Correction: it was Forgotten Felines and Richomnd Homless Cats that did the feral work in Richmond, not the City of Richmond as the above article says.

Carol Reichert (of Richmond Homeless Cats) and I met over trapping cats. I was doing it the hard way and she had started with the traps that we all currently use. I don't know about Carol but I do know that we still get calls from Richmond and either I trap or I lend the traps to the people that call even though the Forgotten Felines Shelter has moved to Surrey.

Carol, myself, and a host of other people trapped for years. That is how we got the shelter in Richmond. Mr Al Brew came outside to see what we were doing on his property every day. We told him what we were doing and that we had already trapped all the cats and had them fixed but we had to put them back as Carol had over 100 in her house and I had 50. He said, 'You guys need a property where you can build a shelter'. He was very impressed because at that point we had 41 feeding stations all in Richmond except two on the other side of the local bridge.

We of course agreed and the next thing we knew he had found the property and contacted Carol to go and look at it. Hence the shelter was born. When we went to the city to get approval, they all sat there in council and asked us where were we going to find cats to put into the shelter. We then explained about what we did and only one guy on council named Harold Steves knew about feral and homeless cats as he was a farmer. In fact Steveston is named after his grandfather.

The mayor and all other council did not have a clue. Between Carol and myself we took thousands of cats off the streets of Richmond. I started in 1972 in Richmond picking up stray cats and having them fixed,etc.

Penny March
Forgotten Felines