Salt Lake County backs off from chicken proposal -- for now
By Jeremiah Stettler
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_12675079
The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 06/23/2009 07:03:25 PM MDT
Hold off on that chicken coop.
The Salt Lake County Council stalled Tuesday in an effort to make backyard hens legal -- not because it would lead to too many chickens pecking through unincorporated neighborhoods, but because the proposed rules are so restrictive that building a coop could prove impractical, if not impossible.
"There is no sense in us passing something that is meaningless," Democratic Councilman Joe Hatch said.
Instead, the council referred the proposal to its public-works subcommittee for revision.
While the proposed rules would allow homeowners to tend up to 15 backyard hens, it also would impose regulations for coop construction so strict that some critics have described them as akin to erecting a "maximum-security prison."
The coop would have to stand no closer than 50 feet from any residence. The enclosure would have to consist of a quarter-inch hardware cloth that extends 2 feet underground and bends an additional 2 feet away from the pen.
Republican Councilman David Wilde said his own home -- which sits on a third of an acre in Murray -- couldn't meet the proposed ordinance's 50-foot separation requirements.
"Technically," he said, "almost nobody can qualify to have a chicken coop on their lot."
So the county is returning to the drawing board to devise rules that, if adopted, would make urban chickens a reality for residents in unincorporated areas and six townships, including Kearns, Magna and Millcreek.
"We want an ordinance that allows people to do it," Democratic Councilwoman Jani Iwamoto said, "but really means it."
By Jeremiah Stettler
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_12675079
The Salt Lake Tribune
Updated: 06/23/2009 07:03:25 PM MDT
Hold off on that chicken coop.
The Salt Lake County Council stalled Tuesday in an effort to make backyard hens legal -- not because it would lead to too many chickens pecking through unincorporated neighborhoods, but because the proposed rules are so restrictive that building a coop could prove impractical, if not impossible.
"There is no sense in us passing something that is meaningless," Democratic Councilman Joe Hatch said.
Instead, the council referred the proposal to its public-works subcommittee for revision.
While the proposed rules would allow homeowners to tend up to 15 backyard hens, it also would impose regulations for coop construction so strict that some critics have described them as akin to erecting a "maximum-security prison."
The coop would have to stand no closer than 50 feet from any residence. The enclosure would have to consist of a quarter-inch hardware cloth that extends 2 feet underground and bends an additional 2 feet away from the pen.
Republican Councilman David Wilde said his own home -- which sits on a third of an acre in Murray -- couldn't meet the proposed ordinance's 50-foot separation requirements.
"Technically," he said, "almost nobody can qualify to have a chicken coop on their lot."
So the county is returning to the drawing board to devise rules that, if adopted, would make urban chickens a reality for residents in unincorporated areas and six townships, including Kearns, Magna and Millcreek.
"We want an ordinance that allows people to do it," Democratic Councilwoman Jani Iwamoto said, "but really means it."
