Feral cats and roaming felines.
Ansonia has too many of them and there aren’t a heck of a lot of options to bring down the numbers.
The issue occasionally comes up at local meetings, such as the city’s police commission.
This week, Tuesday to be exact, the cat problem came up at a meeting of the Board of Aldermen.
First Ward Alderman Edward Adamowski asked about a cat problem that was brought to his attention on Morningside Drive.
“I know we’ve had this issue, at least three to four times in other parts of town, where the cats are not owned by anybody and they’re just running rampant all over the place,” Adamowski said.
Adamowski suggested the Board of Aldermen seek legal advice on what options are available to control the population.
“I don’t think telling someone you have to live with 15 cats in your backyard is an appropriate answer,” he said.
Ansonia Police Chief Kevin Hale said someone in a given neighborhood is usually feeding the stray cats, which supports the population. See the video at the top of this story for a portion of his remarks.
“They stay where the food is. We see it all the time. Someone will leave food out even though it’s not their cat,” he said. “But you can’t just take these cats and drive them to Oxford. We can’t do that.”
Ansonia officials urged the public not to feed the cats. The hope is that if the cats aren’t fed, they’ll move on and populate elsewhere.
However, the ASPCA and the U.S. Humane Society have raised questions about whether a “feed ban” policy is effective.
Ansonia officials are searching for grant money to continue a spay and neutering program that aims to keep the feral and roaming feline population in line.
The city received a number of grants over the years from PetSmart Charities as part of the company’s “targeted spay/neuter program.” The money — roughly $9,000 in the past year — was used to sterilize 150 cats, according to Eileen Krugel, the city’s grant writer.
The grant money allowed the city to trap feral cats, get them sterilized, then placed back to where the cats were found, a requirement of the grant.
Managing cat populations can be maddening, due to the high reproduction rates of feral cats. The city’s animal control officer is no longer picking up cats to have them spayed and neutered since the grant money ran out, according to the voicemail greeting on her cell phone.
There is no cat shelter in Ansonia, though volunteers and the city’s animal control officer tried to raise money for one. Simply put — the city can’t collect the all cat colonies.
Feral and roaming cats can also tax municipal resources. The grant money received from Ansonia has been used for the spay/neuter medical procedure — but the time at a vet’s office for the animal to recuperate comes from the Ansonia Police Department’s budget.
“We struggle with the cat problem,” Hale told the Aldermen. “As much as you hear it, we hear it all over town. We can trap them, but we don’t have a budget to spay or neuter them. And people don’t want to hear that we have to release them back into their neighborhood.”
The chief said he would talk to the city’s animal control officer to explore whether there are volunteer groups that would be willing to relocate the city’s feral cat population.
A message seeking comment was left with the city’s animal control officer.
