Essex town council wants more information before considering backyard chickens
A resident of the Town of Essex wants councillors to allow people to keep chickens in the backyards for domestic purposes, but the town wants more information before making a decision.
Carmen White made a presentation during Monday evening's regular council meeting, saying a domestic chickens program would benefit members of the community and could also bring revenue to the town.
A motion asking for a report to be prepared by administration on the pros and cons on an urban domestic chickens program failed after a four-four vote by councillors. However, council asked White to return with more information on the subject and approved a motion for another delegation by her at a future meeting.
According to White, "there is great interest in the community regarding the owning of urban chickens," adding that the matter has been brought up to council before.
Making the case, White said "many communities have already implemented this program … and have found many benefits." She says those benefits include chickens creating natural fertilizer for gardens, acting as pest controllers, reducing waste by eating kitchen scraps and helping mental and emotional health as well as they give people something to care for.
'I see it as a big cost to the town'
Coun. Rodney Hammond says while he loves chickens, he has reservations about the feasibility of such a program.
"There will have to be a permit process and I have no idea what it would cost to enforce the amount of details that would be involved in such a permit," Hammond said.
"So, I'm up in the air and I don't know how council wants to review this but right now I see it as a big cost to the town and a lot of work for administration just looking into it."
Meanwhile, Ward 2 Coun. Kim Verbeek said raising chickens can help people lower their food budget.
"A lot of people are suffering from food insecurity right now and I know from, especially one of my daughters that keeps my three other adult children in eggs all the time just from her little flock, it can make a difference in your food budget," she said.
"I think that it's something we should look into. If we did go this route, I think that it would require registration and licensing. It would be a big burden on our staff to operate this, so there would have to be a fee attached at minimum to cover the administrative cost."
After years of debate, Toronto launched its UrbanHensTO pilot program in March 2018, which allows people in four former City of Toronto wards to legally keep up to four hens — though no roosters — in their yard. The pilot was originally set to end in 2021 but was later extended. As of last year there were around 80 households enrolled in the program.
