Morgan Hill
– Town and country clashed this week – and the country lost.
So did the neighborhood children, elderly ladies, and moms and
babies who stop daily to visit and give treats to five goats cared
for by Frank Dutra on Diana Avenue.
After several neighbors complained about the animals he’s taken
care of for decades, Dutra trucked off the goats, three horses and
a mule to a friend’s 20-acre ranch near the Sacramento Delta
Wednesday night, bringing the property into compliance with city
ordinances.
Morgan Hill – Town and country clashed this week – and the country lost.
So did the neighborhood children, elderly ladies, and moms and babies who stop daily to visit and give treats to five goats cared for by Frank Dutra on Diana Avenue.
After several neighbors complained about the animals he’s taken care of for decades, Dutra trucked off the goats, three horses and a mule to a friend’s 20-acre ranch near the Sacramento Delta Wednesday night, bringing the property into compliance with city ordinances.
“If I don’t do this the city will take them and bill me,” Dutra said Wednesday afternoon.
While livestock has lived on the property at 815 Diana, between Butterfield Boulevard and U.S. Highway 101, for many years – illegally since an ordinance requiring no more than two large animals on at least an acre was passed in the 1960s – the city did not bother them until complaints were filed.
“These goats are like pets to me,” Dutra said. “I don’t understand why they are doing this to me.”
Dutra said he knows the horses are gone for good – he was just tending them for a friend. But, he hopes to get the goats back soon. Dutra is considering appealing to the City Council for understanding and possibly a variance.
While neither Dutra nor Bryan Trumpp, whose family owns the property, know who complained, they think it could be one of the people who moved into some new adjacent houses.
“They come down from San Jose looking for a rural life,” Trumpp said. “Why move to the country if you then complain about country ways?”
Dutra said one woman who owns a condominium behind the property asked to buy a small piece of the site.
“She wanted to put in a swimming pool,” Dutra said, “but the owners said no.”
Dutra thinks the woman may have been one of the complainers.
The problem started when land east of the Trumpp/Dutra property was annexed into the city limits in the 1980s and houses were built close to the pasture. The Trumpp property had been the eastern edge of the city limits since incorporation in November 1906.
“They built around me,” Dutra said. “I didn’t build around them.”
Ryan Martin, city code enforcement officer, said the first complaint was filed in April.
“We had more than one formal complaint,” Martin said, “and more than one informal complaint, too.”
Daniel Pina, the city’s animal control officer, told Martin he had a few informal complaints as well.
Trumpp said most of their neighbors in all kinds of houses, new and old, favor keeping the goats who were there first.
“We have a petition signed by almost every neighbor,” he said.
Claudia Marquez, 12, her little sister Sandra, 9, and brother Joel, just starting kindergarten at 5, brought leaves and apples for the goats.
“They love us a lot,” Claudia said. “We feed them everyday and they come to say hello. They are not smelly at all.”
Removing all the animals from the seven-acre parcel is more than the city required. According to Planning Manager Jim Rowe, who spent considerable effort Wednesday interpreting ordinances covering animal possession, Dutra could have kept any two of the animals plus his dog.
Rowe said the only way more animals, livestock or pets, can be allowed is if a variance, which requires a $3,000 filing fee, is granted by the City Council.
“It’s unbelievable,” Trumpp said of the city ordinance that treats family pets and livestock differently. “You can have five dogs on a quarter-acre but you can’t have five goats on seven acres.”
Neighbor Natasha Wist is also upset over Dutra’s animal troubles.
“Why is it that the general plan can be amended (to build new auto dealerships between Walgreens and the neighborhood houses instead of multi-family housing) but these people can’t get a simple permit,” Wist asked.
