Today we went down to the city council chambers for the planning commission’s review of the proposed backyard hen ordinance. Even though I have been through some of these processes to change city code before, this is still such a learning experience to me. What I have learned overall though is that if you give the government ANYTHING to review, you have to go through so many hoops, red tape and bureaucracy that it’s amazing anything gets done.

And when it does get done, I am beginning to see who really runs things. In the case of Greeley I see that it is not the planning commission, nor even the city council, but the city staff. The Community Development Director runs the show in this backyard hens thing. She is considered the expert and therefore a lot of leniency goes to her opinion. Same goes for the city attorney. While ultimately the city council makes the decisions, the specifics of the codes have been worked on behind the scenes long before.

I almost think in the case of this ordinance that we would have been better off leaving it alone and buying more land behind our house than having to deal with all this bureaucracy and pleasing of every different type of person. Of course we had our chickens without approval for over a year and no one said a word until we were on the front page of the paper.

But there were other people who are not as rebellious as we are and went through all the proper channels and were frustrated with the current code. So when we go and try to change it I think, this will be fairly easy. We simply have to change the code in one of two ways:  a) call them pets and be done with it, b) go from 1 chicken per 4000 sq ft to maybe 1 per 1000 sq ft. But no…we have to write a whole book on the matter plus multiple meetings, committees, discussions, revisions and bring in all the experts.

No wonder we have so much gridlock at the national level to get things done. I am sure this is not just the case in government, but in corportation boards and other entities, but government is where we, the people, are also privy to the goings-on (if we can stand it without tearing ALL our hair out, not to mention that for people who work or have other less flexible jobs than Britton and I do this would be impossible to be part of).  

Why are they picking on us (or is it pecking)?

I  guess sometimes I wish we had the more simpler time when corporations and huge government entities didn’t run things with such thumbs-on control. An inspector for your backyard? A fee and permit to raise/grow your own food? What will we think of next? Now I know where science fiction novels get their premises from. When did we get so backward that there is no license in Colorado required to sell tobacco, the deadliest consumer item out there, but we have to have a permit and fee to get our own eggs? Oh yah, big corporations that control the big bureaucratic government. If the business is big enough, the local, state and federal governments see dollar $igns and will forgive any transgressions including killing 1200 Americans DAILY, but if it is an individual trying to make a difference by raising her own food, being environmentally and economically conscious, CHARGE her.

Yah, you could say I’m a little frustrated.