Sheli Pershing moved to western Franklin County for a nice yard and clean fresh air. Now, though, she's upset that her neighbor is raising and slaughtering goats and sheep that smell, poop and draw flies. Township zoning doesn't apply to agricultural property larger than five acres, said Brown Township Trustee Joe Martin said, and Mahdi Badawi's property is 5.14 acres. He uses the land to raise the animals, then slaughters them, often for others.

Sheli Pershing moved to western Franklin County for a nice yard and clean fresh air.



Now, though, she's upset that her neighbor is raising and slaughtering goats and sheep that smell, poop and draw flies.



"It has completely taken away my quality of life and the enjoyment of my home," Pershing said Friday. "The smell has been horrendous at times. I can't even sleep with my windows open."



The owner of the property with the animals is Mahdi Badawi, owner of Hilliard Fresh Farm. He didn't return calls Friday.



Township zoning doesn't apply to agricultural property larger than five acres, said Brown Township Trustee Joe Martin said, and Badawi's property is 5.14 acres. He uses the land to raise the animals, then slaughters them, often for others.



Martin has been trying to help resolve Pershing's complaints, but said Badawi's property is also too small to fall under Ohio Department of Agriculture rules. And because Badawi's farm plans to "collect wastewater in less than 500 gallon containers and remove the wastewater from the property for final disposal at a permitted facility," it, like other farms with tanks that small, don't require a wastewater permit, an Ohio Environmental Protection Agency official said in an email Friday.



"What an ordeal," Martin said. "These are $300,000 to half-a-million-dollar houses and he's turned the back three acres of it into basically a feed lot with 250 head of sheep and goats. "There's a lot of manure. There's a lot of flies, a lot of odors.



"Because he's following the letter of the law, he's allowed to do what he is doing," Martin said. "It's very frustrating. They're just on the edge of compliance."



It's legal, Pershing said, to slaughter for personal consumption, but a license is needed to slaughter animals for others. Until Friday, Badawi didn't have a license to slaughter animals. On Friday, the Ohio Department of Agriculture said it issued Badawi a license that allows him to slaughter and give the meat to others, but that meat can't be sold to restaurants or stores.



Badawi told Pershing when he moved in � property records show he bought the 5.14 acres Oct. 5, 2015, for $285,000 � and soon built a barn, telling her he wanted to "raise a few animals for his kids." He lives in his house with his wife and two children, she said, but often has many visitors.



Those visitors, Pershing said, often arrive in the early morning hour to drop off goats and sheep � and often leave with the meat of slaughtered animals.



She sent The Dispatch several photos, taken from her property, of dead and slaughtered animals on Badawi's property. "Dead goat - lovely things I get to view from my yard," she noted in the email.



Pershing expects this weekend to be busy at Badawi's. That's when Muslims will celebrate Eid al-Adha, or the Feast of Sacrifice, one of two main holidays in Islam. It honors the biblical and Quranic story that relates the willingness of the prophet Ibrahim (Abraham) to sacrifice his son to God. Instead, a goat was slaughtered. Muslims celebrate the holiday with a slaughtered animal.



There is a Brown Township Council meeting scheduled for Sept. 19, where Pershing and neighbors plan to raise the slaughterhouse issue.



Dispatch reporter JoAnne Viviano contributed to this story.

kperry@dispatch.com

@kimballperry