Farm animals at home? Butler County commissioners confused by some recent requests

The Butler County commissioners recently balked at some proposed rural zoning amendments as premature. One of the proposed changes would allow chickens in residential areas. Staff photo by Greg Lynch

The Butler County commissioners recently balked at some proposed rural zoning amendments as premature. One of the proposed changes would allow chickens in residential areas. Staff photo by Greg Lynch

The Butler County commissioners recently balked at some proposed rural zoning amendments, such as above-ground pool regulations, as overreaching.

The commissioners were taken by surprise at a recent meeting when they were asked to approve zoning amendments that would impose the same regulations for above and in-ground pools, allow chickens and other small farm animals in residential areas and ban parking on residential lawns, among other changes.

Commissioner Don Dixon said they were completely “out of the loop” on the changes.

“If there is a real problem I think we need to understand what the problems are and that these aren’t one-off kind of issues. Treating above ground pools like you would treat an in-ground pool, tell me the logic in that…,” Dixon said. “Those are the kind of questions that when you look at changing these rules, to fix one problem that somebody comes up with, you have to look at what impact it has on everybody else.”

Development Director David Fehr told this news organization that periodically the county goes through the zoning books and try to clarify, update and sometimes add changes suggested by the townships. The proposed zoning changes — the commissioners denied the amendments — would only affect residents and businesses within Hanover, Lemon, Madison, Milford, Oxford and Ross townships where the county controls zoning. The other townships and cities handle their own zoning regulations.

Commissioner T.C. Rogers said he believes people move to rural areas with the expectation they will have more freedom in using their property as they wish.

“Part of the reason you live in the country is you can have a little more flexibility with your property than you can in a subdivision,” Rogers said. “On several of these things I just have never heard anybody bring them up to me.”

Fehr sat down with this news organization to explain their reasoning for the changes. The chickens and other small farm animal amendments for example, were mainly to help out the 4-H families. Current zoning only allows farm animals on residential lots with at least five acres and then only one animal per acre is allowed.

“It’s the 4-H projects, we have people who say, ‘Oh my daughter is in 4-H, she’s going to have rabbits for a few months,’ and we tell people you need a five-acre tract of ground,” Fehr said. “They say, ‘That’s ridiculous, it’s 4-H’.”

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The above-ground pool amendment came about because the code does not address them at all, which means if people wanted to put that type of pool in their front yard they could. The regulations would not impact blow-up kiddie pools.

Dixon still said he doesn’t like that rule.

“Do you want to make everybody get a permit to put an above-ground pool?” he said. “You just have to be careful what you’re doing.”

One of the suggested changes would actually save people money — this one was suggested by Madison and Oxford townships. It would increase the maximum size and decrease the setback requirements for accessory buildings like garages. Fehr said over the past three years, had the changes been in place, there would have been a 55 percent reduction of zoning appeals, a process that costs homeowners $500.

Dixon said the next step will be to convene a committee comprised of staff, stakeholders from the community and for the commissioners to consider the proposed changes.

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