After Arkansas Act 314 of 2025, can cities still plan and zone in unincorporated areas outside their corporate limits?

Plain-English summary

Representative Paul Childress asked what Act 314 of 2025 did to Arkansas cities' power to plan and zone outside their corporate limits, including the status of ordinances enacted before the Act. The Attorney General answered generally because the specific Bryant and Benton ordinances named in the request were not supplied for review, and his office does not construe local ordinances in this kind of opinion.

Before Act 314, a city generally had to establish a planning commission, designate and file its extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ) boundaries, have the commission prepare plans and recommend measures, and adopt and record any measures required for enforcement. Properly adopted and recorded plans, ordinances, and regulations carried force of law in the designated ETJ. The 2025 act repealed the statutory authority to exercise municipal planning and zoning power outside corporate limits. Cities that had not adopted ETJ ordinances cannot now do so, and previously enacted city ETJ ordinances cannot be enforced there. The opinion says county authorities now have exclusive jurisdiction over unincorporated areas.

The Attorney General described Act 314 as weakly retroactive. It changes the legal consequence of a past event, adoption of an ETJ ordinance, by removing that ordinance's enforceability outside the city at and after the Act's effective date. It does not change what the law was before that date. The opinion says the General Assembly can enact retroactive legislation that preempts conflicting local ordinances and that none of the identified ex post facto, due process, takings, or contracts concerns is implicated here. A city ordinance need not first be repealed locally for its former ETJ provisions to lose enforcement force.

A joint planning commission cannot enforce a municipality's former ETJ ordinance in unincorporated territory. The opinion still allows municipalities and joint commissions, within remaining statutory authority, to prepare advisory planning documents that consider areas beyond city limits. Such plans have no legal effect there and cannot support enforcement of a city ordinance.

What this means for you

If you work for a city or joint planning commission

Do not treat an old ETJ ordinance as authority to enforce city planning or zoning requirements outside the corporate limits after Act 314's effective date. The opinion distinguishes enforceable ordinances from advisory plans and coordination work that may still consider surrounding areas. It did not analyze the validity or wording of any particular local ordinance.

If you own land outside city limits

The Attorney General says county authorities now have exclusive jurisdiction over unincorporated areas. The opinion also says a city's previously enacted ETJ ordinance cannot be enforced there after Act 314's effective date. It does not decide a particular permit, pending enforcement matter, or property dispute.

If you are reviewing the Act's effect on past ordinances

The opinion's retroactivity analysis matters: earlier enactment is the past action, while loss of enforceability begins at the Act's effective date. It characterizes that as weak retroactivity, rather than denying retroactive effect altogether.

Common questions

Q: Could a city with no earlier ETJ ordinance adopt one after Act 314? A: No. The opinion says Act 314 repealed the statutory authority for municipal planning or zoning outside corporate limits.

Q: Can a city enforce an ETJ ordinance it validly adopted years earlier? A: No. The opinion says even earlier ETJ ordinances became unenforceable outside city limits from Act 314's effective date.

Q: Does the Attorney General call this a retroactive change?
A: Yes. He calls Act 314 weakly retroactive because it changes the future legal consequence of earlier ordinance enactments. He says it does not alter the past legal consequences of past conduct in the past.

Q: Did the opinion find the retroactive effect unconstitutional?
A: No. It says the General Assembly may enact retroactive legislation preempting conflicting local ordinances and that the constitutional concerns it identifies are not implicated here.

Q: Can a joint planning commission still prepare plans for areas outside city limits? A: The opinion permits advisory planning and coordination within remaining statutory authority, but says those documents have no enforcement effect outside municipal limits.

Background and statutory framework

The opinion traces former municipal ETJ authority to Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and A.C.A. § 14-56-413, repealed by Act 314 of 2025. It distinguishes strong retroactivity, which changes past legal consequences in the past, from weak retroactivity, which changes the consequences of a past event only after the new law takes effect. For joint commissions it cites A.C.A. § 14-56-504(b), which limits them to powers their member governments may exercise under existing law. It also identifies remaining municipal authority to prepare advisory plans under A.C.A. §§ 14-56-402 and 14-56-403(a).

Citations and references

• Act 314 of 2025 and former A.C.A. § 14-56-413, opinion footnote 3 and discussion of Questions 2–6.
• Acts 186 of 1957 and 56 of 1987, discussed in Question 1.
• A.C.A. §§ 14-56-402, 14-56-403(a), and 14-56-504(b), discussion of Question 7.
• Landgraf v. USI Film Products, 511 U.S. 244 (1994), opinion footnote 6 on retroactivity.
• City of Piggott v. Eblen, 236 Ark. 390, 366 S.W.2d 192 (1963), opinion footnote 8 on preemption.

Source

• Landing page: https://arkansasag.gov/divisions/opinions-foia/attorney-general-opinions-search/

Original opinion text

Opinion No. 2026-009

May 12, 2026

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
1003 River Raynes Trail
Benton, Arkansas 72019

Dear Representative Childress:

I am writing in response to your request for an opinion regarding the effect of Act 314 of 2025 on municipal ordinances that concern extraterritorial jurisdiction (“ETJ”) and that were adopted before Act 314 was enacted. You state that following the repeal of A.C.A. § 14-56-413, uncertainty has arisen regarding the legal status and enforceability of such ordinances.1

Against this background, you ask the following questions:

1. Under Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413, what was required of a city to establish and exercise planning and/or zoning outside the city limits and within the extraterritorial jurisdiction? Did the law require a city to adopt an ordinance to exercise the authority to establish planning and/or zoning outside the city limits? Did such ordinances have the force and effect of law?

Brief response: Before Act 314 of 2025, a municipality was generally required to adopt a plan, ordinance, or regulation to exercise planning or zoning authority outside its corporate limits within its ETJ. When adopted in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and A.C.A. § 14-56-413, and when properly filed or recorded as required by law, such plans, ordinances, and regulations carried the force of law within the designated ETJ.

1
Although your opinion request references several specific municipal ordinances, those ordinances were not provided for my review. Furthermore, it has long been the policy of the Attorney General’s Office to decline to construe the provisions of specific local ordinances. E.g., Ark. Att’y Gen. Ops. 2012-099, 2008-009, 2007-235, 2004-235, 2002-

306. Therefore, this opinion instead provides a general analysis that applies to any ordinance authorizing planning or
     zoning in a municipality’s ETJ and should not be construed as assessing the validity or meaning of any specific local ordinance.

                                 BOB R. BROOKS JR. JUSTICE BUILDING
                                     101 WEST CAPITOL AVENUE
                                   LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS 72201
     

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 2

2. If adoption of a planning and/or zoning ordinance was required to establish and exercise
  planning and/or zoning authority within the ETJ, do cities that refrained and failed to enact
  such ordinances prior to the effective date of Act 314, have any ability to establish planning
  or zoning outside their city limits? To exercise authority within the ETJ? Was the effect of
  Act 314 of 2025 to deny cities that have not previously enacted planning and zoning
  ordinances outside the city limits and within the ETJ to foreclose them from adopting
  ordinances seeking to establish or exercise planning or zoning outside the city limits
  (following the effective date of Act 314)? May the cities of Traskwood, Haskell, Pine Bluff
  (or cities which have not adopted ordinances on planning or zoning outside the city limits)
  now adopt ordinances seeking to establish planning or zoning outside the city limits?

  Brief response: Act 314 of 2025 repealed municipalities’ statutory authority to exercise
                  planning or zoning powers outside their corporate limits. Cities that did
                  not adopt ETJ ordinances before Act 314 took effect now lack authority
                  to do so, and cities that previously enacted ETJ ordinances may no longer
                  enforce them beyond their corporate limits. County authorities now have
                  exclusive jurisdiction over unincorporated areas.

3. Does Act 314 operate retroactively and to repeal or void city ordinances lawfully adopted
  establishing and exercising planning and/or zoning outside the city limits and within some
  or all of the ETJ? What provision of Act 314 of 2025, if any, purports to repeal the valid
  ordinances of cities lawfully adopted between 1957 and 2025 establishing planning and/or
  zoning within the ETJ as provided by and in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of
  1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413? What provision of Act 314, if any, purports to act
  retroactively or ex post facto?

4. Does Act 314 operate retroactively and repeal or render void:

          a. Bryant Ordinance No. 99-16, (Exhibit 1, including the map attached thereto);

          b. Benton Ordinance No. 2013-60, (Exhibit 2, including the map attached thereto);

          c. Other ordinances that cities have adopted in accordance with Act 186 of 1957,
             Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413 establishing planning and/or
             zoning outside their city limits and expanding their authority within the ETJ?

5. Under Arkansas law, ordinances lawfully adopted by cities or counties are presumed valid
  and considered law, unless and until declared invalid by a court of proper jurisdiction. Are
  the ordinances referenced in this opinion request and described below presumed to be valid
  unless and until declared void by a court of competent jurisdiction:

          a. Bryant Ordinance No. 99-16, (Exhibit 1, including the map attached thereto);

          b. Benton Ordinance No. 2013-60, (Exhibit 2, including the map attached thereto);

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 3

c. Other ordinances that cities have adopted in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413 establishing planning and/or zoning outside their city limits and expanding their authority within the ETJ?

6. Does the General Assembly of the State of Arkansas have the legal authority or power to retroactively declare city or county ordinances previously and lawfully adopted to be invalid? Does the General Assembly have the authority and power to retroactively declare the ordinances referenced in Question 5 to be invalid?

Brief response: In response to Questions 3, 4, 5, and 6, Act 314 of 2025 renders previously enacted municipal ETJ ordinances unenforceable on and after the Act’s effective date. Because ETJ authority was purely statutory and municipalities possess only those powers granted by the General Assembly, such ordinances may no longer be enforced outside of municipal corporate limits.

7. If previously adopted city ETJ ordinances remain valid following Act 314, may a joint planning commission commence or continue to enforce those city ordinances?

Brief response: No. A joint planning commission may exercise only those powers that its member municipalities or counties are authorized to exercise under existing law. Because Act 314 of 2025 eliminated municipal authority to enforce ETJ ordinances in unincorporated areas, a joint planning commission likewise lacks authority to commence or continue enforcement of such ordinances. Any remaining planning activities concerning areas outside municipal corporate limits are advisory in nature and do not provide a lawful basis for enforcement.

DISCUSSION

Question 1: Under Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413, what was required of a city to establish and exercise planning and/or zoning outside the city limits and within the extraterritorial jurisdiction? Did the law require a city to adopt an ordinance to exercise the authority to establish planning and/or zoning outside the city limits? Did such ordinances have the force and effect of law?

Under Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and A.C.A. § 14-56-413, a city generally had to take several steps before exercising planning or zoning authority within its ETJ. Specifically, it had to (1) establish a planning commission and designate the area in which it would exercise ETJ authority;2 (2) file a description of that area’s boundaries with the city clerk and county recorder;3

2
Act 186 of 1957, §§ 1(b), 3(c); A.C.A. § 14-56-404.
3
Act 186 of 1957, § 3(l); A.C.A. § 14-56-413 (repealed by Act 314 of 2025, § 5).

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 4

(3) direct the planning commission to prepare plans and recommend ordinances and regulations to the municipal legislative body;4 and (4) if those measures were enacted, file them with the county recorder in each affected county.5 Once properly adopted and recorded, those plans, ordinances, and regulations carried the force of law within the ETJ.

Question 2: If adoption of a planning and/or zoning ordinance was required to establish and exercise planning and/or zoning authority within the ETJ, do cities that refrained and failed to enact such ordinances prior to the effective date of Act 314, have any ability to establish planning or zoning outside their city limits? To exercise authority within the ETJ? Was the effect of Act 314 of 2025 to deny cities that have not previously enacted planning and zoning ordinances outside the city limits and within the ETJ to foreclose them from adopting ordinances seeking to establish or exercise planning or zoning outside the city limits (following the effective date of Act 314)? May the cities of Traskwood, Haskell, Pine Bluff (or cities which have not adopted ordinances on planning or zoning outside the city limits) now adopt ordinances seeking to establish planning or zoning outside the city limits?

Act 314 of 2025 repealed municipalities’ statutory authority to exercise planning or zoning powers outside their corporate limits. As a result, cities that did not adopt ETJ ordinances before Act 314 took effect no longer have authority to do so, and cities that previously enacted such ordinances may no longer enforce them beyond their corporate limits. County authorities now have exclusive jurisdiction over unincorporated areas.

Question 3: Does Act 314 operate retroactively and to repeal or void city ordinances lawfully adopted establishing and exercising planning and/or zoning outside the city limits and within some or all of the ETJ? What provision of Act 314 of 2025, if any, purports to repeal the valid ordinances of cities lawfully adopted between 1957 and 2025 establishing planning and/or zoning within the ETJ as provided by and in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413? What provision of Act 314, if any, purports to act retroactively or ex post facto?

Question 4: Does Act 314 operate retroactively and repeal or render void:

a. Bryant Ordinance No. 99-16, (Exhibit 1, including the map attached thereto);

b. Benton Ordinance No. 2013-60, (Exhibit 2, including the map attached thereto);

c. Other ordinances that cities have adopted in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413 establishing planning and/or zoning outside their city limits and expanding their authority within the ETJ?

4
Act 186 of 1957, § 5(a); A.C.A. § 14-56-422(1)(A)–(5)(A).
5
Act 186 of 1957, § 6(a)(5); A.C.A. § 14-56-422(5)(B) (repealed by Act 314 of 2025, § 6).

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 5

Question 5: Under Arkansas law, ordinances lawfully adopted by cities or counties are presumed valid and considered law, unless and until declared invalid by a court of proper jurisdiction. Are the ordinances referenced in this opinion request and described below presumed to be valid unless and until declared void by a court of competent jurisdiction:

a. Bryant Ordinance No. 99-16, (Exhibit 1, including the map attached thereto);

b. Benton Ordinance No. 2013-60, (Exhibit 2, including the map attached thereto);

c. Other ordinances that cities have adopted in accordance with Act 186 of 1957, Act 56 of 1987, and Arkansas Code § 14-56-413 establishing planning and/or zoning outside their city limits and expanding their authority within the ETJ?

Question 6: Does the General Assembly of the State of Arkansas have the legal authority or power to retroactively declare city or county ordinances previously and lawfully adopted to be invalid? Does the General Assembly have the authority and power to retroactively declare the ordinances referenced in Question 5 to be invalid?

In response to Questions 3, 4, 5, and 6, Act 314 of 2025 operates retroactively to make previously passed ETJ ordinances unenforceable only at and after the act’s effective date. Retroactivity turns on whether the act expressly or impliedly alters the legal consequences of a past action or event.6 A law can be retroactive in two ways, which are sometimes called “strong” or “weak.”7 A law is strongly retroactive if it alters the past legal consequences of a past action or event in the past. A law is weakly retroactive when it alters the past legal consequences of a past action or event only at and after the act’s effective date.

Act 314 of 2025 is weakly retroactive. It changes the legal consequences of a past action—the enactment of municipal ETJ ordinances—by removing their enforceability in the ETJ area on and after the Act’s effective date. The General Assembly has the authority to pass legislation—

6
See Landgraf v. USI Film Products, 511 U.S. 244, 269–70, 280 (1994) (requiring courts to assess whether a statute is retroactive by “ask[ing] whether the new provision attaches new legal consequences to events completed before its enactment” and requiring courts to “first … determine whether [the legislature] prescribed the statute’s proper reach”); see also Stephen R. Munzer, Retroactive Law, J. Legal Stud. 373, 373 (1977) (“A law is retroactive if it alters the legal status of acts that were performed before it came into existence.”). 7 While numerous courts and scholars have recognized and applied this distinction, they often use different labels for the two kinds of retroactivity: E.D. Ark.: St. Bernard’s Hosp., Inc. v. Sullivan, 781 F. Supp. 576, 590–91 (E.D. Ark. 1991); D.C. Cir.: Nat’l Cable & Telecomms. Assn. v. F.C.C., 567 F.3d 659, 670 (D.C. Cir. 2009); 5th Cir.: F.D.I.C. v. Faulkner, 991 F.2d 262, 266 (5th Cir. 1993); 9th Cir.: Nat’l Med. Enters., Inc. v. Sullivan, 957 F.2d 644, 671 (9th Cir. 1992); Calif.: 20th Century Ins. Co. v. Garamendi, 878 P.2d 566, 607 (Cal. 1994) (en banc); New Jersey: Harris v. Branin Transp., Inc., 711 A.2d 311, 337 (N.J. 1998) (“A pure retroactive statute changes what the law was in the past. Bowen v. Georgetown Univ. Hosp., 488 U.S. 204, 220 (1988) (Scalia, J., concurring). A law or rule that has exclusively future effects, but that affects past transactions is ‘secondarily retroactive.’ Ibid. A secondarily retroactive law is valid so long as it is not arbitrary or capricious. Ibid.”). See also Daniel E. Troy, Toward a Definition and Critique of Retroactivity, 51 Ala. L. Rev. 1329, 1334–35 (2000).

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 6

including retroactive legislation—that preempts city and county ordinances when those ordinances conflict with state statutes.8 Cities and counties, as municipal corporations, are “creatures of the legislature and as such only have the power bestowed upon them by statute or the Arkansas Constitution.”9 Any substantial doubt about the existence of a power in a municipal corporation must be resolved against it.10 Because ETJ regulatory authority was purely statutory, municipalities may no longer enforce ETJ ordinances outside their corporate limits now that the General Assembly has withdrawn that authority, even if those measures have not been repealed locally.11

Determining that an act is retroactive does not necessarily mean the act is unconstitutional. Acts of the legislature are presumed to apply only prospectively. But because this “presumption against retroactivity is [merely] a guide” or canon of interpretation and “not a constitutional rule,” an act “can explicitly or by clear implication be made retroactive.”12 As shown above, Act 314 of 2025 has, by clear implication, been made retroactive. Of course, applying an act retroactively might render the act unconstitutional “under one of the Ex Post Facto Clauses, one of the Due Process Clauses, the Takings Clause, or the Obligation of Contracts Clause,” or their counterparts under our state constitution.13 None of these constitutional concerns are implicated here. Act 314 does not impose criminal liability, disturb vested rights, impair contractual obligations, or appropriate private property. Rather, it represents a permissible exercise of the State’s authority to define, limit, or withdraw municipal power.

Question 7: If previously adopted city ETJ ordinances remain valid following Act 314, may a joint planning commission commence or continue to enforce those city ordinances?

No, a joint planning commission may not commence or continue to enforce ETJ ordinances in an unincorporated area of a county after Act 314 of 2025. Under A.C.A. § 14-56-504(b), a joint planning agency “may be empowered to carry into effect such provisions of state law relating to planning which are authorized for the joining cities or counties and which each may, under existing laws, separately exercise and perform.” Because Act 314 of 2025 eliminated municipal authority

8
City of Piggott v. Eblen, 236 Ark. 390, 395, 366 S.W.2d 192, 195 (1963) (state statutes are paramount and supreme and preempt city ordinances). 9 Municipality of Helena-W. Helena v. Weaver, 374 Ark. 109, 114, 286 S.W.3d 132, 136 (2008) (reaffirming that municipal corporations have no inherent powers and may exercise only those powers granted by statute or the Arkansas Constitution). 10 White Cnty. v. Cities of Judsonia, Kensett & Pangburn, 369 Ark. 151, 155, 251 S.W.3d 275, 279 (2007).
11
This conclusion concerns municipal regulatory authority in unincorporated areas; it does not address whether previously recorded planning-jurisdiction boundaries may remain relevant for other statutory purposes not amended or repealed by Act 314 of 2025. See Ark. Att’y Gen. Op. 2026-018. 12 Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 261 (2012).
13
Id. at 262.

The Honorable Paul Childress
State Representative
Opinion No. 2026-009
Page 7

to exercise territorial jurisdiction in unincorporated areas, municipalities no longer “may, under existing laws,” enforce ETJ ordinances outside their corporate limits. A joint planning commission therefore cannot enforce ETJ ordinances on a municipality’s behalf in territory formerly within the ETJ.

Although Act 314 of 2025 eliminated municipal extraterritorial planning jurisdiction, a municipality may still prepare and maintain planning documents that consider areas outside its corporate limits for advisory and coordination purposes. And to the extent a joint planning commission continues to exist, A.C.A. § 14-56-504(b) likewise limits its role to planning functions the member governments still possess under existing law. Under A.C.A. § 14-56-402, municipalities may adopt plans for “the coordinated, adjusted, and harmonious development of the municipality and its environs,” and under A.C.A. § 14-56-403(a), municipal plans may address “present and future needs” and promote “the safety, morals, order, convenience, prosperity, and general welfare of the citizens.”

Consistent with these provisions, municipalities may continue to prepare and maintain comprehensive plans, future land-use maps, and transportation or infrastructure studies that consider areas outside corporate limits. Joint planning commissions may likewise assist with or contribute to planning documents and coordination efforts of this type, to the extent permitted by remaining statutory authority under A.C.A. § 14-56-504(b). But those planning documents are advisory only and have no legal effect beyond municipal corporate limits, and neither a municipality nor a joint planning commission may treat such planning materials as a basis to enforce municipal ordinances in unincorporated territory formerly within the ETJ.

Assistant Attorney General Justin Hughes prepared this opinion, which I hereby approve.

Sincerely,

TIM GRIFFIN
Attorney General