Help! My subdivision is suing me!

[OrpingtonBrahma]

http://www.urbanfarmliving.com/the-brief-on-chickens/st-louis-city-county-chicken-ordinances/

Here is a site you might find interesting. If you followed all of the conditions for your area, they really don't have a fight and are just trying to get money out of you for no reason. Where I live we don't have any neighbors, so I can't say much from experiance

 

[RoyalCoopMom]

Thanks for all the great ideas. My focus is on the exception to the paragraph that explicitly allows household pets.

Livestock and Poultry: No animals livestock or poultry shall be raised, bred or kept on any lot,EXCEPT, THAT, household pets, in limited numbers may be kept provided they are not maintained for any commercial purpose.

By definition a pet is simply a domesticated animal and "domesticated" is defined as any animal that depends on human beings and cannot survive in the wild.

I actually talked to 100 other homeowners 80 signed a petition affirming my interpretation, and supporting clarifying the indentures to limit the number to 8 and imposing some guidelines on appropriate care, sanitation, and consideration for neighbors. The trustees didn't care what the homeowners thought they just insisted their only responsibility was to enforce the indentures.

I was actually pretty surprised when they actually sued me because they still have not said one word to the homeowners about it and the indentures require them to get permission for expenses that exceed our annual assessments which, by my calculations, this will. They had been threatening for months so last February when the annual homeowners meeting happened without the trustees even broaching the subject with the homeowners I figured they were dropping it. apparently not!

I think we need new trustees - as near as I can tell this is the first time in 42 years the trustees have sued anyone and they currently have TWO cases, mine and one against another homeowner for a permit violation. Unfortunately our indentures don't have any guidelines on how to fire them without waiting for their terms to expire!

 

[RoyalCoopMom]

Thanks for the tip OrpingtonBrahma! Urbanfarmliving .com should be very helpful!

The subdivision claims that chickens are poultry not pets and therefore not exempt. But the wording of the county jurisdiction we are in clearly considers chickens as potential pets! This is perfect!


From UrbanFarmLiving.com
Chickens (Unincorporated) St Louis County
In unincorporated St. Louis County, residents are allowed to keep chickens on their property as pets, but may not breed them for sale or sell any of their bi-products (i.e. eggs). Residents who elect to keep chickens on their property must abide by SLCRO 611.210 and not allow the animals to become a public nuisance.
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Love this site!

BTW we are still waiting for a court date.

 

[MeepBeep]

I see one flaw in your argument, you are basing your argument on the 'household pets' wording yet the birds by your own admission are not kept in the house but in the backyard in a coop, so while you try to twist the 'household pets' clause in your favor you can bet it will be twisted right back and used against you...

I hope the best, and hope the Subdivision does't simply rewrite the law with no (or a very short) grandfathering clause as I have seen many a small community do when someone is able to exploit the original wording of the law...

 

[RoyalCoopMom]

The wording is household pets not house pets. Household property is defined and anything maintained on the contiguous property that contains your primary residence. As such a lawn mower in your shed is considered household property even though it not maintained in the house. Likewise my chickens are household property, members of my household, AND household pets.

 

[MeepBeep]

The wording is household pets not house pets.  Household property is defined and anything maintained on the contiguous property that contains your primary residence.  As such a lawn mower in your shed is considered household property even though it not maintained in the house.  Likewise my chickens are household property, members of my household, AND household pets.

You are correct the law says household not house, but on the same token it also doesn't say household 'property' as you went on to suggest it did...

Good luck on trying to get your definition accepted and theirs tossed,I was merely bringing up the argument you are going to face in court... I highly doubt if they are suing you they are going to accept your definition without fighting back as to the the 'intent' of the law...

IMO you are gambling on the letter of the law being interpreted in your favor over the spirit of the law and the possible other interpretation of the law, if they can bring in the authors of the law to give affidavits in respect to it's intent you are really going to face an uphill battle...

As I said previous I hope they simply don't revise the wording before or even after if you do win making your entire argument moot... Because truth be told if your argument holds water, then there is no prohibition for poultry and livestock at all as long as people called them 'pets' and I highly doubt your neighborhood would allow that... I have seen this argument used and I have yet to see it fly... Even the 'service animal' or 'companion animal' excuses don't generally fly as chickens are not covered by the ADA, the ADA specified dogs and dogs only...

IMO instead of focusing on a loophole you should be focusing on getting the law revised, if as you said 80/100 support you that is a very good argument to bring before the policy makers when asking for a law to be revised...

 

[MeepBeep]

Thanks for the tip OrpingtonBrahma! Urbanfarmliving .com should be very helpful! The subdivision claims that chickens are poultry not pets and therefore not exempt. But the wording of the county jurisdiction we are in clearly considers chickens as potential pets! This is perfect!

From UrbanFarmLiving.com
Chickens (Unincorporated) St Louis County
In unincorporated St. Louis County, residents are allowed to keep chickens on their property as pets , but may not breed them for sale or sell any of their bi-products (i.e. eggs). Residents who elect to keep chickens on their property must abide by SLCRO 611.210 and not allow the animals to become a public nuisance.
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Love this site!

BTW we are still waiting for a court date.

I caution that wording as 'pets' is not official, I briefly glanced over the Missouri County codes and found no mention of chickens, thus they are legal by default since they are not prohibited... No where did I see any reference as to them being 'pets' in the county code... The short of it the above is just someone in an unofficial capacity basically saying yes you can keep chickens for 'non-commericial use' because it appears that to sell any eggs and almost certainly for processing chickens you need license(s) and thus you become a business and that complicates the yes/no to chicken keeping...

 

[azjustin]

Thanks for all the great ideas. My focus is on the exception to the paragraph that explicitly allows household pets.

Livestock and Poultry: No animals livestock or poultry shall be raised, bred or kept on any lot,EXCEPT, THAT, household pets, in limited numbers may be kept provided they are not maintained for any commercial purpose.

By definition a pet is simply a domesticated animal and "domesticated" is defined as any animal that depends on human beings and cannot survive in the wild.

Interpretation is 9/10ths of the law, and it's your lawyers job to convince the judge to interpret it your way. I've been involved in court cases that were a lot harder to win than what you have, I think you'll be OK. However that will depend on the judge.

We have other experience with HOA's, not necessarily with chickens, but: does anyone else have chickens in your HOA subdivision? If so, you may have an even better case.

We erected a structure that was technically "HOA pre-approved" but received a hate letter when they objected to the siding that was used. I canvassed the entire neighborhood, talked to the people that had the same type structure (at least 20 others), approached the HOA with pictures and they proceeded to send the "violation" to their lawyers. I retained a lawyer who basically just laughed when I told him the deal. Sent him the info and a (small) check, and the HOA dropped the issue like a solid lead balloon.

Point being, at least in AZ, restrictive groups (HOAs) are not allowed to selectively enforce and by allowing other houses to do so set a precedent of allowing those rules to be bent. It's like discrimination, but on an HOA/housing/law level. It doesn't expunge you of wrongdoing, but it muddies the waters enough legally to typically have your case thrown out for the time being.

However, if your judge is pro HOA and hates chickens, ouch.

Good luck!

Hopefully some of this makes sense. Feel free to ask questions, I'll elaborate after some sleep.

 

[BruceAZ]

As I said previous I hope they simply don't revise the wording before or even after if you do win making your entire argument moot... Because truth be told if your argument holds water, then there is no prohibition for poultry and livestock at all as long as people called them 'pets' and I highly doubt your neighborhood would allow that... I have seen this argument used and I have yet to see it fly... Even the 'service animal' or 'companion animal' excuses don't generally fly as chickens are not covered by the ADA, the ADA specified dogs and dogs only...

this is where it's pretty sketchy.. just hope people will not start keeping cows, pigs, goats, etc. in their backyard around here... because to them they are household pets..


anyway.. this is a small court type case no? is there really a need for a lawyer ? since what's the total cost of the legal fee so far ?

i'm curious to know the "small fee" as one user stated.. some documents would be sufficient


i don't really like lawyers to be honest..

 

[RoyalCoopMom]

You are right. The only ones winning here are the lawyers. The trustees have been unwilling to talk to me without their lawyer present since day one! I have no idea what that might have cost the subdivision already. But I'm sure the trustees are willing to go the distance since they will pass the cost on to the whole neighborhood.