nothin Hen Legalization Gets 2nd Chance | New Haven Independent

Hen Legalization Gets 2nd Chance

TM_042309_010.jpgAs a legally owned urban chicken, Sussex is able to strut around with her head held high. With the passage of an upcoming ordinance amendment that would permit backyard hens, other city chickens may soon be able to stand tall.

Sussex lives with four other hens on Willard Street in Westville. Her owner, Rebecca Weiner, is one of a several New Haveners who have received zoning permission to keep hens in their backyards. A newly proposed ordinance would extend that permission citywide, allowing all residents to keep up to six hens.

The proposed amendment — the second attempt by lawmakers to advance the idea — will be taken up by the City Plan Commission at its May meeting. It will need final approval by the Board of Aldermen.

The ordinance would open the door for new hen owners as well as legalize current chicken keepers who are operating below the radar. Hens would have to be kept in an enclosure, for non-commercial use in residential zones. Roosters, along with all other non-hen livestock, would continue to be prohibited. See a draft of the ordinance here.

Proponents of the plan say that hens are a quiet and unobtrusive way for people to get fresh eggs and feel more connected to their food supply. Detractors say that hens just aren’t right for city life. They worry about noise and mess and attracting predators like raccoons and possums.

The idea for the amendment was hatched over a year ago by Weiner, after going through a drawn out zoning battle to keep her hens (read about that here, here, and here). Recounting the story in her backyard, Weiner said that she had thought to herself at the time, This is a little silly. Maybe there’s something that we can do about changing the ordinance.”

TM_042309_047.jpgWeiner (pictured) approached her alderwoman, Ward 25’s Ina Silverman, and they put together a proposal. The momentum for that plan fizzled, but the issue was recently resurrected by Fair Haven Alderwoman Erin Sturgis-Pascale, who joined together with Westville, East Rock and Fair Haven alders to push the issue again.

The great motivator was my husband, because he wanted to keep chickens in the backyard,” Sturgis-Pascale explained, adding with a laugh, He is my most important constituent.”

Sturgis-Pascale said that the hens ordinance is taking flight this time because of a confluence of factors, including a burgeoning interest in local food and a growing recession. There is a cultural trend unfolding before us,” said Sturgis-Pascale, who worked in sustainable agriculture for ten years. Unlike her parents’ generation, which pursued a back-to-the-land, anti-urban philosophy, we’re becoming urbanites, but taking responsibility for our food,” she explained.

People are beginning to see that the factory farming system is failing us,” said Weiner. Referring to Michael Pollan’s bestseller, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, she mentioned the high levels of hormones in mass-produced eggs and a huge agro-business system that runs off of subsidized corn and fossil fuels. With more and more people rejecting big factory farming, chickens have become chic,” she said. There a number of people who are keeping hens in the city without permission, said Weiner.

TM_042309_011.jpgKeeping chickens makes sense economically, emotionally, and for health reasons, said Weiner who has had hens since 2002. She uses the hens to help her compost kitchen scraps and all the leaves she rakes each fall. You end up with this very nice compost that your chickens turn for you,” she said. They’re your little garden slaves.”

Weiner has calculated the cost of feeding and caring for her birds and determined that she pays 12 cents per dozen of organic, grass-fed, free-range, local fresh eggs. If you can even find them in the store, comparable eggs would cost you $5, she said.

Plus, the eggs have 40 percent less cholesterol than eggs from factory farms. You can go on and on about the health benefits of eating this way,” she said.

Emotionally, there’s a big dissatisfaction that we have with the separation with the natural world,” Weiner went on. She said that she likes being able to show her four-year-old daughter where her food comes from.

Keeping chickens is a return to what urban life once was, Weiner said. One hundred fifty years ago, everyone lived this way,” she said, gesturing to her backyard chicken coop, which her husband built from scrap lumber. This is how cities were.”

TM_042309_049.jpgEven 70 years ago, raising chickens was quite common in New Haven. I had them when I was a kid over in Fair Haven, said Weiner’s neighbor, 81-year-old Tom Coughlin, at right in photo with another neighbor, Rocky. You used to be able to buy them by the dozen from a store on State Street, he said. They were all over, really.”

It’s fun to watch the neighborhood kids go look at them,” Rocky said. There’s no smell at all, he added. And without a rooster, there’s no noise, Coughlin said.

Coughlin is all for the proposed amendment. Do it the way [Weiner] does it, it’s super,” he said. I think it’s a great idea.”

Others aren’t so pleased with the idea.

This really needs to be thought about and maybe limited to two hens to a property,” said Rafael Ramos, deputy director at city government’s Livable City Initiative.

I know the trend with people wanting to be able to control their breakfast,” he said. But houses are so close together … and not everyone is going to be neat. Too many hens is going to be a problem.”

Ramos suggested that hen owners should have at least a quarter of an acre. He also worried that chickens would attract predators like raccoons, foxes, possums, coyotes, and larger birds of prey. The country or the suburbs would be more appropriate,” he said.

We have a tough enough time fighting back wild animals,” Ramos said. Seems to me like [chickens] should be on a farm.”

Weiner conceded that predators can be an issue for hen owners.

I think it’s a very legitimate concern and it needs to be addressed with coop design,” she said. She pointed to her covered chicken run, which is enclosed by two different kinds of mesh, to protect her birds from raccoons and other animals. You need to take proper precautions.”

Weiner said that she had a loss” over the winter. One of her birds was sick and a hawk swooped down and took her away when she was out in the yard. But predators will go after any household pet, and even small children, if they’re left unattended and defenseless in the back yard, she said.

Weiner said that she strongly recommends a Chicken 101 course.” She said that she and other New Haven chicken keepers have offered to give a biannual training on proper care and feeding to prospective poultry owners.

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