Consulting Services for Municipalities Drafting Chicken-Related Legal Codes
Home to Roost offers consulting services for cities, villages, and municipalities working on drafting chicken-related legal codes. We can draft language for your approval, or we can review your existing draft. We also offer expert testimony if you are debating legislation. Please contact us for rates and information on our professional consultations.
Resources
Here are a few resources for those of you interested in legalizing chickens in your community.
- BACKYARD CHICKENS: Why HENS are the “IT” BIRD (PPT presentation on reasons to keep chickens, from the Ogden Chicken Alliance)
- “Illegal Fowl: A Survey of Municipal Laws Relating to Backyard Poultry and a Model Ordinance for Regulating City Chickens” by Jaime M. Bouvier
- Information Useful in Amending Chicken-Keeping Ordinances: A link to the Chicago Chicken Enthusiasts Google Group’s resources
- Chickens and Property Values: A study to answer the argument “But chickens will reduce our community’s property values!”
- Backyard Poultry Magazine on Legalizing Chickens: An article in one of the premier poultry publications
- Urban Chickens: Myth and Fact: A link to an article that debunks several myths related to urban chickens
- Chicken Ordinance Report: A study by a DePaul professor that examines chicken-related issues in large U.S. cities
- Are Hens Right for Your City? 5 Reasons for Urban Chickens: The title says it all!
- Reasons to Raise Chickens: My personal top-ten list
- Billings Blog Counts Its Chickens: A link to a blog that lists the top U.S. cities that allow chickens
- Shattering seven urban myths about raising chickens: A great article by chicken expert Patricia Foreman
Home to Roost 
Posted by Nomadic Chef on June 10, 2012 at 10:10 am
Here is a flyer I put togethor to help change my town ordinance banning chickens..
http://dstuchel.blogspot.com/2012/06/urban-chickens-supporting-urban.html
Posted by chickenwoman on June 10, 2012 at 10:30 am
Thanks, Nomadic Chef!
Posted by MunicipalChickenAdvocate on November 6, 2014 at 3:13 am
This article, “Illegal Fowl: A Survey of Municipal Laws Relating to Backyard Poultry and a Model Ordinance for Regulating City Chickens” by Jaime M. Bouvier has been extremely useful in a push to legalize hens in a city here in central Nebraska:
http://s3.amazonaws.com/mocobyc/SSRN-id2119494.pdf
Here is the abstract:
As the movement towards keeping backyard chickens continues to grow, many cities are facing the decision of whether to allow residents to keep chickens and, if so, how to effectively regulate the practice. This paper provides the information necessary for cities to design a workable ordinance. First, the paper gathers information about the benefits and concerns of keeping backyard chickens. Next, the paper surveys municipal ordinances in the top 100 most populous cities in the United States that concern keeping and raising chickens. This survey reveals that chickens are, perhaps surprisingly, legal in the vast majority of large cities. The survey also identifies regulatory norms and some effective and less effective ways to regulate chicken-keeping. Finally, the paper offers a model ordinance, based on the background information and survey results, that a city can adopt or easily modify to fit the city’s unique needs.
Posted by Peter Chi on October 16, 2016 at 8:34 am
when will Wilmette change?
Posted by chickenwoman on October 16, 2016 at 9:23 pm
Hello, Peter –
I have not yet heard of an effort to legalize chickens in Wilmette. Perhaps you could be a catalyst!
Jen