Happy The Donkey

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Auburn CA

Happy (see photo below) is a friendly donkey who lives on an acre or so of land owned by Lisa and her family in Meadow Vista, a small rural community a half-dozen miles east on Interstate 80 from our place in Auburn. I know about Happy because Lisa is employed by the same organization that I volunteer at once a week. Living on some land larger than a city lot and in an area zoned Agricultural-Residential, they have other livestock, just as many folks do around this part of the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. In fact, that's why they purchased the property in the first place.

One of the reasons they acquired Happy is that (and this may surprise you), donkeys are very effective at predator control. Yes, we do have predators here ... coyotes, skunks who love chickens and ducks, bobcats, and even bears and mountain lions. Additionally, they can ride Happy, which can be a lifesaver for her son who has asthma. When they go out for a walk, perhaps down one of the many canals here that date from the California Gold Rush, they take Happy so their son can ride back if he has a sudden attack.

Donkeys are territorial, and they will bray if another animal invades their space. It is loud, sharp, and lasts perhaps 5 seconds. It is effective, and the County Agricultural Office recommends them for predator control.

Unfortunately, "doing what comes naturally" is what got Happy (and Lisa and her family) into a bit of a problem. It seems that a nearby but not adjacent neighbor said that he was being awakened at night as Happy was doing his job. Over a period of months, these awakenings apparently mounted up to 21 times. The neighbor is a contractor, and charges his clients $100/hour for his services. He decided that it took him an hour to go back to sleep after Happy "did his thing" and rid his space of the skunk or coyote, and that cost him an equivalent hour of work the next day. Consequently, he began sending demands for $100 per nighttime bray to Lisa.

Well, these mounted up, of course, and when they had reached the $2,100 mark, the neighbor filed a claim in Small Claims Court. Meanwhile, Lisa and her family had had Happy, shall we say, "made neutral" (kind of an "ouch" for Happy), and subsequently had his hormone levels checked to assure that he really was "neutral," in the hopes that it would reduce his tendency to bray at night, but not so much that he would no longer be a predator control. They even tried a shock collar, which was not very effective. Alas, it appeared that any bray at all created yet another letter demanding $100, because hormones or not, with or without the shock collar, Happy would bray when his space was invaded.

The Trial

OK, Small Claims Court isn't exactly a trial in the Perry Mason sense, but let's just go with the flow here. The case was the first on the docket, and the judge is "Pro Tem" which means he's a local attorney who sits in and helps the County out by hearing these small cases (and for which I imagine he gets paid). My wife and I were there, we too live on about 5 acres zoned A-R. While we don't have a donkey (right now), we have had all sorts of animals as the kids were growing up.

The contractor presented his case (see above paragraphs), billing it as a "lost wages" case. Lisa presented her case: Their land use zoning permits as many as 3 equines (of any flavor), some number of fowl, and various other livestock and animals. A multitude of her neighbors have signed onto a statement that Happy does not disturb them and that Meadow Vista is a rural community with appropriate zoning. In fact, Happy is not the only donkey in the neighborhood.

The judge finally said that he didn't really buy the argument of $100 lost wages per bray, but "how about $750 settlement" which was a bit shocking since it was obvious to even non-lawyers that an exchange of money was not going to solve this problem. Lisa perservered that this was no solution, and he ultimately took it under submission. We all hoped at the time that he would discuss this case with a real judge before rendering a decision, and it appears he did.

His final decision, filed a couple of weeks later, was that Happy was clearly not a public nuisance since there were a number of donkeys in the neighborhood and no one was complaining about any of them. He found against the neighbor and in favor of Happy on the grounds that Lisa and her family were well within the legal zoning restrictions for livestock on their property, and had made significant attempts to mitigate the situation. All in all, a win for Lisa, her family, Happy, and the neighborhood. Moreover, it was a win for all of us who live in neighborhoods with similar zoning.

The Other Cases

The case of Happy The Donkey was first on the docket, and my wife and I were very curious and stayed for the remainder of the morning's schedule in the court (we retired folks have those kinds of options!) Each (and every) one of the remaining cases were clearly resolvable with an exchange of money, possibly not to the satisfaction of both parties, but nevertheless, the case would be settled. A contractor and his client -- the client believed the work wasn't being done, and hired others, and the contractor said it was being done and wanted to be paid. A number of automobile dealers in some conflict with a customer. A dispute within a family over a car. Many, in fact, were settled between the parties in the hallway, and all the judge did was to ratify the settlement. Standing alone was Happy, The Donkey, a case that would not ever be resolved by the exchange of any amount of money.

The Real Issue

The real issue is, of course, land use planning and zoning, and a number of people around and even outside the country who are in similar circumstances as Lisa and her family have taken a strong intrest in this matter. Lisa's neighbor said he had lived on his property for 14 years. During that time, it has always been zoned as Agricultural-Residential. Also during that time, the population density in Meadow Vista has grown quite slowly ... we've lived in this area for almost 30 years now, and Meadow Vista looks pretty much as it did when we first arrived -- a single road, about a mile of commercial enterprises and an elementary school. There is a new school at the bottom end of town and a new little market at the top end. Despite this, it is unmistakably A-R in character, just as the General Plan defines it.

General Plans for an area have a lifetime measured in decades. They have to be that long-lived because people use them as the basis for high-value, long-term decisions. If you purchase a lot and build a house, because the very large, vacant piece of property behind your house made it attractive to you, you will want to check the zoning on it (or buy it). If it is zoned O-R ("Oil Refinery"), eventually, you are likely to have a brightly lit and smelly industrial complex to look at.

We all think the Judge Pro Tem made the right decision and are greatly relieved. Just like us nearly 30 years ago, Lisa and her family purchased their property because they wanted to have livestock and animals, and they depended on the area's General Plan and land use zoning designation to assure they would be within the law in doing so. Andrea and I also learned that Small Claims Court is for issues and disputes that have a monetary resolution. Her neighbor's claim that a lost hour of sleep equaled a lost hour of work is pretty flimsy, at best. But even if it were true, demanding $2,100 for "past brays" does nothing to resolve his problem.

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