Council allows veteran to keep ducks

WEST LAFAYETTE - At a special meeting Tuesday, West Lafayette Village Council voted 5-1 to grant Darin Welker a variance to a village ordinance prohibiting farm animals in village limits. Legislation allowed two therapy animals per household if they weighed under 20 pounds, not including dogs. Welker wanted to keep six ducks and at one point had 14 ducks on his property.

Ron Lusk was the only no vote. Council members Craig Bordenkircher and Christie Maurer said it was time to bring the situation - that started in the summer of 2014 - to a close.

“It’s time to settle this and be done,” Bordenkircher said. “Given the documentation, I say we grant him the variance.”

Welker presented an affidavit of facts from his primary care physician, Dr. Thomas Hanf, and a letter from Hanf to Judge Robert Batchelor of the Coshocton County Common Pleas Court on Welker’s treatment. 

Hanf said in the letter that Welker had made great strides over the past five years on his physical pains, but the post-traumatic stress disorder from serving in Iraq in 2005 had been harder to deal with and that the progress Welker had made with the ducks encouraged him to get some too.

Welker also presented seven signed letters from neighbors stating they had no issues with the ducks and were fine with Welker keeping them.

Even though Welker earned a victory he declined to comment during or after the meeting based on other pending litigation. 

Mayor Stephen Bordenkircher said Welker had used a backhoe to tear up part of an alley next to his Grandview Street home that he said encroached onto his land according to maps. Bordenkircher said the damage was close to $2,000. 

A civil suit on that matter is pending in Coshocton County Common Pleas Court with a trial set for 9 a.m. Jan. 30. Online court records show that a countersuit relating to the keeping of the ducks had been dropped per Welker’s attorneys on Wednesday.