An original recommended motion from city staff suggested clarifying an existing ordinance that six hens may be kept in any-sized residential lot in any zone, including residential areas larger than 20,000-square-feet. The city said previous code, written in 2014, could be misread to suggest larger lots could keep more than six hens.

However, Springville City Administrator Patrick Monney said the Springville City Council discussed the hens’ situation in a work session last week and suggested the possibility of basing the chickens allowed on lot size.

“And the intent is not to take away anybody’s chicken rights,” said Monney, who emphasized nothing has been decided. “But it’s just to make it so that it works based on the size of lots that they have and the number of chickens that they’ll be able to use.”

When the ordinance was last implemented a decade ago, Monney said there were not as many tiny lots with housing duplexes as there are now, and that the council is trying to make things relevant for today.

“If you have a really, really small lot, you may not be able to have any (hens). We don’t know that yet,” he said. “But obviously, as the lots become larger, you can have four and then six and then eight or 10. I don’t know how the increments are going to work, but it’s going to be conducive to the size of lots.”

Residents who own chickens addressed the council in a public meeting Wednesday, with many emphasizing the importance of the right to own hens. Brandon Ashby said getting chickens to produce eggs has been “a huge blessing to his family.” 

“We really should maintain those rights,” he said. “And I’m not opposed to that being based on how much land people have and that kind of thing, because we don’t want to be a nuisance to neighbors.

“However, I’m not keen at all about (permitting people). I don’t see the need for that. … we want to keep the small town feel of Springville City. And the last thing that keeps a city’s small town feel is starting to regulate everything that people should have a right to already.”

Monney said the city will look to have a new proposal back to the council for consideration in March.