ChicagoClout: City of Chicago wants to Remove Chickens

Chicago Chickens.jpg
Cock-a-doodle-do Mayor Daley. Many of Chicago's Hispanic community have live Roosters in the back yard. They provide a warning if strangers are lurking. Also in the morning these birds provide a wake-up call. These are egg-cellent birds. Mayor Daley is cracked. This possible new law leaves egg on the Mayor's face. Daley is scrambling for answers on this. I could go on and on, but Chicago has a Budget Crisis and all the billions of dollars made on Chicago assets like the Chicago Skyway is now gone. Read more on this story click below. Thanks Fran Spielman. Photo by Patrick McDonough

First pigeons, now chickens cause a stink
CITY COUNCIL | Alderman wants to add birds to ban

October 9, 2007
BY FRAN SPIELMAN City Hall Reporter/fspielman@suntimes.com
Four years ago, the City Council clipped the wings of Chicagoans who bred and raced pigeons in residential neighborhoods amid complaints from homeowners fed up with the stench.

"Flatulence is like roses compared to the smell of pigeon manure," Northwest Side resident Paul Covangka complained then.

Now, Southwest Side Ald. Lona Lane (18th) wants to throw chickens into the same coop. She's introduced an ordinance to amend the pigeon ban to include chickens.

"There are residents within our ward who have neighbors raising chickens as pets. They're letting them run around in their backyards. Debris from the chickens is creating mice. The odor from the feathers is something they're not happy with," Lane told the Chicago Sun-Times.

"I was alerted that some of the people are cutting their heads off in some kind of ritual, letting them run around, then dumping them in hot water, plucking their feathers and cooking them. They're throwing carcasses in the garbage."

The ordinance that Lane introduced at the Sept. 27 City Council meeting would make it a crime to "import, sell, own, keep or otherwise possess any live chicken" in a district zoned for residential use. The "keeping of chickens for slaughter" would require a "valid wholesale food establishments license."

Lane's staff could not immediately identify either neighbors who had complained about pet chickens or the residents accused of keeping them.

During City Council hearings on the pigeon ban, breeders spoke with passion about a cherished family tradition that dates back at least four generations to their great-grandfathers in Poland.

But aldermen overruled them because of what Ald. Tom Allen (38th) called an "epidemic of pigeon coops" that had made life smelly and miserable for Northwest Side neighbors. The ban has been upheld by a federal appeals court.

Comments

This doesn't make sense.

If there's a city ordinance prohibiting the keeping of pigeons in residential neighborhoods, how is it that so many clouted city employees are allowed to reside in said neighborhoods?

(Response) Now that's a good good.

Posted by: puzzled | October 10, 2007 5:39 PM

Posted by: Mayor Daley is a fool | October 11, 2007 12:37 AM

Do you really think the ILLEGALS are going to obey the law

Posted by: Anonymous | October 14, 2007 10:47 PM

How absurd. I live in Chicago and keep chickens. First I talked with my neighbors to ensure that they didn't have a concern. I keep them clean and safe - we don't slaughter and we don't have roosters. Otherwise this would be a nuisance and a complaint would be filed. Do we need to legislate every behavior that COULD become a problem?

Posted by: Tom R | October 22, 2007 12:16 PM

No, we don't "...need to legislate every behavior that COULD become a problem...", but that's not the purpose aldermen and alderwomen have in mind, when they propose ordinances like this one.

Their purpose is to avoid addressing the important issues facing them, distract from the many scandals and appear to be actually serving their constituents, all the while doing substantially nothing to solve the many problems they are responsible for creating.

It is, indeed, absurd, but it is deliberately absurd.

After all, these people believe that they can do whatever the fuck they want to, regardless of what hardships their actions impose upon the common citizens.

HAVE NO DOUBT, VOTE INCUMBENTS OUT

Posted by: uh, no..... | October 23, 2007 3:12 PM

Chicago considers residential chicken ban
November 21, 2007 (CHICAGO) - Live chickens aren't meant for big-city neighborhoods.

Related Links
Should chickens be allowed in the city?
At least that's how some Chicago aldermen see it and they're moving to ban the keeping of the birds in residential areas.
The phenomenon of city chickens is apparently on the rise. Animal control officials in Chicago say they've had more than 700 complaints about chickens this year. That includes hundreds of gripes about rosters crowing too loudly.

Alderman Lona Lane has taken the lead in pushing a hen and rooster ban through the City Council's Health Committee. It's expected to pass at a council meeting next month.

Lane says the chickens literally create a stink in some neighborhoods. She says chicken waste not only smells -- it also attracts rodents.

Posted by: More on Chicago Clout and Chickens | November 21, 2007 12:47 PM

Mostly Mexicians have live Chickens in the back yard in Chicago.

Posted by: Chicago Live Chickens in Back Yards | November 21, 2007 1:30 PM

^^^ real educated post. just like any other pet if a person does not take care of the animal of course there will be problems. why punish everyone for the few that cause problems? punish those who violate noise and sanitary issues and leave the rest in peace!

Posted by: why not | November 26, 2007 12:49 AM

As a keeper of several quiet, clean egg-laying hens, this issue frustrates me very much. As for any uncleanliness caused by too many chickens, or excessive noise caused by roosters, these are legitimate concerns. Concerns that are ALREADY COVERED IN EXISTING ORDINANCES. It is fine to shut down those who bother their neighbors with 4am crowing or unsanitary conditions or the slaughtering of chickens in the yard, but these issues need no new legislation. This newly proposed legislation does nothing new to fight the abuses...all it does is shut down those of us doing it quietly, with our neighbors consent. It is ridiculous.

Posted by: Steven | December 6, 2007 11:11 PM

Chicago Alderman vs. The Urban Chicken
Produced by Shawn Allee on Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Today is decision day for the Chicago chicken—not the kind in city restaurants, but the ones in Chicago's backyards.

Believe it or not, America's biggest cities are pretty accommodating to the urban chicken. With caveats, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago all allow birds in residential areas, but today Chicago aldermen could ban pet chickens.

The city's pro-chicken contingent includes sustainable urban agriculture groups like The Angelic Organics Learning Center. The Center's Martha Boyd.

BOYD: You can take a bird you're raising yourself and have it killed and dressed for you. All of that provides nutrition for families and they're raising that animal themselves, they know what it's been fed, and in general it's probably better nutrition than what they're getting when they buy chickens at the store.

Ban proponents argue stray chicken feed and droppings attract rats, but a streets and sanitation spokesperson says Chicago has not targeted chicken coops as a source of rats.

Posted by: Chicago Super Chicken | December 12, 2007 1:50 PM

Get ready for another "Daley Tax"... Register your chickens... and pay the tax... (Also.. your chickens will be included on the voting list and... will also be listed as having voted.)

Posted by: Alan and Linnea | December 13, 2007 9:08 AM

I think it is extremely disappointing that they would want to ban chickens. Yes, ban roosters and possibly put a limit to the number of hens a family can own, but making a family get rid of a family pet is very sad and unfair. If an animal is being neglected then the proper measures for neglect should be taken but that is for all pets not just chickens!

Posted by: Friend of Chickens | May 15, 2008 11:45 AM

Posted by: advendexy | August 28, 2008 3:56 AM

I recently noticed that one of my neighbors has a rooster and 2 turkeys in their yard? Is this even legal in the city of Chicago? (Response) There are 50 turkeys at Chicago City Hall.

Posted by: Debi Norman | April 3, 2010 10:53 AM