Which Comes First? The chicken, the egg, or permission from the city?

I live in a small town within the Twin Cities metropolitan area.  I just moved here a couple of months ago (Sept 2010).  In my old neighborhood (3.5 miles up the road), there were only a handful of neighbors that I knew well enough to talk to and that was fine.  Where I live now, there are only 500 residents.  And I get the feeling that most of them know who I am.

Back on election day, I had to register to vote.  I had no idea who I was voting for in the local elections, but I did my best to choose correctly (is alphabetically an appropriate voting technique?)  Anyway, the election judges were very nice, helpful and chatty.  The city clerk was there and I wanted to ask her about permits for the chickens.  She told me I had to contact the city planner, but since I was leaving on vacation the next day, I put it off until I got back.

I get home from vacation the weekend before Thanksgiving.  I called the city planner on Wednesday, 11/24 to ask her about permits, etc.  She was waiting for my phone call.  She had already researched the information and told me what I needed to do.  I had to contact the city forester to get the permit.  There were no other restrictions.

During the course of our call together, she mentioned that she was asked to come up with a proposal to present to the city council at the December meeting to better define the ordinances for farm animals.  Apparently my seemingly innocent inquiry on election day turned into a bigger deal than I thought it would.  The city wants to change the rules. 

The city forester has never had to do this before, so he is looking for guidance as well.  He and his wife actually stopped by the house yesterday.  He told me he was going to wait until after the city council meeting.   No big deal, but I would like my permit now so I can be grandfathered into the current rules, in case the new ones become too restrictive.

So it looks like I will be attending the city council meeting to hear the proposal.  I plan on asking questions and making sure I can get my permit now.  I have eggs hatching on Christmas so I'd like to be legal by then.