Thread: City codes and other laws..

I have mulled over this situation my family had been in for almost a month now. Let me explain.

We live on the outskirts of our town, nearly rural. We do rent, it is a duplex, with a dcent, private fenced backyard. We were told that we could have chickens, so long as they were penned in.

My teen son, who works at a feed store part-time, wanted to do just this. So knowing many teens go astray these days, we said yes, knowing this was something good (he has always been an upright kid, never in trouble and always responsible). He reveled in building, fencing and caring for his chickens from chicks on up to egg laying hens. Everyone enjoyed watching them and their antics and getting to collect the eggs, everyone was involved in their care too.

In early September, suddenly, it was no longer ok to have chickens in our town. So we watched things pensively wondering what would come of a proposed vote to allow them. On November 2nd, we came home from a pre-op appointment for my husband (work place injury, hernia) to my oldest daughter waiting in our front yard, appearing to be upset. Our youngest (12) had been home and had called her in a panic. Apparently two large dogs had been loose and found a narrow spot between fences in adjoining yards, found the hens and killed four of them (the youngest called when she ran out trying to stop the dogs and they growled and snarled at her).

At the same time, we had a notice on the door from the city stating that the chickens had to go. Bad day all around. One cherished pet hen had to be put down, back was broken, so she just lay their suffering. The rest had to be taken to a family friends up in Washington state to live on her property.

I later found out that the city would not have enforced it, had not the neighbors behind us called and complained. Now...they are not the nicest, nor friendliest bunch, the woman was upset at me one night (it was about 10 pm) as her dachsund was barking at me through the fence while I tapped out my hepa filter for my vaccum, she asked me to stop as it was bothering her dog....you all get the picture of what they are like.

The city has a policy of a complaint based code enforcement system, basically a bit of Stalinism in my eyes (get your neighbors to nark on your every move if they do not like you).

I have sat on it and wondered why it all made me so angry. We had a bad day on the second, was it my emotions? No. Was it the chickens, were we attached? No, not really. After a while it came to my mind what it was really about was that these people, my own fellow citizens, who do not even know me (although we have lived here for 6 years and never caused them a bit of trouble, nor have they in any way been decent to us, or know our names) were willing to turn us over to the city for a minor infraction which was just then being enforced after a change, but these same people, I feel strongly that they would look the other way on this issue of illegal immigration and workplace enforcement.

It was not truly personal about them, but a general feeling of how people can know illegal aliens are all around them, taking American jobs, stealing identities to have those jobs, committing crimes and taking up resources they are not entitled to, and these same people would not speak out about it, against it, but they have no problem speaking out against their neighbors, fellow American citizens, for having some chickens.......

This is exactly what was at the core of my anger and disgust. Americans willing to turn against other Americans when it somehow benefits them (their perceived property values? or maybe just the satisfaction of a feeling of superiority), but not willing to speak out when our nation is being taken bit by bit from us by invaders.

Things are very backwards when our citizens and town councils are so heavily concerned about chickens in their midst, but not about what illegal aliens are doing to the fabric of our town (our town has 114 known gangs out of a population of 100,000, almost all of them being Latino and we can feel strongly almost all are anchor babies or illegal aliens).

I understand your feelings exactly. Living for a long time in a FL beach resort town, there were the snow birds that came to spend the winter each year and while some were nice, others complained about everyone and everything. Then there were the tourists that paid for a week or two for a rental condo, and while some never complained, there were those that complained about everything (one yelling about not having egg cups in the condo for their breakfast of soft-boiled eggs; another demanded another condo because the decor was in colors the wife hated...) Even the European tourists were telling us how they do things better.
My renter's black lab had eight puppies and one of the retiree neighbors called animal control about all the barking. As the officer walked to the house no dog barked. And the sad thing is this guy is the father of eight kids, and I am sure they made a heck of a lot more noise than these puppies.
You are right. We are turning on each other for minor things and not looking at the bigger picture of what could be causing us to be angry at fellow Americans. We are frustrated and I believe illegal immigration is part of the frustration. Working together to solve problems has been cleaved as more often these days, we have no understanding of the language the problem is being presented in.

I went to a few homeowners meetings before they got SO SO STUPID, I had to stand up and and just start laughing out loud at the morons before walking out! When I say STUPID I mean STUPID!! The neighbors are probably just really ANAL and STUPID! They have no real purpose in life but making yours harder so they can feel like they have some control left over something, since they obviously have none over their own lives.

"AmericanElizabeth" Have you and your husband confronted those neighbors? Of course the way some people are they would not listen to you or maybe not even answer the door. Some people out there are real pieces of work. SIMPLETONS!

We are fortunate that on December 1st, the city council has been convinced to reconvene as one guy was gone on vacation and another had been out after surgery, so they will do another vote on this issue. The county's laws were you could have them, only three, we were even told that by a city inspector. However, he apparently was wrong.

So instead of the 100 foot buffer they had, they plan to vote on an approval of 25 feet, which almost all cities who allow chickens (only hens) have a 25 foot buffer to the next residence (unattached). We would then qualify for this.

The day all you-know-what broke loose, we went looking for the rest of the birds (yes...we had more than the three, but have found out so many more do too), and knew one was in this neighbors yard, and instead of just allowing my son to jump their fence to get it, I drove all the way around to ask permission. I knocked and no one answered and then went next door to their neighbor, a woman we know, and explained things, she said for him to go ahead and go over, they were nice people .......neither of us knew they had been the narks at that time.

So...in the meantime, we wait for the city, get it on letterhead, and take that to the landlord, and hopefully get to start fresh (gave our egg laying hens to a friend). So in the interim, we got some squirrel and bird feeders.... just to put on the fence (remember, this woman gets mad every time her dog barks, it is everyone and anything elses fault the dog barks). Yeah, I know, it is being a bit ornery. It is an outlet for me and my son. Now each time we are outside doing yard work, and that dog starts her tirade against the fence, my son yells "shut up". They now come out quickly and quietly to get her.