Brick's 'Trap, Neuter, Release' Program Progresses

The first veterinarian to participate in Brick's "Trap, Neuter, Release," or TNR, program has been approved by the township council.

The council will act as the agency that pays for cats to be trapped, neutered and then released back into the community. The TNR program, which runs on a , involves trapping stray cats, sending them to a veterinarian to be spayed or neutered, then releasing them. It will be funded through donations and fundraising, officials have said, and is designed to help control the township's feral cat population.

Councilman Mike Thulen, who has helped spearhead the program in town, said the township solicited bids from the veterinarians and sent out invitations to bid to 12 vets, but just one responded. "People for Animals," of Hillside, was the one veterinarian to be added to what Thulen hopes will become a pool of vets.

"The concept we had from the beginning was to have a pool of vets to go to," he said. "I would like, in the near future, to go out and ask the vets again. That way we could possibly get that pool together."

Thulen said the TNR program does not have enough money to get off the ground just yet, but more fundraising is planned. A group of citizen volunteers are planning a fundraising day at Brick's IHOP restaurant on Route 88, where 20 percent of the restaurant's proceeds on Oct. 24, between the hours of 4 p.m. and 9 p.m., will go toward the program.