Chickens and Georgia Urban Farm Bill

Yes, yes, this blog has fallen into an inadvertent hibernation. That happens with blogs. It's Springtime in the Midwest, so spending stretches of several hours online is less appealing now as it in, say, January. But we haven't stopped working on local food issues.

One story playing out here in Muncie, as it is in many, many perhaps into the hundreds, of municipalities across the country is whether keeping chickens within city limits should be legal. This Washington Post article touches upon several of the issues.

The Georgia House of Representatives is closing in on passing a state level urban farm bill package. HR 842 would "protect the right to grow food crops and raise small animals on private property so long as such crops and animals are used for human consumption by the occupants, gardeners, or raisers and their households and not for commercial purposes" across the state. These protections would preempt the often drawn-out, often sensational and tiresome city council debates over issues like chicken keeping. Enforcement would depend upon local nuisance laws that are already in place. This editorial from the Athens Banner-Herald sums up the bill.

Again, we keep turning back to the question: Why not Indiana?