KINGSVILLE — Diane Carr is feeling defeated.
Carr, board president of the Ashtabula County Animal Protective League, announced in late July that the shelter would begin euthanizing cats for space amid a feline population crisis. The shelter found homes for 94 cats in less than two weeks by reducing the adoption fee to just $5 per cat.
“Here we are, just a month later, back in the same situation, with 75 cats that must be adopted this week,” Carr said.
Carr said the reasons for the cat overpopulation are the same: Sluggish cat adoptions and the burden of several large-number intakes filled the once-empty cages with furry faces and twitchy tails.
“We are back to over capacity. It is like a problem we can’t seem to solve, but we just won’t stop trying,” she said.
The board has a ceiling of 70 cats in the shelter at any given time, Carr said. That means the APL shelter must adopt out 75 cats by Sunday.
To help the shelter bring the number of cats under control within two weeks, the APL is selling cats for $20 each, which includes spaying or neutering and vaccinations. Every adoptable cat and kitten is included in the sale.
“We just couldn’t do the $5 sale again,” Carr said. “The shelter spends as much as $100 on each cat in preparation for adoption. We have to have the money to spay and neuter the next round of cats, so the sale price is $20 per cat.”
Carr said 75 cats are immediately available for adoption and the APL board will re-evaluate the cat population on Monday and decide what to do with the remaining cats.
“We are not discussing the alternative to adoption at this point,” Carr said. “But we will do our best this week to place these cats and then have that discussion.”
The APL shelter, located at 5970 Green Road, is open 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. Monday and Friday, 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday, and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday. The shelter is closed Wednesdays and Sundays.
The APL Mall Adoption Center is open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. every Saturday at the Ashtabula Mall.
For more information on the shelter or a specific animal, call (440) 224-1222. The shelter animals are also listed with pictures at http://ashtabulaapl.petfinder.org.
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