The big peck-ture: Residents express concerns over chicken ordinance

NEWBERRY COUNTY — A second reading of a proposed ordinance that would establish regulations for the issuance of permits for the keeping of chickens on a non-commercial basis on residential properties in Newberry County was postponed after a number of residents spoke during the public hearing portion of the Newberry County Council meeting last week to express their concerns.

Newberry County handles the zoning for all the unincorporated areas in the county and incorporated areas except the City of Newberry, Town of Prosperity and Town of Little Mountain.

County Administrator Jeff Shacker said most of Newberry County is classified as R2-Rural and the minimum lot size for this classification is one acre or more. Most properties with this designation are larger than one acre with some being much larger. Shacker said its uses are for timber, agricultural and residential uses, typically on home acreage – most people who live in Newberry County in unincorporated areas have that zoning designation.

“In R2 Rural, and this is current, because this ordinance does not effect R2 Rural that’s been proposed, you can have chickens and you can not only have chickens, but you can have any number of chickens that you want, among other things. So the vast majority of Newberry County outside of the three municipalities I mentioned, you can have chickens. There’s no permit required for it. It is a permitted use in the zoning table, you can have those animals and there are no requirements in R2 Rural related to caging or enclosures,” Shacker said.

To break it down, outside of the three municipalities, Shacker said in Newberry County there are 20,092 parcels that are zoned residential – all but 7,001 are zoned R2 Rural.

Shacker said a resident was concerned about lakes and how it would effect residents on or near the lake. During the work session, Shacker said the majority of parcels that are not R2 Rural and are zoned residential are on Lake Greenwood and Lake Murray. In addition, Shacker said there were a handful of smaller areas, ‘ribbons’ as he called them, that are zoned as Residential and not R2. An example he used were areas between Little Mountain and Prosperity and areas near Highway 34.

“We’ve got some single family residential in general residential zoning – those would be the areas that would be effected by this ordinance,” he said.

The reasoning for the ordinance, he added, began when a complaint was made by a resident relating to neighboring chickens. The piece of property, Shacker said, is zoned as single family residential (RSM) – residential single family has a minimum lot size of half an acre, RSV, another form of single family residential, is also half an acre and the minimum lot size for RSM is one third of an acre.

“That allows both stick built and manufactured housing. We found that right now you can’t have chickens, while within the City of Newberry you can have six and with the Town of Prosperity you can have six. Prosperity does have the caveat that your lot has to be a half acre or greater in size in order to have that six, but you can have those in those two municipalities,” Shacker said. “Quite honestly, the approach that the City of Newberry and Prosperity took was very reasonable and consistent with what other municipalities do across the state and that was sort of the logic behind six chickens.”

During the regular Council Meeting, Shacker told residents, many who requested Council to table the second reading during the public hearing, that the draft ordinance was created to correct a mistake.

When the ordinance was initially adopted, Shacker said the current County staff and Council were not on board at the time. He said they believed this was more than likely an oversight and developed the draft ordinance in front of Council as a way to recommend something to Council that would be reasonable and would allow a small number of chickens without impacting neighbors who don’t want the chickens near their property.

“Under the current zoning ordinance, chickens are not allowed on properties with that zoning and that was brought to our attention by a resident who had some concerns about a neighboring property owner who had chickens and pointed out that chickens are not allowed on that piece of property,” Shacker said. “We looked at that and said it was likely an oversight because the City of Newberry and the Town of Prosperity, who have their own zoning, allow six hens within those two cities.”

The ordinance would change the verbiage from no chickens to up to six chickens provided they are hens and in an enclosure – typically a chicken coop – no bigger than 250 square feet (language that could be changed) and other standards such as how close the coop can be to the property line.

“The whole idea here was to try to allow chickens, but also try to protect neighbors who maybe don’t want chickens right beside them in sort of a higher density environment. So we tried to strike that balance with the ordinance,” Shacker said.

Many who spoke during the public hearing felt the ordinance was just another rule the County was deciding to enforce. Some called the move a knee jerk reaction because one person out of 40,000 Newberry County residents complained. Others said the County would be making money off of the ordinance since residents would now be required to register and get permits to have their chickens – a permit application is $75.

At the conclusion of the public hearing and listening to what residents had to say, Council opted to postpone the second reading until the group’s second meeting in September to do additional research before moving forward.

Other business:

• Council reviewed and discussed an ordinance establishing a Building, Fire and Nuisance Codes Board of Appeals for Newberry County. It was recommended to Council to establish the board with seven members who would each serve three-year terms. Appointments would be made by members of Council. First reading of the ordinance was passed unanimously.
• Council recognized the following employees for their years of service and one employee retirement: Hannah Chapman (five years, Treasurer’s Office); Erika Moon (five years, Treasurer’s Office); Gary Ball (15 years, Facilities); Sharon McClanahan (20 years, Newberry County Sheriff’s Office); Judy Sanders (30 years, Magistrate); and Mike Pisano (Retirement, Public Works).
• Council unanimously approved the award for a bid for the full-depth repairs to Summerset Place to Steed Paving in the amount of $58,530.30.
• Councilman Johnny Mack Scurry appointed Tonya Lyles Dean to the Newberry County Memorial Hospital Board – Distrcit 6 and Councilman Travis Reeder appointed Denise Marshal to the NCMH Board – District 7.

Reach Kelly Duncan at 803-276-3122 ext. 1867 or kduncan@championcarolinas.com.