1) The USDA (or was it the MDA?) is in the process of changing a regulation in Michigan that requires all livestock to have identification ear tags (and not just animals being imported into Michigan) in order to keep records on disease such as scrapie (the version of mad-cow that goats and sheep can get). In addition, entities such as the Ingham County animal shelter will be required to slaughter any un-tagged goats they pick up.
The King Has Goat Ears
Learn more
Katarina Jovanovic Unlike un-registered dogs, which get impounded and eventually re-homed, goats will get impounded and slaughtered, with no option of re-homing. The animal shelter does not want to be responsible for "disposing" of the animals and also doesn't want to get a bad rap. Having to slaughter someone's untagged pet goat would be a public-relations nightmare! Furthermore, even if we specifically state in our goat ordinance that "ALL GOATS MUST HAVE IDENTIFYING EAR TAGS" a lot of people won't pay attention to the rules...and as a result, their animal could get needlessly slaughtered.

2) The Ingham County Animal Shelter is already under-funded and under-staffed. Allowing any new "critter" in the county will inevitably make more work for them. Regardless of how clearly spelled-out the regulations are in the goat ordinance, many people will obtain goats without ever reading the regulations.  A possible way to "pay-back" the animal shelter for having to deal with goats will be to require a licensing fee (like a dog license).

The plan is to collect more information on the USDA regulation and figure out the issues with the animal shelter and/or licensing fees. Then we will meet with the Animal Control Advisory Board again in late March (they only meet every other month). If the advisory board approves the updated resolution, then we can go to the Law Enforcement Committee to get the resolution passed (hopefully).