WEST WINDSOR, NJ Town Council Meeting

[westwindsorres]

To West Windsor Residents:

The West Windsor Town Council will have a meeting next Monday, July 18, at 7 PM at the the West Windsor Municipal Building.

On the agenda will be a discussion of whether or not the town ought to revise its restrictive chicken-raising laws.

Since the chairwoman of the board, Linda Geevers, is ardently anti-chicken, and has been organizing people against chickens to speak, it would be great if any resident of West Windsor could come out and speak (in the public comment section) in favor of raising chickens.

Last week, the Zoning Board of West Windsor handed down a decision interpreting chickens as pets, which means that up to three chickens may be raised by any West Windsor resident as pets, with no zoning restrictions whatsoever. But this will be at risk if the council decides to ban chickens altogether. It is essential that the council decide to create less restrictive laws concerning the raising of chickens, and that decision will depend heavily on public testimony.

Please come out if you can, and if you have any questions, please PM my account. Thanks!

 

[EggsRUs1948]

Can't really post this too many places:

Pet chickens are incidental to residential use. In City of Sparta v. Page, 2015 IL App (5th) 140463-U, the appellate court affirmed the trial court’s finding that the defendant landowner was not in violation of a local zoning ordinance. The City of Sparta (City), a home rule municipality, claimed the defendant violated a zoning ordinance by conducting an unpermitted use in a residential district by keeping chickens at his residence.
In the summer of 2013, the City’s animal control officer discovered the defendant raising chickens at his residence and claimed he warned him to remove the chickens. The residence was situated on a one and one-half acre tract within the city limits where defendant had been raising chickens for approximately four years on the property using a movable fence. He considered his chickens to be pets and did not use them for any commercial enterprise; no evidence was presented that he sold either the chickens or their eggs. In March 2014, the defendant called in a complaint to the City’s police department reporting a stray dog attacked one of his chickens. When the animal control officer responded, he discovered the defendant had not complied with his previous warning and the officer issued a citation. The citation listed a violation of a City municipal code pertaining to harboring certain animals including swine, cattle, horses, mules, or game birds within the city limits, which was later amended to a zoning violation for conducting a prohibited agricultural use in a residential district. The trial court held that raising chickens was not prohibited by the code and that the defendant’s activities were not commercial in nature and, therefore, did not constitute agricultural use. The court reasoned the defendant’s use was merely incidental to permitted residential use of the property, much like having a vegetable garden. Moreover, the court reasoned the clear primary use of the property was residential and normal incidental uses of residential homes and property include having pets. While the zoning code does not specifically permit dogs, vegetable gardens, or fruit trees in a residential district, all of those uses are incidental to residential use and clearly are not prohibited. Source​