Given the current state of affairs, access to affordable and healthy food is becoming a national issue encroaching on our local community. With supply chain disruptions and price gouging egg prices have nearly tripled for many commercial food suppliers. A simple way of protecting one’s own access to fresh food is allowing one to grow and harvest his or her own food. We feel that now is an appropriate time for the Village of St. Johnsville to allow members of the community to own a small, well maintained flock of backyard chickens,

Allowing residents to own a small flock of hens has a myriad of benefits, including:

 Ecological benefits: Backyard chicken act as nature’s composters; readily consuming leftover food scraps and redirecting a significant amount of waste away from landfills. One of the byproducts of chickens is chicken manure, which is an excellent organic fertilizer for use in gardens and lawns. Owning chickens can also contribute to reducing the use of synthetic chemicals such as fertilizers. Shifting egg production to the backyard would eliminate significant pollution caused by factory egg farming.

Food security: By allowing community members to raise a small backyard flock of chickens, it makes a readily available source of healthy protein accessible to many who might otherwise struggle to regularly provide this nutrition for their families. This would also lessen the dependence on cruel and environmentally unfriendly practice of egg farming.

Lifelong learning: Teaching our children and grandchildren to raise and watch over a small flock of backyard chickens is an excellent educational opportunity. It provides the chance to foster responsibility by caring for a living creature and instill an appreciation for where food comes from.

Many of our neighboring towns, villages and cities allow for a resident to have a coop with reasonable (or none at all) limitations.

We propose passing a Village ordinance to allow residents to own a reasonable number of chickens, with limitations on quantity, housing, setbacks and other health and safety concerns provided by the Village.