At its July 28 meeting, the Festus City Council plans to add new details to an ordinance it passed last week that restricts the feeding of feral cats.
Council members voted 6-0 at their July 14 meeting to adopt an ordinance “to prohibit the feeding of feral cats to assist in reducing uncontrolled feral cat colonies” in the city. Council members Staci Templeton of Ward 2 and Michael Cook of Ward 4 were absent from the meeting.
Since adopting the ordinance, the city has received a flurry of calls from people concerned about the feral cats, City Administrator Greg Camp said, so city leaders plan to revisit the ordinance next week to add information about the process known as “trap-neuter-return,” or TNR, which includes “trapping, sterilizing, vaccinating for rabies, eartipping and returning cats to their original location.” The addition to the ordinance will say that TNR “is an effective way to manage the population of cats within the city of Festus.”
The ordinance describes eartipping as the removal of one quarter of a cat’s left ear, which identifies it as a community cat that has been sterilized and vaccinated for rabies.
Camp said the city has practiced TNR for some time, but the practice was not included in the new ordinance.
Residents concerned about feral cats may participate in the TNR program, and the city will supply traps for them to use, Camp added.
“If there were citizens, if there were organizations who want to do this, we want them to follow the guidelines,” he said.
Camp said the proposed additions to the ordinance do not eliminate the restriction on feeding feral cats but provide more information about what the city does to address problems with feral cats.
He said the new ordinance did not spring out of a sudden increase in the feral cat population, but instead is a proactive move to control the population.
“We know based on residents calling to complain of several clusters of feral cats,” he said. “Over the years, we have seen other communities who have done this (TNR) see a reduction in the feral cat population.
Both versions of the ordinance say it is unlawful to feed feral cats within the city, with the exception of temporarily feeding a feral cat for up to five consecutive days for the purpose of trapping it for TNR. Feeding a feral cat for longer than five consecutive days requires approval from the city’s Animal Control officer, according to the ordinance.
According to the ordinance, penalties for violating it include a warning, along with educational materials for the first offense; a fine not to exceed $100 for the second offense; and a fine not to exceed $250 per offense for the third and subsequent offenses. Each day a violation continues constitutes a separate offense.
Camp said the original version of the ordinance went into effect July 14 after Mayor Sam Richards signed it, but the city has held off enforcing following the public concerns that have come to light. The council is expected to discuss the city’s enforcement of the ordinance at the July 28 meeting.
He said city staff won’t be out looking for people feeding feral cats but will enforce the ordinance after investigating complaints from residents about others feeding feral cats.
“It’s complaint driven,” he said. “That’s the same as any nuisance issue. We don’t drive around town looking for feral cats.”
He said city officials began looking at the problem of people feeding feral cats after residents complained about it and brought up health issues related to the practice, such as the spreading of parasites and diseases that arise from clusters of feral cats.
“Neighbors have complained. You get someone feeding the feral cats and you could get a colony of 10 or 20 of these cats,” Camp said.
He said that while City Hall has received many calls about the feral cat ordinance, he believes most of them have been from non-residents of Festus.