What are we going to do about all the complaints about all the people who don't want to keep chickens?

A friend and I attended the September Public Forum Meeting and boy did we get a show! The County Commissioners were so happy to rezone an entire 130+ acres in order to honor the Constitutional rights of the would be property owner, who happens to be a developer that was involved in previous bribery charges against former commissioners. I wrote all about it here. 

The County Commissioners did not like that I called them to accountability and questioned: If you are going to honor the Constitutional Property rights and rezone an entire plot of land against the wishes of the community around it, then are you going to be consistent and change the zoning laws to honor my property rights?

The answer to that is a big fat no.

I met with Chairman Charlotte Nash shortly after publishing that editorial. Here are her concerns:

• The rights of the people who do not want to live next door to chickens.
• Forcing people to comply with the standards that Code Enforcement will be carrying out (coop size, location, number of birds, etc.)
• Keeping up with Cobb County
• Not that many people want chickens
• How are we going to deal with all the complaints about people having chickens

Measuring that against the vision statement of the Gwinnett County Commissioners, I'd say it falls pretty short.

As you can see, her last two points don't even make sense. If not that many people even WANT chickens, then not many people are going to keep chickens, which means that not that many complaints are going to be made.

Also, I hope I don't even have to point out to you that there has never ever ever in the entire history of the world, in no period of time, been the "right to not let your neighbors...." It is NOT a Constitutional right to disallow your neighbors to quietly enjoy their property. It's just not. 

However, it IS a Constitutional right to keep chickens or donkeys or geese or azaleas or whatever else you want on your property, so long as it doesn't disturb your neighbor's right to quiet enjoyment of their own property. 

The most appropriate response to these asinine arguments has already been written out by the Cato Institute in their Handbook for Policymakers. 

 "The first problem, as noted earlier, is the modern permitting regime. We would not stand for speech or religion or most other rights to be enjoyed only by permit. Yet that is what we do today with property rights, which places enormous, often arbitrary, power in the hands of federal, state, and local ‘‘planners.’’ Driven by political goals and considerations— notwithstanding their pretense to ‘‘smart growth’’—planning commissions open the application forum not only to those whose rights might be at stake but to those with interests in the matter. Thus is the common-law distinction between rights and interests blurred and eventually lost. Thus is the matter transformed from one of protecting rights to one of deciding whose ‘‘interests’’ should prevail. Thus are property rights effectively politicized. And that is the end of the matter for most owners because that is as far as they can afford to take it." 

The Handbook is an excellent guide to understanding how Constitutional issues should be fleshed out. It's definitely worth a read, and you should pull your favorite quote and email it to each of the Commissioners. I did! 

However, I haven't gotten any response. The Gwinnett County Commissioners are, for all intents and purposes, completely ignoring our issue. They are simply not interested in valuing our concerns and our rights. They have left us no choice but to see to it that they are not reelected and that this is the end of their political careers. I'm on board for this completely.

Charlotte Nash is more interested in Cobb County. Cobb County wants property owners to have to get their properties surveyed (a cost of around $450) and then pay a fine in order to keep chickens, after you get the signed consent of your neighbors.

This is mockery and should not be accepted.

As we read in the Cato Handbook, the government should actually be paying us when they restrict the use of our land! We do not pay them to restrict us. This should never make sense to any clear thinking individual.

I tried to tell the Gwinnett County Commissioners about how well allowing chickens is going in Dekalb County. They recently had their Urban Coop Tour to celebrate the way that chickens are beneficial to the earth and to healthy communities. The Commissioners did not seem interested in this since it isn't Cobb County. (NO, that is not a typo, Chairman Nash told me she wants to follow Cobb County.) Many other counties around us have no laws written in regards to chickens. Fulton County has very generous allowances for chickens, and absolutely no chickens problems to report. Most of the examples I could find of zoning allowances for chickens were found in city zoning laws, not county. Why Gwinnett County has a bug up their britches in regards to chickens is beyond me. But these Commissioners are solidly against it.

Tommy Hunter is friendly to the idea, but I haven't seen any solid show support from him yet. This is probably because if he were to try to bring the issue to a vote, the other Commissioners would shoot it down immediately.

Because all the people who don't want to keep chickens might cause a lot of complaining from the people who have the right for their neighbors not to keep chickens and this would really overwhelm the Quality of Life Police Division (aka Code Enforcement) as they seek to make sure that people are not enjoying their own properties too much.

So, what are you going to do about it, Gwinnett County? Are you going to sit idly by and watch your rights be trampled on?

Email the Commissioners. Request a meeting. This matters.