Pittsylvania County property owners are required to obtain a land disturbance permit to disturb more than 10,000 square feet of land. Land-disturbing activity means any man-made change to the land surface that may result in soil erosion from water or wind and the movement of sediments. Generally, this includes clearing, grading, excavating, transporting, and filling land of an area of more than 10,000 square feet.

Applications for a land disturbance permit should be submitted to the Community Development Department for consideration. Applicants will be required to submit an engineered plan. The permit fee is $150.00, plus $10.00 per acre for commercial projects.

 The permit fee for land-disturbing activities for single-family dwellings only is $45.00. 

• Commercial Land Disturbance Application
• Residential Land Disturbance Application 

Failing to obtain a permit can result in penalties per Article 2.4 of the Code of Virginia. Each day the violation if found to exists shall constitute a separate offence.

What are the exemptions?

Below is a list of exemptions for land-disturbance permits. 

• Disturbed land areas of less than 10,000 square feet in size. This includes minor land-disturbing activities such as home gardens and individual home landscaping, repairs, and maintenance work, individual service connections, and the installation of fences and signposts or telephone and electric poles and other kinds of posts or poles.
• Installation, maintenance, or repair of any underground public utility lines when such activity occurs on an existing hard-surfaced road, street, or sidewalk, provided the land-disturbing activity is confined to the area of the road, street, or sidewalk that is hard-surfaced.
• Septic tank lines or drainage fields unless included in an overall plan for land-disturbing activity relating to the construction of the building to be served by the septic tank system.
• Permitted surface or deep mining operations and projects, or oil and gas operations. 
• Tilling, planting, or harvesting of agricultural, horticultural, or forest crops, livestock feedlot operations, including engineering operations as follows: construction of terraces, terrace outlets, check dams, desilting basins, dikes, ponds, ditches, strip cropping, lister furrowing, contour cultivating, contour furrowing, land drainage, and land irrigation.
• Repair or rebuilding of the tracks, rights-of-way, bridges, communication facilities, and other related structures and facilities of a railroad company.
• Agricultural engineering operations, including but not limited to the construction of terraces, terrace outlets, check dams, desilting basins, dikes, ponds not required to comply with the provisions of the Dam Safety Act (§ 10.1-604 et seq.), ditches, strip cropping, lister furrowing, contour cultivating, contour furrowing, land drainage, and land irrigation. Agricultural buildings are not exempt.
• Emergency work to protect life, limb, or property, and emergency repairs; however, if the land-disturbing activity would have required an approved erosion and sediment control plan, if the activity were not an emergency, then the land area disturbed shall be shaped and stabilized in accordance with the requirements of the VESCP authority.

What is required prior to, during and after clearing?

A construction entrance is required to prevent sediment from tracking on main roads prior to clearing. Silt fence, diversion ditches, and/or straw bales are required in low-lying areas to contain sediment onsite and prevent sediment from leaching into streams and wet weather ditches prior to clearing.

Permanent or temporary soil stabilization shall be applied to denuded areas within seven days after the final grade is reached on any portion of the site. Temporary soil stabilization shall be applied within seven days to denuded areas that may not be at final grade but will remain dormant for longer than 14 days. Permanent stabilization shall be applied to areas that are to be left dormant for more than one year.