By Ashley Perham
For HDMedia
Is a honeybee an animal?
The Intermediate Court of Appeals, with the aid of two dictionaries, ruled this week that the buzzy pollinator is — in fact — an animal and can therefore be regulated by the City of South Charleston.
The ruling overturns a Kanawha County Circuit Court decision by Judge Tera Salango, who looked through state code and found that the term “animal” does not include insects.
Salango also found that the city’s “total ban on beekeeping” conflicted with the West Virginia Apiary Act, which gives the authority to regulate bees and beekeeping to the agriculture commissioner.
The ICA said there was no conflict between the West Virginia Apiary Act and South Charleston’s code. The agriculture commissioner’s duties are “administrative and supervisory in nature,” the panel ruled.
Beekeepers
The initial lawsuit was filed by South Charleston resident M. Alex Urban in August 2023. Urban started keeping bees in high school. In 2022, he moved to South Charleston and tried to get a beekeeping permit.
At the time, South Charleston had a permitting process with detailed regulations, but the city had never approved a permit for beekeeping. About a week after Urban’s suit was filed, the South Charleston City Council amended the city code, banning beekeeping completely.
Salango ruled in January 2025 that while municipalities can regulate the keeping of animals, bees aren’t considered animals under state law.
Urban declined to comment for this story.
The city’s position
Michael Moore, attorney for South Charleston, maintains that the city is not anti-bee, but they had to defend their position when Urban sued the city.
“ The administration has nothing against bees, but there was some input from the residents that they didn’t want beehives in congested areas of the city,” he said. “If bees were placed in areas that weren’t going to affect the highly congested residential areas where you have small lots, then that’s certainly something that the city would not have opposition to.”
The ordinance prohibiting beekeeping has penalties of a fine up to $500, imprisonment up to 30 days or both.
Moore said he was not aware of anyone being charged under that ordinance before.
ICA ruling
In their Feb. 24 ruling, the ICA used two dictionaries to find the “plain, ordinary and common meaning of the word animal”:
- Black’s Law Dictionary defines animal as “any living creature (besides plants) other than a human being.”
- Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines animal as “any of a kingdom (Animalia) of living things including many-celled organisms and often many of the single-celled ones (such as protozoans) that typically differ from plants[.]”
The ICA also found that there is no “express language” under state law that shows a “legislative intent for the acts to supersede or repeal the City’s authority to regulate beekeeping.”
“[W]e discern that had the legislature desired to limit or prohibit a municipality from regulating beekeeping, it would have done so, either expressly or by specifically defining the term animal to the exclusion of bees,” the court said.
The ICA also mentioned repeated unsuccessful attempts to amend West Virginia’s beekeeping laws to supersede municipal codes.
“These failed efforts are certainly symbolic of a legislative intent not to expand the Department’s or Commissioner’s authority or otherwise wane the plenary authority granted to municipalities…” the court wrote.
Beekeeping law amendment
This session, the Legislature is again attempting to amend the West Virginia Apiary Act. Senate Bill 927 has passed the Senate and has been sent to the House.
The amendment gives the agriculture commissioner the “exclusive authority” to regulate beekeeping. The amendment says that no county, municipality or other political subdivision can adopt beekeeping regulations that conflict with the commissioner’s rules.
Moore said South Charleston is advocating for another amendment that would allow municipalities some say on where the hives could be kept through zoning.
“If the [bill] passes in its current form, I think that’s problematic to various cities,” he said.
He said in the downtown area of South Charleston, there are not many places conducive for beehive placement. However, there are some outer areas that could work.
“ If there’s an amendment … that would permit the cities to have power to control the placement and location again through zoning, that would, I think, be a middle ground that everybody could live with,” he said.
Agriculture Commissioner Kent Leonhardt’s office did not respond to a request for comment.
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