Kent Amberson: It’s time to consider a cat tax for Atwater

Re “Atwater program will curb stray cats” (Page A1, April 9): My hat is off to city manager/police chief Frank Pietro, who had the guts to tackle this problem which had been neglected by the former leadership of the Atwater Police Department. I was one of the lucky ones with 6-plus cats roaming around my backyard. At the same time, I had a next door neighbor who would put out food to whomever came around to attract them, which of course didn’t help much either.

The problem with cats is that there are no boundaries for them, they roam wherever they please and to most people that’s a nuisance. In view of city’s money situation, wouldn’t it be a good idea for some kind of cat-owner tax to cover the 230 cats in 2013 ($22,655, or $98.50 each) and 199 in 2014 ($19,601, or $98.50 each) for a total for two years of $42,256? Perhaps the people that feel they need to have three-plus cats in the neighborhood, and mostly outside of thier own dwellings, realize it’s not worth the money that before was paid by others without cats.

This story was originally published April 20, 2015 at 12:35 PM with the headline "Kent Amberson: It’s time to consider a cat tax for Atwater."