Thursday, May 13, 1999, in the Miami Herald
By Charles Savage Herald Staff Writer
At dusk they appear, slinking through the darkening shadows of Kendall's Miami-Dade Community College grounds in search of food, water, perhaps a mate.In the morning they retreat again into the woods and dark hollow places, leaving behind only heaps of dung for the humans who pretend to run this campus to contend with.
By some estimates there are more than 150 cats and a half a dozen different colonies roaming the MDCC grounds at 11011 SW 104th St. Many are diseased or malnourished and harbor parasites. It's a problem that threatens to overrun the campus, a problem that has finally driven college president Richard Schinoff to act.
``I've been at Miami-Dade Kendall since 1968, and we've always had cats on campus,'' Schinoff said. ``Neighbors would drop off cats when they didn't want them anymore, and people on campus used to feed them. The population has grown and grown. It's such a mess on some parts of the campus that you can slide around on cat droppings and the odor is terrible.''
Schinoff thinks he has come up with a humane solution to the problem. Starting this week, he has invited The Cat Network to trap the animals and transport them to a local vet, Dr. Glenn Larkins of Galloway Animal Hospital, who has volunteered to test and treat them at less than half the normal fee for such services.
The healthy cats will be sterilized and put up for adoption. Those that suffer from feline leukemia or test positive for Feline Immunodeficiency Virus will be euthanized.
Those cats not lucky enough to find homes will return to the campus to live out their lives with controlled food and litter conditions -- and no new kittens to compound the problem.
``Right now they're all over the campus, defecating in walkways and inside exposed hallways and on the grass,'' said Jeff Torain, director of MDCC's office of administrative support. ``We are going to try to contain them to three of four areas on campus and hopefully on its outer areas.''
Cindy Hewitt, The Cat Network volunteer coordinating the MDCC project, issued a plea to the public not to dump their animals on the campus or anywhere else.
``When animals are relocated they are frightened, they're confused, and they're put into a treacherous situation,'' Hewitt said. ``They have to deal with the existing territorial animals, unfamiliar dangers such as dogs or traffic or different kinds of poisons in the environment. Dumped animals frequently die horrible deaths.''
Those dangers translate into an average life expectancy of only three to five years for an outdoor stray, compared to 15 years for a pet feline. Administrators at MDCC are hoping that life won't be quite that rough for the animals after the new policy is implemented, but they are looking forward to a campus with far fewer cats.
``We're hoping with adoption and natural attrition with no more kittens we can get it under control,'' Schinoff said. ``We're never going to get rid of them entirely, but if we keep trapping and neutering them we can keep it stable. We have to do something. I'm a pet lover -- I have a dog -- and deep down it bothers me to take a good healthy cat and have to kill it. We think we can find people to adopt them.''
HOW TO HELP
People who want to assist The Cat Network with the project at MDCC are asked to meet at 1 p.m. today in the Conference Center of the Kendall Campus, 11011 SW 104th St., Building 400, Room 422.
The all-volunteer Cat Network, which tries to help animals throughout the county, has many healthy and adoptable cats waiting to find homes. The network can be reached on-line at www.thecatnetwork.org or via voice mail at 305-255-3482.
Author: csavage@herald.com
 NetPets® Main Page |  The Cat Center |