Supervisor raises questions about cat capture, neuter and release program

A catch-spay-and-release program intended to control the feral cat population has its critics, including county Supervisor Jim DeMartini.

At Tuesday’s Board of Supervisors meeting, DeMartini raised questions about the cost and legality of the 2-year-old program run by the Stanislaus Animal Services Agency, which is intended to reduce the feral cat population and the number of unwanted cats destroyed at the animal shelter.

DeMartini said the county received a complaint from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, or PETA, which claimed that returning the feral animals to the community amounts to illegal abandonment.

The supervisor also suggested there’s a major discrepancy between the $30,000 budgeted each year for what’s called the “trap-neuter-return program” and its actual cost.

County board members also received a letter in April from Modesto resident Mary Wallace, who complained that a feral cat she had captured for the program was released back into her neighborhood. Wallace wrote that the homeless animal was sick and attacked her house cat, requiring her to pay for veterinary treatment.

Executive Director Annette Patton said in a presentation to the agency board earlier this year that the program cost is figured at $225 per animal. She says 4,000 cats were trapped, altered and released the first two years.

That works out to $900,000, DeMartini noted.

“It is a lot more than what she says it is,” the supervisor said later Tuesday. He suggested some city managers on the agency board were unaware the program existed and that its expense does not appear on budget documents.

DeMartini said he’s also heard complaints that feral cats are dumped in Patterson neighborhoods.

Patton responded that $225 per animal was an estimate that included building costs, staff time, insurance, administration and other overhead items. She said the veterinarians that contract with the agency can do the procedures for $15 a cat. The agency pays the vets $72 an hour. Patton described an operation in which 20 or 30 spay or neuter procedures are done in a day.

Patton stood by her position that the direct costs are $30,000 to alter and process 2,000 animals each year. Her presentation to the agency board in June suggested that trap-neuter-release, at $225 per animal, reduces the feral cat population at less cost to the agency than trap and euthanize, which costs $250 an animal.

The director says the county counsel and other legal advisers have supported her position that it’s legal to release the cats in the vicinity where they were caught.

To participate in the effort, residents in Modesto, Ceres, Patterson, Hughson, Waterford and unincorporated areas can rent traps from Stanislaus Animal Services or use their own traps to catch strays and bring them to the agency’s shelter on Cornucopia Way.

The stray animals are altered and vaccinated at no cost to the participant. The agency says healthy and friendly cats or kittens may be offered for adoption, while unsocialized healthy cats are returned to the community by volunteers.

Patton said the agency has seen an 11 percent drop in cat intake at the shelter.

Supervisor Vito Chiesa said the program’s future should be reviewed if a larger reduction is not achieved.

Ceres City Manager Toby Wells, an agency board member, said he’s pleased with the results thus far. He said Patton fully addressed the complaints from PETA and Wallace after the letters arrived in March and April.

“Annette does a fantastic job of keeping us informed,” Wells said. “I am surprised (DeMartini) brought it up.”

Ceres, Hughson and Waterford are exploring a $100,000 PetSmart grant as a way to cover program costs. Patton said much smaller grants have covered some costs.

Patton said the agency does not want to release sick cats. She never confirmed if the stray cat that generated Wallace’s complaint was sick.

The letter from Teresa Chagrin of PETA’s cruelty investigation department said such programs may increase a shelter’s “save rate,” but they don’t reduce the homeless cat population. “The abandoned cats aren’t ‘saved’ – they just die somewhere else and usually in terrible ways,” Chagrin wrote.

This story was originally published September 29, 2015 at 6:41 PM with the headline "Supervisor raises questions about cat capture, neuter and release program."