Buying Land in Towner County, North Dakota

Drainage Permits Route Through a Multi-County Basin Board

Case-by-case / verify locally

Towner County is one of seven member counties (with Cavalier, Eddy, Nelson, Pierce, Ramsey, and Walsh) of the Devils Lake Basin Joint Water Resource Board, which has authority to review and approve state drain permits within the basin -- a real, additional layer on top of standard North Dakota Department of Water Resources review for any agricultural drainage or tiling project. This region has a long, well-documented history of closed-basin flooding around Devils Lake itself (well south and east of most of Towner County), which is part of why this joint board exists. If a parcel's value or usability depends on field drainage, confirm directly with the board and the county whether the specific tract is within the basin's regulated area and what permitting applies.

Devils Lake Wetland Management District: Possible Federal Easements

Could not confirm

Towner County sits within the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service's Devils Lake Wetland Management District, an administrative area tied to federal wetland and grassland easements purchased from landowners across this part of the Prairie Pothole region -- easements that restrict draining, filling, or burning wetland areas on the specific parcels that carry them, often decades-old and sometimes vaguely worded (a pattern that has produced landowner disputes elsewhere in North Dakota in 2026). Not every parcel in the county carries such an easement, but any given tract should be checked against USFWS easement records before you assume full, unrestricted use of low-lying or wetland portions of the property.

Zoning: A 2007 County Ordinance Plus Separate Township Rules

Case-by-case / verify locally

Towner County has its own zoning ordinance on file with the state, dated July 26, 2007, and current county government pages still list active Planning, Zoning & Permits functions handled through the courthouse in Cando -- so this is a live, administered function, not an abandoned one. At the same time, individual townships within the county -- Coolin Township and Cando Township are both documented -- have adopted their own separate zoning ordinances (also dated 2007). That means the applicable rules for a specific parcel can depend on both the county-level ordinance and, potentially, a separate township ordinance layered on top of it. Confirm both, and confirm neither has been superseded since 2007, directly with the county before relying on either document.