May 15, 2010Comments are closed.cats
We’re told constantly that we have an “overwhelming cat problem that needs to be addressed”:
Animal welfare shelters need your help to stop the appalling destruction of tens thousands of healthy cats and kittens every year. Cat overpopulation is a serious problem and we all need to take action to do something about it.
But in Yass, there is a different problem – they’re not summarily killing hundreds of cats…
Local resident Gaby Browarczyk happened upon a stray cat recently and was surprised that council could not take it. She then rang Yass Veterinary Hospital. Staff members there were sympathetic but said there was little they could do. They had been instructed by council to allow cats to roam.
Because the pound doesn’t accept cats:
“We don’t have capacity to take cats at the pound. It’s a dog pound,” said Director of Planning & Environment Services Paul De Szell.
But don’t panic; they’re working to create themselves a ‘cat problem’, by arming the public with traps;
“In the next couple of months we’ll be reviewing our policy in relation to cats,” he added.
“Under the current policy, we hire out cat traps, and then people are advised to take the cats to Yass Valley Veterinary Hospital.”
but….
Gail Battye at Yass Valley Vet Hospital was surprised to hear that was the policy, as she said they had been advised by council that they weren’t to take in strays.
“We’ve been told that cats are allowed to stray,” Ms Battye said. “And they should just be returned to where they were found.”
Now would be a great time for a council funded, outreach desexing scheme, free to anyone caring for one of these cats to have it desexed; you know, reduce the problem before it begins?
Not likely:
Greens councillor Chris McHarg-McKenzie raised the issue at the last council meeting.
“The council couldn’t really respond. They said they hire out cat traps, but then there’s no real plan of what to do with them after that,” councillor McHarg-McKenzie said.
What’s the bet, the answer they come up with, is to build a cat-pound, keep them for a bit and then kill them? And then cat ‘lovers’ group will form, encourage people to get busy trapping even more cats from the street that have no hope of ever being tame enough to find a home (for their own good), and we’ll have a ‘real’ cat problem in Yass.
Stay tuned.
