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Feral Cat Forum Foretells
Commish Difficulties
A Loss for Wings Air in
the Local Airline Wars
None of Atbens-Clarke County's elected
officials were present at a Feb. 5 forum on
feral and free-ranging cats presented by the
Oconee Rivers Audubon Society, but had any
attended they would have seen first-hand the
level of emotion at play among interested par
ties. That's not to say that elected officials
haven't heard directly from advocates for and
against the strategy known as TNR (Trap-
Neuter-Release). But if the present debate
going on in the community does in fact evolve
into a policy discussion of some sort at City
Hall, the ACC Mayor and Commission would do
well to note beforehand the live wires running
beneath the issue.
The discussion at the meeting, moderated
by local Audubon president Vanessa Lane,
was by and large respectful, though, and was
marked by an openness and honesty that bade
well for the ongoing debate. One attendee, for
instance, described the TNR work he's been
conducting on private property, which is pres
ently illegal in Athens because local ordinance
defines anyone feeding outdoor cats as effec
tively their owner. (Daily feeding is a standard
part of what's considered by TNR practitioners
to be part of responsible
management of a feral
cat colony.) This stood in
contrast to the TNR being
practiced by the group
Campus Cats on UGA land
not subject to county
ordinances, and discussed by panelist Kelly
Betti nger.
But another panelist at the forum, Steve
Holzman, told the story of encountering a lit
ter of feral kittens with their mother in a strip
mall. He brought up the story to describe his
concern about rabies or other diseases and the
safety of his young daughter, who was with
him at the time; but when pressed about what
he planned to do about the cats, Holzman
paused, then said that the property owner had
asked him to trap them, and that he would.
(Most trapped ferals are taken to the Athens
Area Humane Society, or AAHS, which eutha
nizes them unless they are young enough
to be socialized and adopted. These cats are
not included, for example, in the number of
"adoptable cats euthanized" in each week's
"Adopt Me" listings in Flagpole.)
More to the point of his participating on
the panel, though, Holzman, a member of
the Georgia Ornithological Society, asked poi
gnantly at one point which is more humane;
caring for feral cats, which are an exotic spe
cies in North America, or caring for native
migratory birds which suffer numerous severe
threats to their survival as individuals and, in
some cases, as species. (Cats may not be the
very topmost threat to native migratory birds,
he said, but their impact is significant.) "One
is not more humane than the other," Holzman
said. "Let's not pretend that it is."
Bettinger, meanwhile, said that "no one
who promotes the responsible application of
TNR disputes the fact that cats kill wildlife."
The goal of Campus Cats and other "respon
sible TNR" programs, she said, is to have man
aged colonies of feral cats with suppression
of disease and a reduction in cat numbers.
Bettinger said that there are "dozens of case
studies" in which "there were many animals
and now there is a managed... population of
far fewer animals." A population goal of zero,
she said, is not realistic in a place like Athens.
Bettinger likened the legalization of TNR to
putting "another tool in the toolbox" in deal
ing with local feral cats. She and fellow TNR
proponent Dr. Will Mangham, a veterinarian,
said that not allowing wider TNR application
is essentially inaction on the issue. That's
probably true in the absence of widespread
"trap-and-kill" activity, which—though it
would be in accordance with local ordinances,
if not the enforcement protocol behind local
ordinances—might not recruit volunteers with
nearly the same success as TNR programs do,
to say the least.
Though that line of reasoning might be
presumed to carry weight with elected officials
on the basis of its pragmatism, TNR opponents
seem to disapprove of the approach in part
because of the worry that a successful, wide
spread local program could mean that aban
donee of pets—who are common here—might
do so with less compunction, assuming that
their pets will be cared
for to a degree. They also
disapprove, of course,
because TNR application
means that living, regu
larly-fed cats still roam at
large—even if in lesser
numbers—where they can kill wildlife.
Panelist* and attendees on all sides agreed
that the sources of the problem—the "dump
ing" of unwanted pets, and a general lack of
knowledge about responsible pet ownership—
would be the ideal targets of community
resources. Bettinger, for example, suggested
programs to encourage landlords to promote
spaying and neutering by their tenants who
adopt pets here. But working more strenuously
to reduce pet dumping would be key and, said
one attendee, "Somebody needs to give [the
Athens Area Humane Society] the money to
be able to do that, in a 'humane' community."
All agreed, also, that better promotion of
programs like the American Bird Conservancy's
"Cats Indoors!" campaign is needed here.
That's because even keeping pet cats
indoors all the time is a new concept to many.
ACC Central Services Director David Fluck, who
oversees the Animal Control division, attended
the meeting, and talked with Flagpole after
ward about what one person termed a "double
standard" in Animal Control when it comes to
free-ranging cats as opposed to dogs running
loose. "The ordinance treats dogs and cats the
same, and it's a matter of resources," Ruck
said, admitting that Animal Control doesn't
have the staff to address such cats according
to the ordinance. That's why cat issues have
long been delegated to the private, non-profit
AAHS, which receives local government funds.
Ruck said that in addition to reflecting avail
able department resources, the status quo
enforcement policy at Animal Control reflects,
in part, "community values" about dogs run
ning loose as opposed to cats.
Ben Emanuel ben@flagpole.com
Given the nearly soap-opera-styie drama
surrounding recent months' competition over
passenger air service between Athens and
Atlanta, the strange abruptness of last week's
suspension of service by Wings Air is in a way
unsurprising. The small Georgia-based com
muter airline, which began offering service
here last Nov. 1, put out a press release Feb. 5
titled simply, "Wings Air temporarily suspend
ing some service."
But the thrust of the press release was to
continue the line of reasoning that has char
acterized Wings Air's earlier public stances
this winter: that the federal Department of
Transportation's "Essential Air Service" sub
sidy for its competitor, Georgia Skies (part of
Hawaii-based Pacific Wings), makes it impos
sible for a non-subsidized line to compete in
the local market.
"There are other non-subsidized markets
that we will now focus on that are in need of
our type of service and provide a level playing
field," said Wings Air President Chartie Mintz
in the press release. 'It is unfortunate that
the DOT failed to see
the illogic in subsidiz
ing a carrier that was
providing inferior ser
vice. It's just not pos
sible for us to compete
against pricing that
has no other purpose
than to drive us from the market while they
exist on federal funds." The release also said
that half of Wings Air's staff has been laid off
or furloughed.
Despite Wings Air's higher prices, its main
advantage to customers had been that its gate
access at HartsfieldfJackson International
Airport in Atlanta allowed passengers to go
through security checks at Athens-Ben Epps
airport rather than in Atlanta. The Athens
Banner-Herald reported Feb. 7 that Wings Air
had lost that gate access, prior to suspend
ing its Athens and Macon service, due to an
unpaid bill there. That paper also reported
that Wings bounced a $21,000 check to the
Athens airport.
Meanwhile, true to its own style to date,
Georgia Skies put out a press release on
the afternoon of Feb. 5 titled "Stranded
Passengers Get a Lift," offering free seats to
Wings Air passengers whose flights had been
cancelled. "We're happy to help out," the press
release quotes company president Gabriel .
Kimbrell as saying.
But regardless of the outcome of the dis
pute between the carriers—and even of any
revisiting of the subsidy by the federal DOT—
Wings Air's suspension of service may be an
occasion for Atbens-Clarke County officials to
question the efficacy of the local government's
support for passenger service to Atlanta.
Former ACC Commissioner Elton Dodson served
as an ex officio member of the ACC Airport
Authority before starting Firefly Aviation, a
flight academy and maintenance shop that
he's now almost completely sold. He says he's
always pushed for economic development at
county-funded Ben Epps Airport to be focused
on local, small businesses and job training
opportunities for certified airplane mechanics,
for whom there's high demand nationwide—
not on passenger service to an airport that
can be reached in just over an hour by car.
Dodson says, "We just have to ask ourselves:
What are we accomplishing by subsidizing a
route between Athens and Atlanta?"
He adds, "The second question we need
to be asking ourselves is: Why is this route
not profitable?" The
answer is essentially
that Atlanta is too
close. And based on
a cursory look at the
numbers—keeping
in mind that such a
short flight means the
plane operates only in the most inefficient
part of its "flight envelope," in low altitudes
where the air is thickest and fuel use at its
highest—Dodson guesses that it might take
a half-dozen flights daily between Athens and
Atlanta before a non-subsidized line would
approach the point of profitability. Even Wings
Air's passenger rates, which were higher than
Georgia Skies', were probably not nearly high
enough. "You'd have to charge at least $200
round-trip to make it work, and nobody's
going to pay that, in my opinion," he says.
In addition to funding airport operations,
Athens-Clarke County also has construction of
a new commercial terminal on the project list
for the 2005 SPLOST (special-purpose local-
option sales tax). Estimated at $4.7 million
and scheduled for design work beginning next
year, the 10,000 square-foot facility would
include its own parking area and an entrance
on the Lexington Road side of the airport,
where the new terminal would be located.
Ben Emanuel ben@flagpole.com
“The ordinance treats dogs
and cats the same, and
it’s a matter of resources.”
“We just have to ask ourselves:
What are we accomplishing
by subsidizing a route
between Athens and Atlanta?”
FEBRUARY 11,2009 • FLAGPOLE.COM 5
