Enabling statute

Louisiana

Louisiana Revised Statutes, Title 33 (Municipalities and Parishes), Chapter 11 — Zoning (R.S. 33:4721 through 33:4730)

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Summary

Louisiana follows the Standard State Zoning Enabling Act lineage: the state legislature delegates zoning power rather than zoning at the state level. The principal enabling provision, R.S. 33:4721 (Title 33, Chapter 11, "Zoning," comprising §§ 33:4721–4730), grants the governing authority of all municipalities the power to regulate building height, size, lot coverage, population density, and the use of buildings, structures, and land for the health, safety, morals, or general welfare of the community; R.S. 33:4722 authorizes division of territory into districts with uniform regulations within each district. Parish (county-equivalent) zoning authority in Louisiana is more fragmented: it is conferred primarily through home-rule charters (La. Const. art. VI) and through numerous parish-specific enabling acts scattered in Title 33 (e.g., §§ 33:140.181 for Jefferson, 33:4877 for St. John the Baptist, 33:4776 for St. Tammany), rather than a single uniform parish grant. The authority model is therefore best described as state-delegated zoning held by municipalities (and, parish-by-parish, by parishes under home-rule charters and special acts), with no general state-level zoning regime.

The delegation

§4721. Regulation of size and use of buildings For the purpose of promoting health, safety, morals, or the general welfare of the community, the governing authority of all municipalities may regulate and restrict the height, number of stories, and size of structures, the percentage of lot that may be occupied, the size of yards, courts, and other open spaces, the density of population, and the location and use of the buildings, structures, and land for trade, industry, residence, or other purposes; provided that zoning ordinances enacted by the governing authority of municipalities or the acts of the zoning commission, board of adjustment as herein provided for, or zoning administrator shall be subject to judicial review on the grounds of abuse of discretion, unreasonable exercise of the police powers, an excessive use of the power herein granted, or the denial of the right of due process, provided, further, that the right of judicial review of a zoning ordinance shall not be limited by the foregoing. §4722. Creation of districts; powers of municipal authorities; transfers of development rights; and uniform regulations within district A. Municipalities may divide territory into districts and regulate and restrict the erection, construction, alteration, or use of buildings, structures or land within those zones. [Subsections B and C provide special historic/aesthetic-district and transfer-of-development-rights authority for New Orleans, and require that] regulations shall be uniform for each class or kind of land and structure throughout each district, though the regulations in one district may differ from those in other districts.

Verification

A verification pass checked this record against the source and filed corrections; the citation above is shown as extracted.

Corrected authority model

municipal_delegation + general_parish_delegation (state delegates zoning to municipalities via R.S. 33:4721 et seq. AND to parishes via R.S. 33:4780.40 et seq.; home-rule parishes/municipalities under La. Const. art. VI; certain parishes governed by parish-specific enabling acts). No state-level zoning regime.

Read the verification audit

Core citation is CORRECT and the claim is mostly accurate, but the authority_model/summary contains a material factual error about parish zoning authority, so I cannot mark it verified. CONFIRMED: - La. R.S. 33:4721 is real and current (appears in 2024 and 2025 Louisiana Laws on Justia, FindLaw, and the official legislature site legis.la.gov, d=91118). Title: "Regulation of size and use of buildings." It is the Standard State Zoning Enabling Act-lineage municipal grant: "the governing authority of all municipalities may regulate and restrict the height, number of stories, and size of structures, the percentage of lot that may be occupied... the density of population, and the location and use of the buildings, structures, and land..." for health, safety, morals, or general welfare. This is genuinely the municipal zoning enabling authority. - La. R.S. 33:4722 is real and current: "Creation of districts; powers of municipal authorities... and uniform regulations within district." Authorizes dividing the municipality into districts with regulations uniform within each district. Matches the claim. - The §§ 33:4721 et seq. (through ~33:4730) range is the correct municipal chapter, and the SSZEA-delegation framing (state delegates rather than zones at state level) is accurate. MATERIAL ERROR (reason for verified=false): - The summary asserts that parish (county-equivalent) zoning authority in Louisiana has "no single uniform parish grant" and is "conferred primarily through home-rule charters... and through numerous parish-specific enabling acts," contrasting it with a single municipal grant. This is WRONG. Louisiana HAS a general parish zoning enabling grant: R.S. 33:4780.40 et seq. ("Regulation authorized"), enacted by Acts 1993, No. 201, effective Jan. 1, 1994. It is a direct mirror of 33:4721 (height, stories, size, lot coverage, density, use) and applies generally to parishes (with a handful of statutory carve-outs, e.g., Rapides, Jefferson, Sabine, Webster). It expressly supplements—rather than supersedes—home-rule-charter and special-act parish authority (and does not apply to home-rule parishes per La. Const. art. VI, sec. 6). So the parish-specific acts the claim lists (Jefferson 33:140.181, etc.) and home-rule charters coexist WITH a general parish grant; they are not the primary/only source. CORRECTION: Parishes have a general enabling grant in R.S. 33:4780.40 et seq. (parallel to the municipal 33:4721 et seq.), supplemented by home-rule charters (La. Const. art. VI) and parish-specific acts for certain parishes. The state-delegation/no-state-level-zoning characterization is otherwise accurate.