Henpecked

Former CM Jamie Hollin started a personal blog, and several days ago he followed up a council meeting with reflections on the urban chicken bill. My views on urban chickens are evolving and I'm on the fence on this one (like I originally was on Fairgrounds redevelopment), but leaning toward supporting chicken ownership in the city.

Heck, chicken owners cannot be any worse than some dog owners I know who let their mutts run unleashed and barking at people, including children. I'm much more concerned about uncontained dog waste in the neighborhood than I imagine myself being about contained hen waste.

But I digress. Jamie points to inconsistencies on the part of CMs who exempted their districts in order to prohibit urban chickens (essentially spot-zoning):

The public policy impact is absurd. One’s opinion on the bill is irrelevant. To clarify, it doesn’t matter to me whether you’re a supporter of the bill or part of the loyal opposition or just against its passage. There can be little debate about this being bad public policy. Enforcement will be virtually impossible.

Many members of the loyal opposition to the chicken bill were also some of the strongest advocates to save the fairgrounds. One of the strongest positions—due to its truth—in the fight for preservation, is that every resident of Davidson County owns those 117 acres. In other words, no priority given to nearby citizens—all are equal. As a consequence, each council member was free to vote based upon their constituency—councilmanic courtesy be damned. If councilmanic courtesy would’ve prevailed, the bulldozer’s work at the fairgrounds would be done by now (71% approved Charter amendment).

I cannot remember any instances in the past where exercising councilmanic courtesy lead to good Metro policies.