farm town unfriendly to chickens

[stilldeb]

So I live in the county so this doesn't affect me, but this is 'chick season' at the local farm stores and everybody wants baby chicks and we live in a farming community around Henderson, KY. The nearest large city is Evansville, Indiana, where they DO have a chicken ordinance which permits the keeping of chickens in the city, with restrictions.

However, when a woman went to the local Rural King and got some chickens in Henderson, the city made her get rid of them and told her she couldn't have "livestock" in the city.

Hold the phone! I looked up the ordinance, and the law specifically states that this refers to horses, goats, donkeys, cattle and swine. I even did an advanced search for the words chicken and poultry and there are no city ordinances that even mention the words. So, I wish this woman had asked to see it in print and then refused to get rid of her chickens, that's what I would have done.

You can also have chickens in Louisville, and even where I am from in St. Petersburg, Florida, and a lot of major cities...dinky little Henderson, KY, with it's 27,000 people is not chicken-friendly. (or business friendly either, a well-known fact)

deb g

 

[Denninmi]

A lot of local officials interpret laws any way they want to -- when push comes to shove, they may have to back down if their interpretation is clearly wrong, such as calling chickens livestock when the ordinance specifically defines livestock as something other than chickens. Or, it may take a court to make them back down, or the court could possibly side with them. Hard to say. Petty bureaucrats and power hungry HOA board members are the worst.

 

[PeepCrazee]

We're having trouble in Lee County, Florida (particulary Ft Myers and Lehigh) the outdated ordinances here lump "chickens" and "other domesticated poultry" under the heading of "livestock" with animals such as horses, cattle, sheep, adn goats! We are currently petitioning to the have those labels corrected and to allow us to have chickens here in this area.

I agree, that woman should have asked to see it in writing. Unfortunately, everybody's interpretation of the law can be different, that's why the law needs to be very clear.

Our problem in Lee County is that the ordinance is very clear...but it is very difficult to find...the codes are not easily accessable to the "average joe... or jill"

 

[bunrabbit41]

Living in Madisonville, having chickens and having a son who is very interested in pursuing a living building small 6-hen backyard chicken coops, we've spent some time researching the ordinances of cities in the area. The city fathers of Henderson need to go back and READ the city ordinances! The ordinance clearly defines the animals considered "livestock." Chickens or fowl are NOT included in the definition. It then goes on to discuss reasons that one could not have chickens and it includes all of the usual, can't let them make excessive noise, wander on the neighbors property, etc. In fact here is the link to the ordinance.....http://www.ca.uky.edu/smallflocks/Ordinances.html#Madisonville.

I'd be very interested in finding out whose rendition of this ordinance was sung!

 

[stilldeb]

Yeah, well you'd have to live here to know how they run the town. We don't live in town, thank goodness. You should have seen the fiasco when the county tore up our road a few years ago by mistake (they were just supposed to widen the top of the hill and tore up a MILE of the road instead - including my front yard) and then left it like that for two years. I was all over all of them until they paved it to make me quit, but it took going to the County Judge Executive to finally get it done.

I know, definitely there is no mention whatsoever of chickens or the keeping of chickens as defined under 'livestock' and she should not have believed them without reading it herself.

deb g