Kearney Talks Animal Ordinances

By: Kim Eiten - Email

Updated: Fri 9:50 PM, Jul 20, 2012

If it lives in the backyard and oinks or clucks, you could be in trouble within Kearney's city limits.

But, some of those rules could change soon and became more strict, or at the very least, more clear.

Farm animals in town is a topic that raised a lot of questions Friday.

"What if I'm not going to eat them? What if I'm not going to breed them?" Kearney Planning Commission member Paul Frederickson asked.

"I got a snake and a spider. Are those pets or are those wild animals?" Kearney resident Connie Decker asked.

"If I walk down the street and have a parrot on one shoulder and a chicken on the other and I said which one of these is a barnyard animal and which is a pet, most people would say the one in the middle," Kearney City Planner Lance Lang said.

Lots of laughs at City Hall today as the Kearney Planning Commission discussed some changes to animal ordinances, but the seemingly silly discussion of what's a barnyard animal versus a pet, not so silly for some people that came to speak out.

Those changes could affect what people are or are not allowed to have in residential areas. Right now, those ordinances are unclear.

"There's that confusion," Decker said. "Nobody seems to know."

In Decker's case, that led to her having to get rid of her chickens. She said she called the city before she got the birds.

"I said is there anything that explicitly prevents having chickens in town and I was told no," Decker said.

Then, there was a complaint from a neighbor meaning a new home for the flock.

It's the same story others told at the meeting.

Their objective was asking the city to consider different cases before making a decision.

The commission did not make a decision today. They say they will table the issue until some more research and a roundtable discussion. The topic will continue at a later meeting.

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