Recently, I encountered a man downtown who had a listless, severely distressed baby clinging to his shoulders. The man disclosed he had four children, not just the baby he used to panhandle. I secured a $1,000 medical grant for his older children but he refused care for the baby. He also refused a free stroller so the baby wouldn’t have to hang onto his shoulders for 12 or more hours a day in all weather conditions.
Many of you would have called the authorities to get help for the baby, right? But what if I told you the baby was a kitten? Would your concern and willingness to act remain the same for a baby of another species?
According to the city’s website, “The City of Asheville’s Animal Services Unit is responsible for the enforcement of animal control ordinances within the Asheville City limits” and they are “On-call for emergencies 24/7.” While the city employs four animal control officers, until the day I notified the city I was writing this column, no one from animal control had returned several messages left for them over two months. The city’s compliance division manager, Todd Justice, who oversees animal control, also failed to respond, and city manager, Debra Campbell, and Mayor Esther Manheimer, haven’t responded either. If the baby I was calling about was in critical distress, he would be long dead.
When Sue McMullen, the animal services supervisor at the Asheville Police Department, was asked how many cruelty cases are charged each year, she wrote, “There are usually only a couple of cruelty cases per year that go to court and most get a slap on the hand. It is very hard to provide evidence that proves intent. The proof of evidence is on you.”
Why is proof of evidence on anyone other than law enforcement whether a human baby or a feline baby? If animal control receives a credible report of cruelty or an animal in distress, isn’t it their job to investigate?
A 2021 headline declared, “NC ranks one of worst for animal protection laws, study shows.” According to the Animal Legal Defense Fund, in 2023, North Carolina was ranked 34th out of 50 states.
As I reported in 2018 when a beloved West Asheville cat named Kitty was tortured and mutilated by three sadistic killers who posted pictures of Kitty’s mangled body on social media, the community was righteously outraged when the presiding judge was forced to find the defendants not guilty, calling the photos of Kitty “grotesque, disgusting and frightening” but said the court must answer whether the pictures were illegal.
While I am not arguing the man be charged with a crime, surely animal performers, like human performers downtown, should require permitting and regular veterinary monitoring when forced to perform daily. My concern is that the weak laws that did not cover the sick act that took Kitty from his loving family won’t save this kitten, now grown cat, from a life of rough handling and neglect by a mentally unstable man who may not understand the choices he imposes on his cat.
A dishonorable mention goes to Friends2Ferals for giving the kitten to a man they knew was unwell and refusing to take the kitten back after they were notified of the overloaded and neglectful life the kitten was living. While some cats do well as adventure cats, hiking and even swimming, usually those cats are not forced into those activities for a dozen hours a day. In 2022, Friends2Ferals collected $114,572 in public donations. Shame on this group for taking the easy way out by not rehoming the cat and instead sentencing him to a life of labor with a mentallyunbalanced man.
Some may wonder why we should put any effort into helping one cat when the cat’s human obviously needs a lot of help himself. First, it is not a competition, and second, while it isn’t easy to help humans who don’t want help, the cat needs help and it’s up to humans to help him. That duty now falls to the city where the cat is paraded around for dollar bills to uneducated tourists who don’t understand the hard life the cat lives. Asheville, again, is not the progressive oasis it advertises.
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Diana Starr, of Asheville, studies the complex entanglements of multispecies communities.
This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Opinion: Asheville’s Animal Services Unit doesn't do enough to help animals in distress
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