updates.

Give us your feedback on the proposed Urban Agriculture Codes updates.

Phase 2: Draft 2: Urban Agriculture Ordinance Revisions: Based on Draft 1 Survey Feedback

Draft 2: Urban Agriculture Ordinance Revisions: Based on Draft 1 Survey Feedback

January 26, 2026 6:00 AM - No end date

Survey Feedback from Draft 1 of the Urban Agriculture Ordinance showed the following themes:

Overall, support and desire for more gardens, farms, and use of vacant lots for food production & new use categories are widely supported (Garden, Urban Farm, Urban Farm Mixed-Use)
Permitting, current requirements are unclear in the code language and having changes to the current process could be cause for more confusion, what do current processes (Special Use Permit) & proposed (Administrative Review) processes look like?
Setbacks, calculations for 5% can end up being a barrier to production based on lot shape, calculation errors can be easily made
Engagement & Education, clear call for more education and outreach, understanding of Ch 88 section of the zoning code and how garden & agriculture practices relate to other parts of the code that are not part of this current revision is an obstacle