ERIC BRAZIL

DECEMBER 19, l999

RARE PARROT BREEDERS RUFFLE SOME FEATHERS UP NORTH

NEARBY TURKEY RANCH WANTS COUPLE'S USE PERMIT YANKED

The Parrot Preservation Society is up against the wall in a struggle with Mendocnio County ranchers and powerful neighbors to preserve its Point Arena breeding and research 'ranch'.

"They may have to handcuff both of us, and we'll spend our Christmas in jail", said bird breeder Barbara Gould. "I'm a conservation breeder, and I've never thought of myself as an activist," but with her family's life's work on the line, she's ready to fight, she said.

At issue is whether breeding endangered South American parrots and macaws to maintain a viable gene pool is an agricultural use or - as county planners contend- more akin to a dog grooming salon.

Mendocino County supervisors will vote the parrots up or out Monday morning at a rare emergency meeting.

Barbara Gould, the nonprofit's embattled founder, is aggrieved because she believes her operation is the innocent victim of Mendocino County politics.

"Before we purchased our property, on April 6, the county people said 'great', and that no use permit was required for our birds," Gould said. But "forces were at work against us before the ink was dry on our escrow agreement'.

Gould said she and her artist husband, Geoffrey, moved their 120 birds from Arizona, where the operation had been established for 26 years, to Point Arena because growth had turned Phoenix into 'a solar collector," with a climate now less than ideal for the birds.

The 16.4 acre ranch two miles north of Point Arena is zoned for agriculture, and Gould said planners and the real estate people she dealt with assured her the parrot facility was a permissible land use.

But the planners apparently had second thoughts. In October, the Mendocino County Planning Department issued an order prohibiting the use of the property for parrot breeding and research. The Goulds have appealed the order; hence, Monday's 9am hearing.

In its notice to the Goulds, the county said it is prepared to take them to court if they don't go gently.

Owners of the nearby Nicholas turkey breeding farm had objected to the parrots on the grounds that they might pose a health risk to their turkeys. The prominent Stornetta dairying family, which leases the land to Nicholas, backed their objections.

But Mendocino County Supervisor David Colfax, who called the emergency meeting, said the Nicholas and Stornetta families' objections are irrelevant. The planning commission's anti-parrot decision will be difficult to overturn, he added.

"The basic complaint is that they are in violation of our ordinances. This is not an appropriate use in an agricultural zoned area. It's as simple as that, said Colfax, of Booneville.

The blue and gold Ara Ararauna parrots, and scarlet and hyacinth macaws that occupy the Gould's aviaries are worth $1500 to $10,000 retail.

But Gould said, "The idea that we're a pet store is all wrong. I dont retail. I do not do grooming. I dont do sales and service. Pet stores dont keep guard dogs and dont refuse sales. I'm an agricultural use, and we had the blessing of planning and zoning until five days after we started moving in."

Gould said she only wholesales birds through a single outlet, in Nebraska, and "I'm lucky if I can make the grain bill".

The Goulds had planned to call UC-Davis avian expert Professor George West to testify on their behalf, but he has notified them that Christmas obligations will keep him home on Monday. In a letter to the Goulds, West says the county's defining of agricultuire as applying only to food and fiber is inconsistent, becasue it regards keeping miniature horses, miniature pigs and llamas as agricultural uses.

Attorney William Phillips of Healdsburg, who represents the Goulds, acknowledged that " I dont feel we will prevail on Monday.

note- Mr. Brazil must have interviewed Colfax on this matter. We did not feel that we would 'lose' on Monday, only that this was a step that must be taken to proceed with our claims.