Kathy Sarkisian's attorneys at Pacific Legal Foundation tell AFN that she went to local authorities and received a permit to raise the chickens. Everything was good to go until a week later, when zoning officials informed Sarkisian her permit was being revoked because a neighbor objected.
"The issue really comes down to chickens," says Pacific Legal Foundation attorney David Deerson. "But more substantially it comes down to the government's responsibility to make decisions based on health and safety concerns – and not yield its decision-making authority to the whims of neighbors,"
The City of the Village of Douglas gives neighbors complete power to veto chicken permits for any reason – or no reason at all. Moreover, adjacent landowners must be notified about chicken permit applications within 21 days of submission. If any neighbor objects, the permit "shall not be granted, with no right of appeal."
Pacific Legal Foundation argues the government cannot give a resident's neighbors an unreviewable veto over reasonable and legal uses of what a person can and cannot do on their own property. Nor can the government, PFL argues, take away an individual's property rights without informing them and giving them a chance to object.
According to Deerson, "Douglas received a single complaint from a neighbor saying that she didn't like the chickens; and without any notice, without any process, and without any right of appeal, they revoked the permit from Sarkisian and told her that her chickens were illegal, that she was in violation of the city code, and that for every day that she continued to maintain chickens on her property they would fine her $300."
Sarkisian spent more than $20,000 preparing her property for the chickens, including building a chicken coop and buying the chickens.
PLF has filed a lawsuit against Douglas in the federal district court in the Western District of Michigan, alleging that Douglas violated Sarkisian's civil and constitutional rights.
