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  Straits Times Forum 8 Sep 06
Trap-neuter-release the long-term cat solution
Letter from Dr Tan Chek Wee

I WOULD like to thank Mr Mah Bow Tan, Minister for National Development and MP for Tampines GRC, for staying till late in the evening on Monday to speak to Tampines residents who were concerned about the trapping of cats in the estate.

Many people like myself who do not live in Tampines were following the events closely because we, too, have been applying the trap-neuter-release method to manage the cat population.

Over a two-year period, a few residents and I have trapped close to 90 per cent of the cats in our precinct for sterilisation.

We see the success of this method of managing the cat population when we hear comments from fellow residents like 'We hardly hear any cats fighting or making mating calls', 'We used to have kittens following us into the lift' and 'On behalf of the residents of this estate, I would like to thank you and the other volunteers'.

However, we still live in constant fear that our efforts, time and money would go down the drain if the town council decides to trap the cats, including sterilised ones, in response to complaints.

We would feel very disheartened if this comes about. The vacuum created by the culling of cats will soon be filled by cats migrating from surrounding areas. These new cats, likely unsterilised, will make for environmental unpleasantness with their noise.

The town council will then revert to culling - a method used for more than 20 years with no lasting effect and wasting public funds - starting off yet another endless cycle.

We ask that the town council be receptive to offers of help from volunteers and the cat-welfare organisation in resolving complaints about cats.

From reading Ms Dawn Kua (Director of Operations of the Cat Welfare Society)'s blog at http://www.catwelfare.blogspot.com/ one learns that most of the complaints could have been resolved without the need to kill the cats.

We also hope that the town council will accept only bona fide complaints as the current policy of accepting anonymous complaints could give rise to falsehood and exaggeration (a person who calls 100 times anonymously would go down in the statistics as 100 complaints).

Volunteers like me do not wish to see any increase in the number of community cats. We also do not see the continued killing of cats as a solution.

In our contacts with residents on the evenings that we were trapping cats in the estate, we learnt that most people were receptive to the trap-neuter-release method.

I could recall only one woman who was very upset and shouted at us because she said her mother was afraid of cats. She threatened to have the town council remove all the cats. Fortunately, she didn't. Either that or the town council was wise enough to ignore the complaint.

Many, if not all, the complaints relating to cats can be traced to irresponsible human behaviour.

Let us 'cull' our 'bad habits' with education instead.
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