Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2014 07:46:36 -0400
From: “Elliot M. Cramer”
Subject: The Goathouse Refuge and Guns
Sometime ago when I heard that a petition was going around, opposing a gun range adjacent to the Goathouse refuge, I wrote one of the sponsors saying that it was pointless. Mark Atkeson has a right to have a gun range in the County just as Siglinda Scarpa has a right to have a shelter for cats. I did suggest that they look into Chatham’s noise ordinance.
I recently visited the Goathouse refuge and it certainly appeared idyllic though I have no reason to doubt the Indy report regarding overcrowding of cats in cages and illness. A no-kill shelter is not a solution to the problem of unwanted cats and dogs; spaying and neutering is. No shelter, no matter how large, can accommodate the number of unwanted animals in the County. Keeping feral cats which cannot be adopted out is certainly dubious.
It seems to me that both Atkeson and Scarpa are well-intentioned. According to the N&O Atkeson said that “I would love to work something out with her, … I have yet to be approached by anybody who’s been remotely polite and has any say in what they do over there.” It would be well for Scarpa to try cooperation rather than hostility.
Elliot M. Cramer
PO 428
Chapel Hill, NC 27514
Professor Emeritus
Department of Psychology
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Websites
http://www.ourpaws.info/cramer
http://www.friendsofocas.org
http://www.ourpaws.info