Alderman Bocking at Urban Chickens

By Laura Oppenheimer in Food on Oct 9, 2007 2:10PM

Southwest Side Alderman Lona Lane (18th) isn't feeling like chicken tonight, chicken tonight. She's introduced an ordinance to amend a four-year-old pigeon ban to include chickens. The ordinance would make it a crime to "import, sell, own, keep or otherwise possess any live chicken" in a district zoned for residential use. It would also require a separate food establishment license for those who want to slaughter chickens.

"I was alerted that some of the people are cutting their heads off in some kind of ritual, letting them run around, then dumping them in hot water, plucking their feathers and cooking them," Lane told the Sun-Times. "They're throwing carcasses in the garbage."

We've seen the fate that can become some of these chickens, and it isn't a particularly happy one, but at the same time, does this really require a ban on all chickens? After all, chickens can make great pets and the urban ones are especially hip these days. In light of the fact that Lane's staff "could not immediately identify either neighbors who had complained about pet chickens or the residents accused of keeping them," this all just sounds like a lot of needless squawking to us.

Image via Backyard Chicken.