Can you help interpret this "legal" jargon?!?!

[ohiochickenmom]

Thanks to everyone!!

 

[ohiochickenmom]

Can anybody do me a huge favor? Read and then re-read the quote/law in the first post being sure to pause at the commas. Then post your opinion on the law. Apparently, the commas are making all the world of difference!! The city is still saying no chickens!! :-(

 

[MiaHudy]

If the law was that no chickens be kept from April to Nov. then that would be the end of the statement. There would be no reason to include, after the comma, that you must obtain permission ...

That is how I read it, regardless of the commas.

 

[ohiochickenmom]

I was curious because that's what I'm being told. "It's the commas." I'm still not getting it. My dad thinks I should just risk it!! I can't afford a fine/court costs, though, and really don't want a record (especially for something so ridiculous)!! I really want my chickens, though!! Finally banded my older girls and took them to my brother's!! I want to bring them home, though, thus the leg bands!! Plus, I still have my 2 BA in the brooder!! Enjoying every second with them!! My daughter cried and cried when we took our first 6 to my brother's!! Her only solace was the 2 BA at home!! Can't imagine the scene when we take the last girls over!! :-(

 

[ohiochickenmom]

Also, it's not even like we have a tiny yard!! Our lot is 100' x 250' and about 3/4 of it is yard!!

 

[Wrooster]

MiaHudy is correct, in my non-lawyer opinion. That's just nonsense about the commas. Thing is, though, you aren't going to get anywhere arguing the law with a police officer who has been told to enforce what he or someone else thinks the law is. That's what courts are for and you don't want to be in that position.

Is anyone else keeping chickens? Not that they will have gotten a legal interpretation but you never know. If you feel you must get an interpretation, look for a way to go over or around the person you are talking to, preferably without making an enemy.

If you don't need a permit and are complying with the law, you don't need to go back to the zoning office. Maybe this person is just giving you a hard time.

 

[oldrooster]

Is their a legal aid group in your area? if so take the ordanince and have them take a look at it and explain that you have x y and z (neighbor's okay, property of certain size buildings so many feet from property lines and roadway etc all wrote out on paper) and ask them to interperate if you can have chickens and how and where (perhaps a drawing not nessisarily to scale but showing how the land lays in regards to neighbors buildings and road/alleys etc.

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

This is what my city's codified ordinance states. I have in my mind what it sounds to me it says, but I don't want to taint other posts. Can you please tell me what it says to you?? What the girl who answers at the city zoning office says is TOTALLY different than what it sounds to me like it's saying!! Thanks!!

" (a) No person, being the owner or having charge or possession of any house, pen, yard, or lot in the City, shall keep or suffer to be kept therein any hogs, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, cattle, or other animal or fowl, in such manner as to become offensive or annoying or prejudicial to the health of any other citizen or the public; provided, that no hogs, goats, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, or cattle shall be kept in any manner between April 1 and November 1 in each year, within less than 200 feet of any residence or business of any other person which now is or may be established in the City, without having first obtained the written consent of each person. (1979 Code 91.22)"

(a) No person, being the owner or having charge or possession of any house, pen, yard, or lot in the City, shall keep or suffer to be kept therein any hogs, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, cattle, or other animal or fowl, in such manner as to become offensive or annoying or prejudicial to the health of any other citizen or the public; is the first part, and basically says that you must not create a nuisance in the way you keep your animals

provided, that no hogs, goats, chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, or cattle shall be kept in any manner between April 1 and November 1 in each year, within less than 200 feet of any residence or business of any other person which now is or may be established in the City, without having first obtained the written consent of each person. Is the second part. If the interpretation were that you absolutely cannot keep animals between April and November, then there is no point or meaning to the portion I put in red; thus since that portion IS there, it has meaning equal to the initial statement. The commas separate subordinate and main clauses in a VERY poorly constructed sentence.

 

[annewandering]

ehhh. Someone just doesnt like chickens and/or has low reading comprehension. I had to go back and reread that the first time because it is a strangely worded document. I wonder how long that lady has worked there.
It would be a public service to ask to see someone over her and have them explain the thing to her.