A “Freedom to Garden Act” has passed the Iowa Senate unanimously.
“This bill addresses a growing concern — literally growing our own food,” Senator Cherielynn Westrich of Ottumwa, the bill’s floor manager, said to start debate.
The bill would forbid state and local governments from regulating vegetable gardens on property the gardener owns or rents.
“In other states, heavy handed regulators have used local zoning ordinances to explicitly ban home vegetable gardens or to put up unreasoable rules governing what homeowners may grow and where they can plant their food,” she said, “with heavy fines levied for violating these mandates”
The bill says Iowans have a right” to grow, raise, harvest, produce and consume food” they grow in their own garden and home gardeners would have a right to sell what they grow.
“In my view, this is a basic human right,” Westrich said. “Wisconsin has similar legislation and has added protections into their constitution as well and legislation has sprouted up in states like Florida and Illinois and others.”
There are some exceptions to the bill. It would still be illegal to grow marijuana. A section of the bill would give Iowans who object to a neighbor’s garden a chance to go to court and get a judge to declare the garden a public nuisance.
According to the National Gardening Association’s 2024 survey, over 43% of Americans grew some fruits or vegetables to eat at home.