A woman in Parma Heights has had it. Roughly 30 kittens and adult feral cats have moved into her neighborhood and set up shop in her backyard.
“They tear things up in the yard. My neighbor has dogs, they go in, they’re a nuisance there,” said Debbie Cunningham.
It doesn’t take long walking around Cunningham’s back yard to realize she’s got a cat infestation.
Cats out of control in this Parma Heights neighborhood. Neighbors say at any given time 16-20 feral cats are running wild. Story on @WEWS pic.twitter.com/1JFM7YX1xI
— James Gherardi (@JamesGherardi) June 27, 2017
“They’re getting into everybody’s yard and they’re doing that they want to do. Sometimes I come home and I can find up to 15 cats and kittens in my backyard,” she said.
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What started with a small litter last year born from feral cats, bloomed this spring into 30 stray kittens and cats roaming around her property.
“They’ll be sitting on my lawn furniture; they’ll be tearing up grape vines and going in there trying to find a place to stay,” she said.
They’ve ripped up fencing around her garden, her and her neighbors won’t feed them in hopes they’ll leave, but instead, she says, the cats feast on birds and continue to make their home behind her and her neighbor’s garages.
Someone complained to the city about the cats and the city of Parma Heights sent Cunningham a letter. It read:
The feeding or harboring of these animals is causing a nuisance for the surrounding neighborhood, so therefore the activity must stop.
She thinks they were claiming she was responsible for the cat infestation and says that's a ridiculous accusation.
“I’m not going to take responsibility for any of these cats, but the letter I received from the City of Parma Heights kind of suggests that I’m at fault,” she said.
News 5 called the Parma Heights Police Department to see what the deal was. The police said they had no idea that there were some 30 cats roaming around her neighborhood and, while the city does not have an animal control officer, said they would have their service department come and handle the situation.
