Backyard Chickens

[ATS]

Just a quick question, can someone tell me when the backyard chickens first came before city council?

[grammafreddy]

Just a quick question, can someone tell me when the backyard chickens first came before city council?

If I remember correctly, it was somewhere around the fall of 2008 when I wrote my first letter to them. I know I wasn't the first one, though. In the summer of 2009 I was invited to meet with city staff after council directed them to do a study on the issue. I provided them with all the homework and research I had done, copies of good and efficient bylaws from other places, all kinds of information they could use and not have to reinvent the wheel.

That study took over a year to complete and all their report back to council contained was two letters - one from Interior Health supporting Urban Hens and one from the BCSPCA (not the local one) which wasn't against them but addressed some issues they felt the city should consider if they went ahead with allowing chickens on residential properties. There was not one iota of research or anything to indicate staff had done anything other than write two letters and receive the two responses to their letters. Not one bit of anything anyone had contributed to the city was included.

Edited to add:

You will find pretty much everything chronicled in this thread viewtopic.php?f=34&t=16229 . You'll see I started that thread November 20, 2008 which was about when I started communicating with the city.

In 2010, I stared the Kelowna Kluckers website for like-minded people to have a place on the web to discuss the topic and find information about building coops and runs, caring for chickens and anything else I could think of or that they wanted to contribute to the site. It has a small following but I have not advertised it and it has all been word of mouth.

[ATS]

So If I am reading this correctly, it has been with our current council for over two years and it sounds like they are no closer to making any sort of decision than they were two years ago? Is this a classic example of a council that can not make a decision and spends too much time in committee?

[Kathy73]

So If I am reading this correctly, it has been with our current council for over two years and it sounds like they are no closer to making any sort of decision than they were two years ago? Is this a classic example of a council that can not make a decision and spends too much time in committee?

Exactly ATS! Isn't this council pathetic! Time for some real leadership and change!

[Mtn Biker]

So If I am reading this correctly, it has been with our current council for over two years and it sounds like they are no closer to making any sort of decision than they were two years ago? Is this a classic example of a council that can not make a decision and spends too much time in committee?

Exactly ATS! Isn't this council pathetic! Time for some real leadership and change!

Really? So Kate, are you saying, because you brought up the leadership buzz word, leadership in your mind is Wally Gray? Are you saying you would like a leader who "REFUSES" to answer questions asked in an open forum, because he knows the answer will not be “popular”? Perhaps you do. You would choose a leader who openly lies about his involvements with civic organizations in order to appear involved and engaging? Perhaps you do. You would choose a leader who’s in it for his friends, and particular sect of our society and has been openly opposed to supporting any proclamation for any group that doesn’t meet with his narrow minded Christian old school views? Perhaps you do. Yah, it’s time for leadership at city hall, the leadership that’s currently managing and answsering the difficult questions with an eye out for “everyone” . . . not just the chosen few. Sorry Kate, but leadership is not the issue, it’s credibility and accountability, and Shepherd is full of it, and Wally is full of something, but it’s not leadership, more like bull-ship.

[beachday]

Who is Kate? Oh right mt biker is another Sharon supporter showing their true colors by stooping so low to name call? Wow, you sure are helping your cause!!

[Mtn Biker]

Who is Kate? Oh right mt biker is another Sharon supporter showing their true colors by stooping so low to name call? Wow, you sure are helping your cause!!

That's right. But at least I am not a Wally blowhard who joined Castanet a few weeks ago. I am a Shepherd suporter, and I'll stoop to anly level to make sure Wally doesn't get his way. Why don't you go ask Wally a few tough questions in a public forum and watch him squirm when he can't or doesn't want to answer. I am sure that is helping his cause?

[grammafreddy]

I'm inclined to blame staff more for this dragging out than I am council.

[Nom_de_Plume]

I'm inclined to blame staff more for this dragging out than I am council.

Agree, they apparently contracted city staff to do up that report that took them over a year to complete.
and they couldn't even seem to do that correctly.
Like I said at the time, if they didn't contact the only poultry processor in the area to ensure that spent layers could be processed to ensure no one was doing back yard slaughter (as per the bylaw recommendation) then their report was most definitely incomplete.
And they didn't.

[grammafreddy]

And I posted an untruth here earlier when I said that all staff's report back to council contained was three letters. In fact, it was TWO letters - one from Interior Health (in support of backyard chickens with recommendations) and the other from the BC SPCA (not the local one). It was focused on Vancouver issues where there are a number of massive egg producers and the concerns with them, not the family backyard chickens and not backyard chicken issues in Kelowna at all. It also seemed to be more of a "protectionism" attitude to me. Instead of people raising their own eggs, the BCSPCA recommended supporting SPCA certified egg producers - LOL - of course!

It took city staff over a year to get off their *bleep* and get those two letters - and not any other information at all. That was the sum total of their report back to council. http://www.kelowna.ca/CityPage/Docs/PDF ... ickens.pdf

In their report to council, staff said they had researched various other communities but they did not include any of that research in their report.