What to look for at the January 3rd Council meeting. An update.

Signs and Chickens and not much else

This is a Council Meeting devoted to bills on public hearings and unless there is a zoning issue in your neighborhood that you care about, this council meeting will be even more boring than most council meetings. There are only two issues that will generate any general interest.

BILL NO. BL2011-30 will prohibit the conversion of nonconforming static billboards to tri-face billboards. This may sail though with no public comment but some neighborhood activist will be very much in favor of this bill and some sign industry people would be expected to oppose it.

The Backyard Chicken Bill (BL2011-47) sponsored by Karen Bennett establishes regulations and standards pertaining to the keeping of chickens. Currently, it is illegal to keep chickens in the city, this would permit that. Those wanting to keep Chickens would have to pay an annual $25 fee, could have no more than six hens and no roosters. At one time there was a lot of opposition to this bill, so I don't know if there will be a lot of comment or not but their could be.

There are also many people who strongly support this bill. There is even an organization with a Facebook page called Urban Chicken Advocates of Nashville (UCAN) which is pushing for passage of the bill.  I monitor several neighborhood websites and there has not been a lot of chatter about this recently. I am all in favor. I might raise chickens myself if this passes.

Update: Thanks to the Metro Council Member who informed me that currently the rule is that it is illegal to have chickens in the city if you have less than 5 acres. 
  

Another update: Charlotte Park Neighborhood Association opposes the backyard chicken bill. Posted in the Nashville Neighbors Google Group, Charlotte Park Neighborhood leaders Wallace and Janice Lampley post a letter sent to all Metro Council members urging them to vote against the Chicken bill.

We just think this is a bad idea, and will only cause many problems for neighbors and our Codes Department and Health Department, in dealing with all the complaints that will be coming in, if this is approved. As we've said before, Codes Department works hard, and so does our Health Department in trying to keep up with all the complaints in Davidson County, and this is just something that doesn't need to be added to their heavy complaints schedules already, and neighbors don't need to have to start dealing with something else in their neighborhood that has been a problem already in ours.

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