Chickens, Democracy for Worcester

Serena Galleshaw May 3, 2011 Thanks to best selling authors like Michael Pollan and award winning films like Food Inc., the unappetizing truths of the American factory farm industry have entered into mainstream consciousness. Farmers markets, food co-ops, and community supported agriculture swaps are multiplying nationwide, and community gardens are sprouting up where empty lots once sat collecting litter. Worcester is home to 41 of these vegetable oases. Now, an exciting new opportunity for food justice lays waiting in our city. It s currently illegal in Worcester to raise livestock- including chickens, within city limits. But plans are in the works to change this. Chicken enthusiast and District IV councilor Barbara Haller is working on a town ordinance that would allow residents to keep a coop of up to five hens in their backyard. When Worcester city council approves this ordinance, Worcester will join the likes of Providence, New York City, Seattle, San Francisco, Chicago, and dozens of other cities across the country that are standing up for local food and taking back their right to food security by allowing chickens back in the backyard. Why chickens? They re inexpensive and a prolific producer of a staple protein: eggs. Farms often give away chicks for free and they re available on websites like Craigslist, and backyardchickens.com for under five dollars for classic domestic breeds. When they grow into hens, they can provide 250-350 eggs a year. Chicken feed is available for ten dollars for a few months worth. Worcester s ordinance would require a chicken coop registration fee similar to registering a dog in Worcester- around fifteen dollars. Housing the birds wouldn t be very expensive either. There are endless websites dedicated to backyard chickens with do it-yourself instructions for building coops. Adding to the financial benefits of keeping chickens, they also produce top notch fertilizer and devour backyard undesirables like ticks. And it turns out, these pest-annihilating, fertilizing, protein producing little hens can also provide a new hobby.

Jason Przypek, a teacher in Hardwick Mass, has lived with chickens for most of his life. He says caring for them is an easy task; it s almost instinctive they re perfectly happy co-existing with you . And Robert McMinn, producer of Bucky Buckaw s Backyard Chicken Broadcast and urban chickener in New York City actually lives with his birds in his apartment. They re very entertaining, he said to a captive audience at the Regional Environmental Council s Spring Garden Festival in April. It was obviousthe little cluck clucking hens even cuddled up to some chilly festival goers. Pryzpek did admit, however, that his chickens, despite peacefully co-existing with him do try to escape occasionally, as they enjoy roosting in trees. But like training kids with a time out, he plucks the docile creatures from their perch and sets them back in the coop until they get it right. Escapees and noise complaints are the first reasons that opponents of chickening legislations in other cities are concerned with. The truth is, hens cluck softly during the day, and sleep at night. Roosters, the early morning cock-a-doodledoing culprits wouldn t be allowed by Worcester s ordinance. Opponents also believe backyard coops will initiate serious neighbor conflict, purportedly because of the potential for incidences and escapades like those seen in the animated classic, the Chicken Run. So far, the facts have nullified these concerns. One year into legalized chickening in Missoula Montana, the animal control officer has reported only fourteen complaints- much less than the city has ever received for dog complaints. One resident of Missoula said that neighbor relations are actually better off with the chickens; neighborhood kids visit to see the chickens and learn about them. Experiential learning of this kind may lead to a new generation of kids who know that chickens aren t nugget shaped, and eggs are not only stark white. The

future implications of backyard chickening could lead to informed kids who are more likely to become more informed consumers and better nutrition decision makers. Local food activist, and proponent of the chicken legislation Joe Scully says the ordinance is an important lesson in local food. More people are beginning to care about where their food comes from, they want to be a part of the process. Allowing people to be in charge of their nutrition is not only a health issue, it s food democracy. Backyard chickens enables good eggs for all who want them. It s not the end of food injustice in America, but it s a start. It s blow to the mechanized, impersonal and distant system that sends our food in plastic wrapped packages- it s a step towards reducing our reliability on conventional food sources, which are inherently creating food injustice says Amanda Barker, a graduate student in Environmental Science and Policy at Clark University. By standing up for our own food choices, we re taking back our fundamental right to food. What senator is going to say no- you cannot be in charge of your food. We don t regulate the planting of fruit trees, tomatoes or carrots. Why should we be denied the right to raise chickens? Backyard chickening makes good, democratic sense. As for why we ever stopped raising chickens in the first place, that s a good question. Robert McMinn made the story clear: After the depression (and the beginning of the industrial revolution) consumers were persuaded that having someone else, far away, grow and prepare all your food improved the quality of life and was one of the greatest benefits of prosperity . The atrocities and injustices created by the factory farming industry have revealed that this is not the case. Now we know better, and the people of Worcester have the opportunity to take part in a food revolution.