Staff Contributor
A pygmy teacup goat is hiding out in California from a bear and a Powell, Wyoming, city ordinance, the goat’s owner says.
Venus Bontadelli sued the city of Powell, Wyoming in the federal U.S. District Court back in November, saying the town’s original denial last summer of her exotic pet permit was unconstitutional.
She’d applied for the permit so she could keep her domesticated pygmy teacup goat named Porsche Lane at her home in a light industrial-zoned neighborhood in Powell.
That was after she moved to Wyoming from what she called “Commie-fornia,” thinking Wyoming would have more individual liberty-friendly governance, Bontadelli told Cowboy State Daily on Friday.
Bontadelli confirmed that she reached a settlement with the city Thursday.
The agreement says she is to receive an exotic pet permit that’s valid for five years, Bontadelli added.
Around the time they denied Bontadelli’s permit, Powell authorities said they were limited by the words of the city’s ordinance.
Bontadelli’s lawsuit, conversely, asserted that the city denied her of procedural due process and substantive due process rights. It quoted from Article 1, Section 7 of the Wyoming Constitution, which reads:
“Absolute, arbitrary power over the lives, liberty and property of freemen exists nowhere in a republic, not even in the largest majority.”
Powell’s mayor and city council members did not return Cowboy State Daily email requests for comment by publication time.
Story by: Clair McFarland can be reached at clair@cowboystatedaily.com.
