Public response saves cats and kittens at Williamson County Animal Shelter

Crowded facility was facing unpleasant prospect of euthanizing 100 felines.

Robin Givens said she immediately knew what to do when the Williamson County Regional Animal Shelter called for help.

The shelter faced a difficult decision: Either find homes for 100 cats and kittens or have them euthanized. Givens said it is the first time she had seen the “no kill” shelter make that kind of plea. So the next day, she went to the shelter to foster two kittens: Luna and Sol.

Cheryl Schneider, executive director at the shelter, described the response from Givens and dozens of others as “unprecedented.” Their efforts led to 178 cats and kittens leaving the shelter for fostering and “forever” homes.

“It’s crazy amazing,” she said. “People here really do care about animals and want to give them a home.”

Schneider said the shelter’s plea for help followed an enormous influx of cats and kittens — more than 200 from throughout the county. With limited space and kennels, she said, euthanization became an unpleasant but viable option.

“There was no way for staff to keep up with it,” she said. “We knew we had to do something to get them out of here or make some tough decisions we haven’t made in six years.”

Shelter staff made a plea on its Facebook page: Adopt cats or they will be euthanized.

“We are facing a heartbreaking decision,” the post reads. “Find adoptive or foster homes in 3 days for 100 cats or euthanize healthy cats because we simply do not have the capacity to care for them. Will you help?”

The response was both “overwhelming” and “crazy amazing,” Schneider said. People headed to the shelter just hours after the post, heeding the call for adoption.

Givens said she reached the shelter just after it opened noon Aug. 12. There were about 30 people in the lobby, she said, looking to help foster or adopt cats.

“I saw a young couple that adopted three kittens, because they were all part of one litter,” she said. “They said, ‘they’re family,’ and they couldn’t separate them. That’s a good representation of the community’s response as a whole.”

This summer has been particularly difficult for the shelter due to an inordinate number of stray cats and kittens. Schneider said the shelter has received 345 more cats this year than it did the same period last year. While 88 cats from one house in Cedar Park played a role in that increase, she said, the shelter has received cats from all parts of the county.

Feral cat populations can grow rapidly due to fast reproductive cycles, and litters can number as many as eight kittens. Schneider said a cat that is not spayed can have as many as 24 kittens every year.

While the shelter offers free spay and neuter clinics once per month, Schneider said high demand has caused appointments to be booked two months out. Some area cities’ ordinances are also not conducive to groups spaying and neutering cats and then releasing them.

“We need to work on city and county ordinances that lean more towards doing spay and neuter and putting cats back in the community,” she said. “Eventually, through attrition, the cat population will decrease.”