From the Longboat Key (FL) Observer. (Beginning of Observer story) Kip O’Neill hears the peacocks stomping on the roof of her Longbeach Village home every morning. When she takes a quick trip to Publix, she returns to find that peacocks have torn up her plants. And, recently, when she went to her neighborhood book club discussion, participants had to use a side entrance because the peacocks had left behind droppings near the front of the house. “It’s hard to live like this when every day there’s something peacock-related,” she said. Although the peacocks are controversial — some residents love them, while others hate them — many Village residents say that the current system for removal, for which the town gives the Longbeach Village Association money, most recently $2,400 last March, to hire a company to remove the birds, doesn’t work. Former Longboat Key Town Commissioner Gene Jaleski, who worked to bring the peacock issue to the commission’s attention two years ago, said that h...
