Another Town Mulls Urban Chicken OK
It seems that self-sufficiency and raising your own food is winning increasing approval from officialdom in the U.S., with Falmouth, Maine, possibly becoming the next town to OK the keeping of chickens in residential areas.
The Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram reports that the Falmouth Town Council expects to vote next month on a zoning change that would allow backyard poultry-keeping in neighborhoods throughout town. Currently, only four parts of Falmouth have the OK to raise chickens in residential areas.
The Falmouth proposal is similar to one recently adopted in Fort Collins, Colorado, where residents can now keep chickens but no roosters (too noisy for the neighbors, apparently). As with the Fort Collins law, Falmouth’s rule change would also prohibit chicken slaughtering in residential neighborhoods.
While it’s not signed and sealed yet, the Falmouth chicken law seems to be passing the test of public opinion: No residents showed up at the last council meeting to oppose the change, though two people — Geoff Dyhrberg and his daughter, Kiersten, 11 — spoke up in favor of it. Dyhrberg says he supports the new law because he and his wife want their children to grow up closer to at least part of their food supply.
“As a society, we are distancing ourselves further from our food supply,” Dyhrberg was quoted in the Press Herald/Sunday Telegram news article. “I’d like to reverse that, at least for my family. Producing eggs seemed like a simple step to take.”
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Fort Collins Welcomes Urban Chickens
