If a Sioux Falls city councilor gets his way, students could soon be getting buzzed at city schools and universities.

City councilor Greg Neitzert has proposed an amendment to a Sioux Falls city ordinance that is creating some buzz right now in the community. He wants to make it possible for Sioux Falls schools and universities to keep bees on their campuses.

According to Dakota News Now, the city ordinance regarding beekeeping currently requires any beekeeper in Sioux Falls to clear their activities with the city and have the correct zoning for their property.

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Councilor Neitzert would like to see changes made to that ordinance.

Neitzert told Dakota News Now, "I learned that Augustana University was doing bee keeping, and then they were notified that they were not allowed to do it by city ordinance, so they had to move the hives. And it seems like a natural thing as far as environmentalism and sustainability to be able to do that on a school campus.”

As things stand right now, the Sioux Falls city ordinance allows those with a permit to keep bees in their backyard. Neitzert is working on giving Sioux Falls schools and universities the ability to do the same thing on their campuses.

As Neitzert says, “It only makes sense that if we’re going to allow someone to do it in their backyard, then a university ought to be allowed to do it as part of an education enterprise."

Creating a buzz to help students learn about bees is what it's all about...

Neitzert told Dakota News Now that people in the community and students within Sioux Falls schools are very excited about the prospect of possibly being able to keep bees on campus.

Councilman Neitzert plans to take the buzz he has created around bees and present it to the Sioux Falls City Council sometime in August. If things go as planned, Neitzert is hopeful the proposed changes to the city ordinance can be implemented by the time school starts this fall.

Source: Dakota News Now