Elegant solution found to silence din at north county property
raising 499 roosters
Though the term
”
illegal cock fighting
”
was never uttered, San Benito supervisors once again were
confronted Tuesday by angry residents saddled with a neighbor who
raises hundreds of crowing, screeching roosters, birds primarily
used as dispensable creatures in illegal cockfighting rings.
It isn’t the first time the board has had to figure out how to
curb what is ostensibly a legitimate rural ag business in a rural
county dependent on agricultural production. San Benito seems to be
a magnet for people who raise fighting cocks, and the board has had
many a complaint about such businesses over the years.
Elegant solution found to silence din at north county property raising 499 roosters
Though the term “illegal cock fighting” was never uttered, San Benito supervisors once again were confronted Tuesday by angry residents saddled with a neighbor who raises hundreds of crowing, screeching roosters, birds primarily used as dispensable creatures in illegal cockfighting rings.
It isn’t the first time the board has had to figure out how to curb what is ostensibly a legitimate rural ag business in a rural county dependent on agricultural production. San Benito seems to be a magnet for people who raise fighting cocks, and the board has had many a complaint about such businesses over the years.
Especially when that business encroaches on its neighbors. Residents of rural Lone Tree Road and Pan Tempo Way told the board they have to put up with a rooster farm of 499 birds – one rooster short of the county ordinance that requires a use-permit in an ag-productive zone. Now, say the residents, their neighbor recently installed a flood light system that confuses the birds at night, making them cock-a-doodle-doo incessantly throughout the night.
The supervisors came prepared: outgoing Interim County Counsel Claude Biddle had drawn up a new ordinance to solve the problem. The new ordinance says a resident cannot have more than 12 fowl. For 13 or more, breeders have to get a poultry permit. Four-H and youth projects are exempt.
The added detail, however, was that anyone with 499 crowing roosters has two years to conform to the new law, and it soon became apparent where the loophole had come from.
“People in my district raise bantam roosters for shows,” said Supervisor Reb Monaco. “I have a level of concern that we are adding another level of bureaucracy. I just don’t want to see a tremendous layer of bureaucracy.”
“I live right across the street, and now they’re adding lights,” said resident Dave Bell when it was time for public input. “They go crowing at 2 a.m.! For 24 months we’re supposed to put up with this?”
Other neighbors painted vivid visions of harassment in describing their day-to-day living with the classic neighbor from hell.
“Everyone is so afraid of the individual who lives there,” said one resident. He went on to relate an episode when the rooster farm owner stalked one of the homeowners and then called the sheriff to complain that neighborhood children had spray painted one of his landscape rocks. It turned out a county road crew had marked the rock to stake a reference point.
“It’s getting worse,” said the neighbor. “The roosters go all night because they think it’s daytime (with the new flood lights). Nothing’s been done in a year, and now we have to wait?”
Cock fighting is an illegal, underground gambling blood sport that pits rooster against rooster in a fight to the death. Animal rights activists familiar with the brutal methods of cock fighting say flood lighting the roosters in their open hutches during the night is a subtle form of torture that confounds the creatures to the point of madness. The practice makes for a meaner, more aggressive rooster in the ring, where the birds are outfitted with razor-sharp blades attached to their talons, or spurs, near their feet.
The illegal sport is popular in Texas, the Philippines and parts of the California Central Valley. Louisiana and New Mexico are the only two states left that haven’t outlawed the practice.
Residents near the rooster farm were complaining that the planning department, responsible for enforcing local zoning and nuisance laws, have done nothing. It was at that point in the public discussion that Supervisor Pat Loe proposed a brilliant solution.
“We have a Dark Skies ordinance,” she said.
It seemed the entire chambers had a collective, silent epiphany after she said it.
“I didn’t know that,” said county attorney Biddle.
The Dark Skies ordinance was adopted by the previous board in an effort to curtail light pollution that was quickly obliterating the night sky. Nature lovers and astronomers alike applauded the resolution it passed several years ago. The ordinance places restrictions on how much light can leak out of commercial properties and even private residences at night. Street lamps placed within unincorporated county boundaries, for example, must have an overhead cone attached over the lamp in order to prevent light interference of the night sky. Though the old board urged the Hollister City Council to adopt such an ordinance, city officials have yet to act.
The board adopted the resolution that Biddle and others had concocted, but they also directed staff to look into the enforcement of the Dark Skies ordinance in order to impart a modicum of relief to neighbors living near the cock farm. County planning employee Stacey Watson, a code enforcer attending the meeting, told Supervisor Loe she would investigate the property in question on a possible Dark Skies violation.
