Advice on chickens

The Gazette Editorial Board

Lisbon, we gather from the news, has taken on the issue of urban chickens.

The City Council there voted earlier this month to end discussions on the prospect of allowing city residents to raise backyard chickens, disappointing pro-chicken residents.

Although we hate to poke our beaks where they do not belong, we would like to offer Lisbon leaders some friendly advice based on our experience here in Cedar Rapids, where a backyard hens ordinance passed the City Council in 2010.

It's true there was a lot of scratching and crowing here before the council members finally voted to allow residents to have up to six hens, but no roosters. Backers hoped to enjoy the satisfaction of raising their own fresh eggs. Opponents warned that noisy, smelly chickens have no place in the city.

Under the Cedar Rapids ordinance, owners must notify their neighbors and take a class on raising chickens at the Indian Creek Nature Center before getting a permit. Permits are subject to review and renewal. Since 2010, the city's Community Development and Planning Department reports that 100 urban chicken permits have been issued, with five applications pending.

And so far, the dire warnings of opponents haven't come true.

'Overall, I can't say we get a lot of complaints,” said Diane Webber, program manager for Cedar Rapids Animal Care and Control. 'Although we do get some.”

Lisbon, of course, has its own community with its own concerns, and will have to chart its own chicken path. But to those with feathers ruffled, we'd just like to point out that in Cedar Rapids, urban chickens have produced many more eggs than neighborhood drama.

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