CAPE MAY — City council voted unanimously Monday to amend a beach management plan keep the Trap, Neuter and Release (TNR) program for cats operating despite pressure by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to adopt a plan that would have eliminated TNR.
If city council had repealed the TNR program, any cats picked up in the city would have been taken go to the county Animal Shelter, which is so overcrowded with cats that the majority are euthanized.
About 50 members of the public, mostly cat lovers and volunteers with animal organizations, attended the meeting.
After hearing more than an hour of comment, Mayor Jerome E. Inderwies offered a resolution amending the original beach management plan.
Amendments to the plan were:
• Continue TNR program under control of registered caregivers monitored by the city’s Animal Control Officer.
• A phasing in of microchipping animals.
• Establishment of a 1,000-foot buffer zone between cat colonies and beach nesting areas of endangered birds.
• Eliminate requirement of licensing cats.
• Establish a census of cats to be conducted every five years.
• Enact stiff fines for animal abandonment.
Council will vote on a future ordinance to enact the provisions of the plan.
Robert Smith, city superintendent of public works, told city council Oct. 2 the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) and U.S. Department of Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service was requiring the city to submit a beach management plan as a continuation and expansion of a 2002 bird nesting management plan.
He said the plan provides for the protection of the endangered Piping Plover, Least Tern, and Black Skimmer.
“We’re not getting any more sand until a plan is adopted,” said Smith at that time.
At Monday’s meeting, he said the federal plan established protected zones on Cape May’s beaches from Wilmington Avenue to the Coast Guard base and Third Avenue to Eighth Avenue. The federal plan called for a one-mile buffer zone between feral cat colonies and protected beaches, which would have completely eliminated colonies in Cape May due to the small size of the city.
City Animal Control Officer John Queenan said the TNR program was successful in the city and had lowered the feral cat population from close to 400 cats in 1995, when it began, to about 100 cats currently. Since all cats returned to the outdoors are neutered, he said cat colonies were decreasing in size and would continue to do so as cats died off due to old age.
The city has received $100,000 in grant money from the Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation since 1995 for the TNR program which is recognized as one of the most successful in the nation, said Queenan. He said birds have been lost to predators such as seagulls, skunks, coyotes and foxes on the beach.
Queenan said eliminating the TNR would increase the number of feral cats in the city since neutering would end. He said the cost of microchipping a cat was only $5.
Deputy Mayor Niels Favre said he received more than 1,500 emails from cat lovers asking TNR remain in operation. He called for stiff fines for anyone who abandons a cat in the city.
Harry Bellangy, a board member of Animal Outreach, said it costs about $160 to pick up and cat and euthanize it after a week in the shelter, a cost borne by taxpayers. He noted 95 cats were “killed” at the county shelter last month.
Linda Cherkassky, of Voorhees, who identified herself as a wildlife rescuer, offered an opposing view of TNR. She said feral cats do not defend their colonies and new cats join their ranks and suggested colonies be enclosed by fences.
Madeline Filpikski, a local animal activist, said euthanasia is defined as “a peaceable end to a painful life,” but killing a cat ended a viable life.
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