YORKVILLE – It has been more than a year since Yorkville aldermen and the city staff investigated the possibility of allowing residents to keep domesticated chickens as a source of fresh eggs.
The idea failed to gain enough support to move ahead, but the chickens may yet be coming home to roost in Yorkville.
Alderman Chris Funkhouser said he has again been receiving inquiries from residents interested in keeping egg-laying hens in backyard coops.
Funkhouser raised the issue at the May 3 meeting of the city council’s Economic Development Committee. No action was taken, but aldermen Ken Koch and Jason Peterson, the other two members of the panel present, were willing to entertain the concept.
Currently, farm animals are not allowed in the city’s corporate limits. Moreover, many residential subdivisions in the city have covenants prohibiting livestock.
Funkhouser said he wants to allow for residents to keep chickens while respecting the rights of neighbors.
“I don’t want it to be the Wild West, but I want it to be reasonalble,” Funkhouser said.
Funkhouser said he would like to see an ordinance allowing for chickens to be kept only at single-family home properties and not at townhouses or duplexes.
In the discussion among the three aldermen, they frequently mentioned capping the number of chickens allowed at four.
When last considered, an ordinance that would have allowed for “urban chickens” was drafted.
Under that proposal, up to eight chickens would have been allowed on a minimum one-acre residential lot.
The ordinance would have required a covered, predator-proof coop in the back or side yard, with a minimum of two-square-feet per chicken.
A 25-foot property line setback was established for any enclosures, coops or fencing in connection with keeping the chickens.
Only hens would have been allowed, with roosters prohibited after reaching the age of four months. Slaughtering would have been prohibited under the ordinance.
The proposal also specified a several sanitary regulations for maintaining the coops and a requirement for keeping chicken feed in rodent-proof containers.