Catnip Nation's August Report - Settlement Reached Over Jones Beach Ferals

In June I brought you the seventh installment in a series of posts by Tina Traster, Producer and Director of the documentary film Catnip Nation.  This month Tina brings us news about the settlement that was reached between New York State and the American Bird Conversancy over the feral cat colonies at Jones Beach on Long Island, NY. Tina first told us about the plight of the colony in this post from last year. 

I was hoping for better news for the Jones Beach ferals. In the eight years that I've been on social media (four of them blogging), I've never been publicly judgmental, attempting to keep Lola and Lexy's world a positive one. But I wonder how an agency can state worry over the existence and safety of one species with total disregard for the possible demise of another. All living beings are equally important in my book. But it doesn't seem that the American Bird Conservancy shares my view.

This is why TNR ordinances are necessary in every town of this country. Feral cats need to be protected. TNR ordinances work! You can read about a success story here. I thank Tina and her peers for working tirelessly on this issue and bringing important information to light. 

Are there TNR ordinances in your area? Tell us about them in the comments below. 
Dawn

On location with a colony caretaker at Jones Beach.

New York State Reaches Settlement with American Bird Conservancy Over Jones Beach Ferals

Not a Win for Cats

In a settlement reached this month, the State of New York’s Parks Commissioner Rose Harvey agreed to humanely remove and relocate 23 TNRed ferals, or “colony cats,” but sold out on the notion of protecting any other dumped, stray or feral cats at Jones Beach. According to the language of the agreement, the state parks department will “remove in as humane a manner of possible all cats” from the park by March 31st, 2019, to the best of its ability. What isn’t said in the agreement is remove to where, or to what fate? As we cat lovers well know, most ferals are not good candidates for shelters and sanctuaries are scarce (and they generally require a fee).

Overall, the news here is bad. While it offers a reprieve for 23 cats caretakers have been looking after for years, it is roundly a defeat for TNR, which is humane, practical, and the only method we have for cat population management. ABC’s victory here is a shallow one because cats, one way or another, will find their way to Jones Beach. They always have.

The American Bird Conservancy filed their suit in the spring of 2016 under the Endangered Species Act, claiming cats were a threat to the piping plovers at Jones Beach. But for the piping plovers being listed as endangered, the ABC would not have had standing to file such a lawsuit. We have not seen what was gathered during the “discovery” process, but I would love to know what kind of hard evidence existed regarding the threat to the plovers. I do know anecdotally from caretakers on the ground that the cats were never anywhere near the plovers.

According to the settlement, the state must build a containment area for the 23 identified feral cats. They’ve agreed to “place these cats in shelters” (totally unrealistic) “where they won’t be euthanized”. The deadline for this is March 2019, but the colony cats can continue to stay in the containment area so long as the state continues to show a good-faith effort to relocate the cats. No other cat has been given protection under this settlement. So what will happen to these other cats when rounded up? Euthanized? Poisoned? Dumped?

So why did the state defend this suit in the first place?

They had to – not out of any humanity for cats – but to protect the Parks Department from having to remove ferals from all of the other state parks. If there’s a glimmer of good news in this settlement it’s that the settlement will have “no precedential value or effect against the State of New York whatsoever and shall not be admissible in any other action or proceeding against the State of New York as evidence or for any other purpose” except the settlement. What this means is that the case doesn’t set a legal precedent. That indeed is a plus, though I do believe many public servants have been watching this case closely. They know the ABC is a well-funded, powerful organization that holds rigid views on ferals. They do not believe birds and cats can co-exist, and they have no sympathy for the plight of the ferals.

Always lost in lawsuits like these are impact and the collateral damage done to “individuals” – both the cats and the caretakers. A caretaker looking after a colony for a decade is attached to her clowder, and the cats are attached to her. There is a personal relationship. There is a lifetime of money and emotion invested. The cats, too, see their piece of turf as their home. The disruption is just details to the ABC, or even the distant park bureaucrats, but to those who are having their chess pieces moved, there is anger, loss, and disillusionment.

What American Bird Conservancy v. (Commissioner)Rose Harvey shows us is that our ferals are disposable, that parks personnel needs an education on TNR, and that bird lobby is a formidable force to be reckoned with. This mentality can only change when cat lovers demand from their public officials, particularly Gov. Cuomo, that we concentrate on this issue holistically. A few years ago, New York was ready to pass a TNR law, and Cuomo vetoed it after being lobbied by the birders. We need to fight just as hard.

Please weigh in. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this.

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Tina Traster is a socially-conscious, award-winning journalist, author, and filmmaker. Her 30-minute documentary, This House Matters, is an examination on historic preservation in the Hudson Valley. The film has screened at the YoFi Film Festival, the Kingston Film Festival, the Hoboken International Film Festival, and the Nyack Film Festival. Traster's work has appeared in scores of newspapers, magazines and literary journals including The New York Times, The New York Post, Huffington Post, The Daily Beast, The Atlantic, Redbook, Family Circle, Parade, Time Out New York, Audubon, Ski Magazine and many others. She is the author of the award-winning memoir Rescuing Julia Twice: A Mother's Tale of Russian Adoption and Overcoming Reactive Attachment Disorder. Since 2006, Traster has written the "Burb Appeal" column for The New York Post.