Jan 30

Written by: Steve Erbach
Friday, January 30, 2009 11:32 PM

Former Appleton alderman, candidate for state assembly, and proprietor of the excellent FoxPolitics.net, Jo Egelhoff, called me Thursday night to ask for some additional details on the Public Services and Safety Committee meeting of Tuesday.  She wrote a commentary on the rooster squabble at her site and, as usual, invited comments.  Here's what I wrote:

Jo, 

The most interesting piece of the transcription was spoken by Mr. R, the owner of Jake, the rooster. It throws more light on this situation than all the rest, I think. It came during Mr. R's first presentation, directly after Mr. C spoke:

But I have been a good neighbor. I've never thrown a pop can in their yard. That's not what we're about. I agree the noise issue, and I think the proposal of the ordinance should be a noise issue, not a rooster issue. You're not addressing the problem. You can get rid of a rooster. I can play a rooster tape all day long. You're not addressing the fact that it's a noise issue.

For Mr. and Mrs. C it's been a noise issue all along. Now, apparently, Mr. R agrees with them. Of course, he wanted the city to make a refinement of the noise ordinance, rather than offering to mitigate it himself in any way. The Council is "not addressing the problem," he said. As if it's the Council's fault that his neighbors are at wits' end about the rooster.

On top of that, saying, "I can play a rooster tape all day long," proves the point that the C's made; i.e., that Mr. R is immature. I have to agree with them after hearing him say that in public. It was a rich combination of petulance, disingenuousness, and vindictiveness, worthy of a 13-year-old.

After the Public Services and Safety Committee made its recommendation, Mr. R told Appleton Post-Crescent reporter, Duke Behnke, that Jake would be stuffed and mounted in his house. Mr. R's wife (writing as RoosterMom) apparently thought better of that idea and posted several comments to Behnke's story on the Post-Crescent site in which she said that, instead, Jake would be sent to live on a farm. I don't know about you, but the R's seem to have gotten some enjoyment out of this imbroglio.

Update:  I just remembered that Alderman Mark Lange piped up with a suggestion during the meeting that would have "addressed the problem" of the noisy rooster: surgically remove the rooster's ability to crow!

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