With all the talk of drugs, mental health issues and homelessness in Burlington, it’s little wonder that another scourge has largely gone unchecked: free-roaming felines.
Cats are pooping in gardens, killing songbirds and yowling so loudly that they rouse people from sleep. Photos of lost and found kitties abound on Front Porch Forum.
Faced with the dubious task of herding cats, a city council committee is considering an ordinance that would require the pets to be collared and leashed when outdoors, just like their canine counterparts. Failure to follow the rules could land cats in the clink — and get their owners fined.
It’s unclear whether or when the rules might be adopted. But the councilors vetting the idea are taking it seriously.
“Cats are an issue,” Councilor Joan Shannon (D-South District) said at a meeting to discuss the proposal last week. “It’s not like we’re looking at this in lieu of other concerns in the city. We intend to do both.”
Perhaps not surprisingly, the crackdown on cats originated with their mortal enemies, dogs. In 2021, a spike in complaints about barking and bites led the council to create a Dog Task Force to improve canine-human relations. The group was also asked whether cats should be licensed.
Not only did the task force think that was a good idea, but its members also recommended far stricter controls. Besides the collar-and-leash rule, its proposal would ban free-roaming cats from anywhere but their owner’s property or a friend’s. The city would be empowered to impound at-large cats and even kill them if they are deemed “an imminent public safety risk.” Just how a cat would obtain such a status has not been spelled out. Scofflaw owners would be fined up to $250, and the penalty would increase for repeat offenders.
“We have all these huge problems, and here we are trying to arrest pussycats?” Mary McGinniss
Expecting controversy, the council’s Ordinance Committee called a meeting last week to hear from residents. Their hackles up, cat lovers blasted out emails encouraging allies to defend their furry friends. One city councilor said a constituent had planned to bring his two cats to testify against the proposal. Alas, only people attended, about 60 total at city hall and on Zoom.
Task force member Lori Kettler tried to quell any outrage from the outset, saying this “pro-cat ordinance” was designed to keep felines and wildlife safe. Kettler queued up a video that showed cats picking feathers from their teeth and batting around small animals in the grass. “Cats in the wild are killing machines,” the voice-over said.
“The case has been made,” veterinarian Walter Cottrell, who Zoomed in from Newbury, said when the video had ended. “Cats are genetically compelled, indiscriminate predators.”
The majority of attendees agreed. One woman recounted discovering disembodied bird heads and squirrel carcasses in her yard, allegedly slain by a neighbor’s cat. Another said her neighbor’s cat deposited 64 birds on her porch over the course of a year.
Kristen Cameron, who keeps her cat indoors, said she got so tired of cats defecating in her garden and fighting outside her window that she started trapping the animals and bringing them to a humane society. She’s nabbed 10 so far.
“As it stands now, people get to anonymously torment their neighbors with their outdoor cats,” Cameron said. “We need some recourse.”
Cat sympathizers were not having it. A self-described “live-and-let-live sort of person,” Liz Curry is content to allow her gray-and-white tabby, Dandelion, roam the Old North End, where he charms his way into neighbors’ homes for treats. Curry has asked people on Front Porch Forum not to take him in. She said she can get on board with licensing cats but not with confining them, arguing that statistics painting cats as bird killers are overblown.
Others charged that the Dog Task Force had overstepped its authority by going after cats. One woman pleaded with councilors to “not punish all cats for the faults of a few.”
The discussion was largely civil, with just one interruption from someone asking how the city planned to enforce the new rules. Councilors didn’t answer, saying there would be time to debate the finer points later on. The committee will discuss the matter further before sending it to the full council for review.
Meanwhile, at another meeting held at the very same time via Zoom, a different council committee was reviewing data on drug overdoses, thefts and backlogs in the court system. Mary McGinniss, whose ginger cat, Johnny, pals around with Dandelion in the Old North End, said the council should be focused on those issues instead.
“We have all these huge problems, and here we are trying to arrest pussycats?” she said. “Are you kidding?”
The original print version of this article was headlined “Reining Cats and Dogs | Roaming Burlington at will, cats fight, poop and kill songbirds. Councilors are considering a leash law.”
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This article appears in Jan 29 – Feb 4, 2025.
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