Taylor was one of the five women who addressed the village counsel at a recent meeting and has fostered kittens of feral cats for four years.
This year has she has raised 15 kittens that have been adopted through the Orange and Black Cat Foundation in Plain City, and she is caring for four baby kittens now.
“The babies, if you get them young enough, you can socialize them,” she said. “They get adopted and live happily inside homes.”
Taylor also feeds about 20 feral cats at her home daily.
Twice a week she will take feral cats that have not been spayed or neutered to His Hands Extended Sanctuary, St. Paris, or the Black and Orange Cat Foundation.
The cats are spayed and neutered, given vaccinations and ear-tipped, then returned to where she found them.
The process is called “Trap, Neuter, Return,” or TNR for short.
Taylor says this is the only way to handle the feral cat population because of the animal’s territorial nature.
“If they are removed from the area, more just come in. They are feral cats; the population has to be controlled,” Taylor said.
Taylor led residents in presenting educational information and the story of a successful city ordinance from Baltimore that has helped control the feral cat population.
Baltimore has a team made of public health officials and other individuals that can grab feral cats from public and private property to be spayed and neutered, then returned.
Mechanicsburg Village Administrator April Huggins-Davis said the village’s attorney will look over Baltimore’s ordinance and see if it would be feasible and legal in Mechanicsburg.
Huggins-Davis added the village may be constrained by a lack of resources.
Taylor would like the village to seek grant money that could help pay for the spaying and neutering the animals.
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