Urban chicken farmers want to fight new restrictions on flocks

DES MOINES, Iowa — Embracing the Iowa farm life is a conscious choice.

“You have to be connected to your food source,” says urban farmer Ed Fallon.

You’d be hard-pressed to find a duo more connected than Fallon and Kathy Byrnes

“This is part of sustainable and responsible living and we’re super proud to be a part of it at all,” Byrnes said.

From the food they grow to the livestock they raise, evidence of their mission is on the dinner table every night.

Everything they would normally buy in a store is grown in the backyard. From chickens to rabbits, seeds to corn, everything is grown in the heart of Des Moines in the Sherman Hill neighborhood.

“It’s also about freedom. You know, we value freedom in this country and people should be free to live the lives that they live, provided they don’t ruin their neighbors or their community.”

During the special meeting of the city council on Monday, Linda Westergaard, councilor for district II, pointed out complaints about noise pollution and odor that were expressed by residents who live next to chicken flocks.

“There are many people with chickens. There are also many people who live next to the chickens and roosters and who are disturbed in their peace and quiet,” Westergaard said during the meeting.

During the meeting, a vote was taken on an amendment to the existing city ordinance, reducing the number of chickens in backyards from 30 to 12 and restricting all roosters within city limits.

“I’ve never seen anything this devious. Not a single chicken person was alerted. It was a whistleblower who called me and said, hey, you need to know this is going on,” Fallon said.

City Manager Scott Saunders waived the required three readings on the amendment if the council voted unanimously to change the ordinance. Ward III Councilman Josh Mandelbaum opted to hit the brakes.

“I’m hoping we can slow this down and we can have some conversations, so I plan to vote no as it stands right now,” Mandelbaum said.

The council plans a second reading at its next meeting on August 5.

“Right now I’m focused on educating seven people on this and that’s the seven members of the Des Moines City Council and four of them have been to our farm, including Linda Westergaard. They’ve seen what we’re doing here, they all seemed very supportive of it and when we proposed in 2020 that the city create a food security task force to get more urban agriculture going, they unanimously passed,” Fallon said.