MANKATO — City leaders are set to decide Monday whether backyard chickens will be welcome in Mankato for the first time.
The topic was a major source of controversy in City Hall in 2009-10, when chicken lovers and chicken haters clashed over the course of multiple meetings. But based on discussions a month ago, the current City Council appears unanimously comfortable with hens joining humans within city limits.
There will still be one more opportunity for poultry opponents to block the proposed chicken ordinance. A public hearing is to be held on July 13 regarding the specific rules the council is expected to finalize Monday night, lifting a ban that has been in place since at least 1949.
“I think we should start with four,” Council member Jessica Hatanpa said at the May 26 meeting, referring to the number of hens people could keep behind their single-family home. “Just give it a whirl, and we can always make changes.”
The only council member who experienced the chicken wars 17 years ago was of a similar opinion.
“I don’t think we need to overregulate chickens,” Council President Mike Laven said.
With others on the seven-member governing body also on board, city staff set to work drafting the detailed ordinance. It sets the maximum number of chickens at four, allows them at houses (including rental houses if the property owner agrees) but not at apartment buildings, and specifies the size limits and locations of chicken coops and chicken runs. It makes clear that only female chickens will be permitted, avoiding the early-morning noise complaints that would likely come with roosters.
If the council finds the ordinance acceptable, the public hearing will be held at the council’s next scheduled meeting. And if public outrage does not arise at that meeting, the ordinance would presumably receive final approval and be published in The Free Press soon after. Thirty days after publication, chickens would officially be legal residents of the city of Mankato.