Updated: 4/22/2009 10:16:44 PM
Animal control advisors are sharing their thoughts about a push to allow chickens inside the Knoxville city limits.
It's a response to the growing urban chicken grassroots movement.
"We used to have chickens, and we raised them just for eggs," Mark Floer of North Knoxville explained at a strategy session Sunday. He joined other urban chicken advocates who want to change an ordinance that basically bans chickens within city limits.
The law cost Floer his backyard flock.
"They heard the rooster and decided to go ahead and fine us and have us go to court," he said. "So we no longer have them now. It's important for us to get them back since the neighborhood really enjoyed them."
At a meeting Wednesday, Knoxville's Animal Control Board listened to backyard hen advocates.
"It says predator-resistant coops. Does that mean covered on top and bottom?" asked Chairman Ronnie Nease during the half hour discussion.
The chicken supporters wanted input from the board to craft legislation the city will accept.
The concerns include zoning, the permitting process, and abandoned birds.
"The biggest problem is the people who get them, and then they move off and leave them or let them loose, and they're left for us to capture," said Animal Control Officer Karen Pappas.
Dozens of cities do allow chickens, with limits. They include New York City, Atlanta, Chicago, Cincinnati and Raleigh.
"Nobody would like a rooster at 6:00 in the morning," said Nease.
No roosters would be allowed under a proposal still taking shape.
Supporters said they don't want to ruffle feathers, but they do want to come up with a plan to convince the city to change the urban chicken law.
