They Act Like Animal Hoarding Is A Bad Thing!

“Cat Lady” — myth or reality? The Queens Tribune investigates:

Pomonok Houses certainly isn’t the first housing complex in Queens, let alone New York City, to have the noxious scent of cat urine seep into its walls and it won’t be the last, according to the New York City ASPCA.

ASPCA Senior Outreach Manager Allison Cardona said the agency sees at least 50 to 100 cases similar to Pomonok throughout the city each year.

“It wasn’t until recently that the data is being recognized as a social problem, a mental health problem,” explained Cardona. “In the past, everyone heard of a cat lady or a little old lady who rescues too many cats, but instances like these are considered animal hoarding.”

Hoarding is when an individual has more than the typical number of companion animals; is in denial of the inability to provide this minimum care; and is in denial of the impact of that failure on the animals, the household, and human occupants of the dwelling, according to the he Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, a non profit academic research group.

“A lot of times the situation is approached from social service stances, where it’s recognized that you can’t just remove all the animals and everything will be fine,” she said, “because no it’s won’t be fine, and yes, something needs to happen for the human or else they will begin hoarding all over again.”

. . .

Melanie Neer, an Elmhurst woman who had caught national attention for housing close to 120 cats in her studio apartment in 2000 is an example of an animal hoarder who agreed to give up her companions and once again found her apartment crawling with 45 felines in 2006.

Neer was facing eviction and since March 2006 has seen Animal Care and Control cage 27 of her cats, emphasizing that she knows of eight for which they could not find adopters, and which have been euthanized.

Neer never saw her number of pets as being a problem. She simply saw it as living with her “closest friends.”

It is important to recognize that hoarding knows no age, gender, or socioeconomic boundaries, according to HARC. It has been observed in men and women, young and old, married as well as never married or widowed, and in people with professional or white collar jobs.

Backstory on the Pomonok Stench: A Cautionary Tail.