Valencia County ordinance library covers cannabis, animal control, fireworks, land use

Valencia County keeps a public ordinance library for the rules most likely to trip people up: cannabis, animal control, fireworks and land use. Those categories reach into backyards, holiday plans, rental properties and business sites from Los Lunas to Peralta, and the county has already used them to set a 300-foot cannabis buffer and to ban dog chaining.

Cannabis rules shape where a business can open

Valencia County moved early on cannabis regulation after New Mexico created a local-control framework under the Cannabis Regulation Act. The state began processing producer applications on September 1, 2021, and counties across New Mexico rushed to define where cultivation and retail activity could fit before the market widened. Valencia County’s own ordinance was adopted in July 2021 under the long title “Licensing & Regulating Cannabis Growth and Prohibiting the Use of Non-Feminized Cannabis Seeds & Plants and Regulating the Proximity of Cannabis Establishment to Established Schools and Daycare Centers.”

The county’s later recreational and medical cannabis regulations were passed on January 18, 2022 and became effective February 5, 2022. They set the local ground rules for the location and consumption of recreational and medical cannabis, which means a property that looks suitable on paper can still fail if it is too close to a school or daycare center.

That distance rule is the one most residents and property owners need to remember: a cannabis establishment must not be located less than 300 feet from a school or daycare center. In practice, that makes cannabis a land-use issue as much as a business issue, because the county is deciding where one use can sit in relation to another. For anyone eyeing a site in an unincorporated pocket near Los Lunas, Belen or Peralta, that setback can decide whether a proposal moves forward at all.

Animal control is a daily enforcement problem

Animal control has been one of the county’s most visible ordinance fights because it lands directly in neighborhoods and back yards. On March 2, 2022, the Valencia County Board of County Commissioners heard and voted on an animal-control ordinance before a standing-room-only crowd. The revision changed how the county treats tethering, shelter and nuisance behavior.

The amended ordinance, Title IX, Chapter 90, requires fencing, limits tethering, requires adequate shelter, prevents nuisance conditions, further defines vicious animals, requires microchipping, makes continuous barking unlawful and requires sterilization for animals impounded three times or more. Valencia County outlawed chaining dogs and required shelter over their heads, and Animal Protection Voters described the revision as a major victory. On March 4, 2022, KUNM summarized the change bluntly as “unchains dogs” and required shelter.

A dog left on a chain, a yard without proper shelter, or a repeated barking complaint can all put a property owner in the county’s enforcement path. The code also gives a formal complaint route, requiring a signed complaint filed with the County Manager by a person who has knowledge of cruelty to an animal or conduct unbecoming an employee.

Fireworks rules matter long before the holiday crowd builds

Fireworks are seasonal, but the county’s rules are not. Valencia County’s official ordinance library includes fireworks as a standalone category, and the county adopted an emergency ordinance in June 2022 restricting the sale and use of fireworks in unincorporated areas. The Board of County Commissioners met at the Valencia County Administration Building, 444 Luna Avenue in Los Lunas, on June 13, 2022, to act on that measure.

The county code chapter on fireworks specifically bars stick-type rockets, helicopters and aerial spinners in the unincorporated areas of the county. The line between legal celebration and illegal discharge can be narrow, especially in neighborhoods where homes sit close together and where wind and dry conditions raise the risk quickly.

For residents in and around Belen, Peralta and Los Lunas, county fireworks rules should be checked before anything is lit. The county has already shown it will use emergency ordinances when conditions demand it, and the enforcement point is not the store counter alone, it is the place where the firework is sold, possessed or discharged in the unincorporated county.

Land use is the framework behind the other rules

Land use ties together where cannabis businesses go, how animals are kept and what kinds of activities belong in different parts of the county. Valencia County’s 2021 comprehensive plan uses planning and zoning to guide growth, and the ordinance library is one of the tools that makes that plan enforceable. The cannabis setback rule is one obvious example of land use in action, because it ties a business location to nearby schools and daycare centers.

Where city limits and county territory meet, a property owner on the edge of Los Lunas or near Belen may assume a parcel is ready for a new use, only to discover that county rules control the site, the setbacks or the intensity of the activity.

The county rulebook is the first stop before a mistake becomes expensive

The safest sequence is straightforward: check the ordinance before the project, then check it again before the complaint, the purchase or the holiday weekend. In Valencia County, the fine print in Chapter 90, Chapter 93 and the cannabis code is enforceable local policy.