Durham HENS is planning a major show of support at tonight’s City Council public hearing on a proposal to allow backyard hens.

The meeting starts at 7 p.m. at City Hall on Mangum Street, beginning with Mayor Bell's State of the City annual report and a few other matters before the hearing.

Local organizer and former council member Frank Hyman sent an e-mail this morning encouraging supporters to pick up “one of our very cool” Durham HENS T-shirts (Healthy Eggs in Neighborhoods Soon) at Barnes Supply on Ninth Street for $15 and wear it to the hearing. The money will help with education efforts, he says.

At some point organizers plan to ask all supporters to stand up and be counted. Councilmembers are hearing opposition from some constituents, Hyman says, despite newspaper stories showing other cities aren't having problems with backyard hens. As my colleague Jim Wise reports below, Councilman Eugene Brown wants a decision tonight. 

Read Barry Saunders take on Durham's chicken fight here.

City Council member Eugene Brown, in a Sunday memo to his colleagues, urged bringing the long-running chicken question to resolution when it meets tonight.

Whether to allow city residents to raise hens in their yards has absorbed hours of council meeting time over the past two months, and Brown wrote that that may have given the council an unfavorable image among the taxpaying and voting public.

In part, Brown wrote: "Apparently, [Monday night] our attorney's office will present a compromise to us on some of these issues which have been discussed. This is good for although this is an important item,it may only affect a very small number of our citizens, and we also have more important items to deal with, especially in this economy. If at all possible, I believe we should reach a decision on the hen issue tomorrow night. After a while the public may ascertain that we are only engaged in trivia pursuits, the "fiddling while Rome burned" syndrome. So, regardless if we fry it, scramble it, or poach it, tomorrow night we need to pass it,or close the door on the chicken coop debate."

The council meets at 7 p.m.

City Council member Farad Ali on this afternoon's work session:

"We have an economy that's going to hell and we're talking about chickens."

With little discussion and by a 7-0 vote, the Durham City Council approved beekeeping inside the city limits Monday night.

Then they spent more than half an hour talking about chickens before voting to put off voting until February.

Durham’s pro-poultry contingent wants a delay on a vote scheduled for Monday’s City Council meeting.

The city is poised to join the ranks of the chicken friendly after the planning commission voted 10-4 to allow up to 10 chickens per property. (Read our most recent story here.)

But former Councilman Frank Hyman, speaking for Durham HENS (Healthy Eggs in Neighborhoods Soon), says the holidays have hurt efforts to guarantee a good turnout for Monday's meeting. In an e-mail to City Manager Tom Bonfield, he asks for a postponement.

Planning Director Steve Medlin says since the meeting has been advertised under state law the council’s best move is to open the hearing and continue it to a later date. (See agenda item No. 18 here.)

City Councilman Mike Woodard says he’ll propose a delay until Feb. 2. That should give Hyman and company enough time to get their ... uh, chicks in a row.