Lease Committee Meeting and Radio Interview

My dad leaving the lease committee meeting.

What a day... WPLN, Nashville Public Radio, broadcast our brief interview http://wpln.org/newstranscripts/?p=2531 this morning and the Lease Committee Meeting was this afternoon.

My job at the University is quite public and it was fun today to have people stop by & say they'd inadvertently heard the interview on NPR. We weren't sure when it would broadcast, so most everyone heard it just because they listen to NPR anyway.

The lease committee meeting was interesting and enjoyable. Interesting to me to be part of a process, and enjoyable because most of us were at ease while reasonable, natural conversation flowed. The meeting takes place in the "Regent's Room" - a very nice board meeting sort of place with a large center table. There were 2 chairs at the end of the table for Dad & I, microphones and 8 University representatives. Once more for the record, it's a very small town - if we didn't all know each other, we were certainly acquainted. If only I'd been bold enough to take pictures for the blog!

Prior to the meeting, my father, who is on my lease, wrote a very direct letter to the members of the lease committee with copies to me and the neighbor who complained about the chickens. In the meeting today he restated the contents of the letter - focusing mainly on the lease agreement - which prohibits livestock, but not poultry. (I deal with this issue in depth in June posts of the blog). He touched on the integrity of the complaint as well as the issue of ultimately creating backyard chicken policies on the Domain.

I spoke of my research into backyard chicken ordinances across the country and how I would like to help Sewanee develop and implement such policies. I questioned how many complaints the lease superintendent has received from my neighbor (not solely about me, but total). That information was not available, but there have been 3 complaints against me that I'm aware of and others not directed at me were acknowledged.

There were several valid questions asked about chickens and the keeping of them. The history of chickens on campus was pointed out. Others have been forced to remove chickens. "On what grounds?" my father asked (since it's not prohibited in the lease.) Because of the lease, we were told. The policy (which is not in writing as part of our lease agreement) goes back before our current lease superintendent.

The question of noise was raised by my father because that was the original complaint. No one questioned the fact that my 3 hens do not make sufficient noise for any reasonable person to justify a complaint.

Unfortunately only two members of the lease committee ended up coming to see my chickens in person. Others, I assume, relied on the blog. No one at the meeting appeared to question my particular setting. My feeling was more that they just weren't sure what to do about the topic in general.

After the meeting, I found that I had a voice mail from WPLN following up on the story.

This evening I received an email informing me "the Lease Committee deferred the question of chickens to the August Community Council meeting."

Good, I don't blame them. Pass the buck....