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quail is a fowl by the City's definition of every bird being a fowl, and the hawk is killing quails <br />in the mew and they are both fowls, then this would be equivalent to cockfighting sincere there <br />in one fowl killing another fowl. He inquired if a cougars is a cat or a wolf a dog. <br />Mr. Carl inquired, if the safety and property issues are known in advance, whether the City or the <br />applicant would incur liability should there be an attack, should the applicant be required to carry <br />a large insurance policy, and what ongoing responsibility would the City have in notifying the <br />future surrounding property owners that the permit is in place. He was concerned that the <br />keeping of hawks would jeopardize pending real estate transactions and noted that this issue <br />affected the entire neighborhood. <br />Mr. Carl indicated that all the development plans the City approves have conditions of approval <br />that talk about protecting young raptors and not moving nests. In this situation, an activity where <br />a wild raptor is captured, using if for killing other animals, is being enabled. He indicated that <br />this appeared contradictory. <br />Mr. Carl then discussed hunting limits within the City limits. He noted that there were several <br />emails in the public record which discussed the applicant tossing live quail out of season and <br />without a license to the hawk in the hawk enclosure. He inquired whether that was hunting <br />without a license. He noted that UC Davis and Lindsay Wildlife Museum used dead prey. <br />Mr. Carl stated that is a Planning precedent issue. He believed the question of whether a caged <br />wild animal should be acceptable in a residential neighborhood should be a clear yes-or-no issue. <br />He referred to staff's definition of "fowl" with parentheses in terms of small and large and noted <br />that there was not an "i.e." or "e.g." that state that these are examples of fowl. He noted that the <br />Hatsushi property is less than 1,000 feet away and was confused by that in that "hawk" is now <br />considered a fowl on this property and disagreed with the discussion held earlier in the evening. <br />Mr. Carl believed the question of sunset provisions should be clearly addressed. He noted that <br />several friends of his had wished to speak but had been intimidated and did not want to risk some <br />of their standing; they were concerned about the animal rights issues. They believed that <br />because the animals could not speak for themselves, it would be up to the humans to determine <br />whether this was a proper practice. <br />Mr. Carl stated that the applicant holds power over the Planning Commission's positions and is a <br />titular head over City staff. He indicated that the Planning Commissioners should take the data <br />from both sides to determine what the truth is as objectively as possible. <br />Bill Rose noted that he was not a neighbor of the applicant but was along-time bird-watcher; he <br />noted that much of current knowledge about raptors was due to the falconers. He noted that they <br />had rehabilitated injured birds and that any responsible falconer would not fly his or her bird in a <br />residential neighborhood. He noted that attacks are generally provoked by some action, such as <br />getting too close to a nest, and added that because a Chihuahua resembled the hawks' natural <br />prey, he would not take a Chihuahua into the wild. He noted that raptors were wild birds, not <br />domesticated animals. <br />EXCERPTS: PLANNING COMMISSION MINUTES, December 12, 2007 Page 9 of 15 <br />