Cat 'caretakers' get a break with changes to county's animal control ordinance

A change to Washington County's animal control ordinance will make it easier for residents to care for stray cats in their neighborhoods, and to get these animals neutered.

The Board of County Commissioners on Tuesday approved a revision to the ordinance that adds categories for "community cats" and their caretakers.

The revision, made at the request of Colin Berry, executive director of the Washington County Humane Society, defines a community cat as "a free‐roaming cat that is abandoned, lost, or feral and may be cared for by one or more Community Cat Caretakers."

A caretaker is defined as "a person, who, in accordance with a good‐faitheffort to conduct Trap‐Neuter‐Return, provides care, including food, shelter, or medical care to an unowned Community Cat, while not being considered the owner, harborer, controller, or keeper of a Community Cat."

"Trap-neuter-return" is defined as "the process of humanely trapping, sterilizing, ear‐tipping, vaccinating for rabies, and returning a Community Cat to its original location."

The revisions also exempt "community cats" from the section defining "public nuisance animals."

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How do you deal humanely with cat overpopulation?

During a public hearing on the revisions Tuesday, Berry told the commissioners the changes help align the local ordinance with state code. She also noted that nearly 4,000 community cats had been sterilized and vaccinated under the Humane Society's trap and neuter programs since 2019.

"Adding the proposed language addresses a loophole in public health and safety by officially permitting the most humane and effective management tool for community cats," she said.

"The revisions also establish basic protection for community cat caretakers who employ trap-neuter-return methods to control the unwanted population of cats and the spread of rabies."

Rabbi Mark Perman of Congregation B'Nai Abraham in Hagerstown told the commissioners he'd been a "community cat caregiver" in the Maugansville area, and had cooperated with the Humane Society, a local business and a local neighbor to manage care for some cats who had become part of a "nuisance situation," because people were feeding them in front of the business.

"The proposed revisions of the Washington County Animal Control ordinance are important because they adjust the language of the ordinance in order to more specifically apply to what the needs and concerns are, vis-à-vis both the community and the animals rather than what has been previously understood through misperceptions," he said.

"The community cat caretakers I've met had been for years using their own money to provide food and care for these cats, which includes paying for … trap-neuter-release as well as vaccination for rabies," he said.

"This of course over the years has kept the cat population down to manageable levels. These cat caregivers deserve to be treated with respect, not have to face penalties for taking the cats to trap the neuter and return and face penalties or complaints from those who don't want the cats back there."

While she said all the changes to the ordinance are important, Crystal Mowery, formerly the humane society's field services director, said the biggest concern is the community cat issue.

"The answer is not bringing in cats from this county by the masses and euthanizing them. Research, in fact, shows that is not the answer," she said.

"The answer is spaying, neutering, providing much-needed rabies vaccinations. … And that in itself will reduce the population," Mowery said. "We want to do what's best for the cats and the community at large. We need to protect the community from rabies, and this is a proven and effective way to do that and to reduce the population."

Citizens who do not own the animals but seek to have them sterilized should not be fined "for trying to do the right thing," she added.

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What else is in the revisions?

The changes, which the commissioners approved unanimously, also include reducing the stray hold for dogs from five days to three so they can be adopted out more quickly; Berry told the commissioners that 89% of the dogs that were reclaimed by their owners last year were returned within three days. Three days is the state standard, she said.

"The revisions also close a public safety gap by requiring that the owner of vicious and dangerous dogs register their dogs microchip with the agency or in this case the shelter within seven days of being deemed," she said. "In addition, it allows the shelter to implant a microchip into an impounded stray dog who is deemed vicious and dangerous before an owner is identified."

This article originally appeared on The Herald-Mail: County revises animal control ordinance to protect 'community cats'