They came prepared with traps and food in hand for a long night of trapping stray cats in Newburgh. They're a small band of concerned Newburgh residents who travel around the city to trap stray cats in a process called TNR (trap, neuter, return).

Erika Norton-Urie, Judy Thomas and Hannah Anderson, the founder of Newburgh nonprofit Talk To Me About Cats, have trapped dozens of cats in the city. Their plan is to trap several feral cats, bring them to the mobile low-cost clinic run by The Animal Rights Alliance, or TARA, to have the cats spayed and neutered, and then either release the cats if they’re feral or find them happy homes.

What You Need To Know

  • Cat rescuer Erika Norton-Urie says many cats end up on the streets after their owners are forced to put them out by landlords who don't accept pets

  • TNR stands for trap-neuter-return and is a humane way to combat stray cat populations

  • Erika Norton-Urie started a trap bank that allows city residents to borrow cat traps so they can save cats in their own backyards

They say this process of TNR is necessary to control the growing stray cat overpopulation problem in Newburgh.

"Any city block that you go in, in Newburgh, you have got feral and roaming cats," said Norton-Urie. "If you want to move to a neighborhood and you see dead cats on the side of the road, you see a property and you see kittens running around, starving cats crawling all over the place, you know, you might think twice about whether or not you actually want to deal with this​."

They hope to trap several female cats, because each female cat can produce up to 200 kittens in her lifetime. But this process isn’t easy. There’s a lot of waiting​, until finally one of the cats takes the bait.

They do this several times a week, often using their own money to buy food and pay vet fees. So Norton-Urie started a fundraiser in March to raise money to trap more cats. Since then, she and other volunteers have trapped more than 20 cats.

According to Norton-Urie, TARA offered to write a grant for the city of Newburgh which would have allowed Newburgh residents to receive low-cost spay and neuter services for their cats, but she says when she reached out to the mayor and city manager about the opportunity, she never got a reply.

Spectrum News reached out to the city for comment but did not receive a response. TARA also declined to comment.

By the end of the night, the group rescued two cats. It’s not many, but they say even two will make a huge difference.

"One is a victory, one means several hundred fewer kittens over the next couple years," said Anderson.

They want to help more Newburgh residents trap and neuter cats, so Erika started a trap bank that allows residents to borrow traps so they can help cats in their own backyards.

"If everybody participated together, then we could really begin to tackle this problem here," said Norton-Urie.

If you'd like to adopt any of the cats these volunteers have rescued in the city of Newburgh, you can go to talktomeaboutcats.org.