Feline fracas faces Hilton Head’s town council, but what action can officials take?

Residents of The Spa condo complex on Beach City Road have lived alongside a cat sanctuary since 2016. Now some are asking the town for relief due to feces left on doorsteps and nocturnal yowling from the 80 feline residents.

The sanctuary sits on a 1.2 acre parcel that was purchased in 2011 by Claudia Kennedy, the first woman to become a 3-star general in the U.S. Army, who continues to own the land. The sanctuary is operated by the nonprofit organization All About Cats, which Kennedy founded.

Today, the sanctuary is surrounded by a high wooden fence and remains largely undeveloped. A row of wooden feeding huts that double as severe weather shelters for the sanctuary’s furry regulars line the center of the plot. Other features include thick oak trees draped in Spanish moss to provide abundant shade and a row of isolation pens, reserved for cats recovering from medical issues.

While the serene sanctuary is a cat-lover’s delight, some of its human neighbors say the cats have been a source of friction, leaving feces at doorsteps, spooking residents in the stairwells, and screeching loudly through the night.

Residents and leadership at The Spa came before the Hilton Head Town Council on May 2, asking officials to relocate the sanctuary elsewhere on the island. Others at the same meeting urged the town to leave the sanctuary where it is.

“I’m aware of the benefits of having cats on the property because of mice and snakes,” Terri Coco, a resident at The Spa, told The Island Packet. “None of us hate cats, but the number of cats is a nuisance. We have tennis courts behind us, and the cats come onto the tennis courts. We hear them squalling and screeching and whatever else they’re doing at night, because we sleep with our windows open.”

Coco also said she’s cleaned cat poop from in front of the door to her second-floor condo about three times since moving in 2021. Cats running through the stairwell have startled her in the past, she said, posing the risk of her falling down the stairs.

She emphasized she’s not advocating for any violence against the sanctuary or cats, simply a relocation of the facility.

“Again, nothing awful, but a nuisance,” Coco said. “I can’t say it’s every night, but it’s often enough that it’s noticeable.”

“I just feel it needs to be somewhere else, and not in front of a property,” said Carol Hicks, another Spa resident. “How would Belfair, Hilton Head Plantation, Long Cove, how would they like a cat sanctuary in their front yard?”

‘They’re not our cats,’ sanctuary says

Residents’ concerns have become so prevalent that Henry Sanders, the current vice president of the neighborhood’s board, said the board voted 6-1 to take the issue to town council before the May 2 meeting. Sanders was the board’s lone dissenting vote, but others who live in the complex have joined him in support of their furry friends.

“I stand on that, I just think these people are ill-informed,” Sanders said. “It’s a knee-jerk reaction ... it would be animal cruelty on an industrial scale (to relocate the sanctuary).”

Sanders said feral cats have lived in the area since before the sanctuary opened. The Spa previously had feeding stations placed around the neighborhood by a former resident and the local humane society to feed the local cat population. Sanders said those feeders were removed around 2018.

“We probably see more cats than before the shelter got going, but so what?” Sanders said. “I have personally seen those cats stalk and kill squirrels, snakes, mice, and the occasional rats. The cats are healthy and beautiful.”

Sherree Capello, the president of All About Cats, said the organization keeps track of which cats in the area it has trapped, spayed, neutered or taken to receive shots. Those cats have their ears clipped in the process to show those procedures were completed.

Part of All About Cats’ mission, Capello said, is to control the feral cat population on the island. The organization works alongside the Hilton Head Humane Association, which allows All About Cats six slots each week for any cats that still need to be fixed. The animals are also tested for diseases like FIV and leukemia.

Joan Stepke, a volunteer for All About Cats, said felines testing positive for those diseases are euthanized to prevent spread among the island’s cat population. The organization also helps manage about 30 feral cat colonies in the area.

“They’re not our cats,” one speaker on behalf of All About Cats told town council last week.

Many of the cats that Spa residents cite as problems aren’t cats the sanctuary has cared for - they are cats that remain from the population that previously lived at The Spa, Capello said.

“When we spay and neuter, I have a full record of every single cat that we have taken in. They get a number and we take a photo of them,” Capello said. “Our cats pretty much stay in the sanctuary, they don’t leave very far, they’ve been there for a very long time ... the only ones that are hard to tell apart are the all black ones. The ones that we don’t know are the stragglers that come in and we get them fixed, then they go about their way.”

Feral cats from outside the sanctuary are encouraged to stick around The Spa because some residents continue to feed those animals, Capello said. Because of this separate population, Capello said removing the sanctuary wouldn’t solve The Spa residents’ issues.

“I know there is a cat rescue adjacent to the complex and it is my understanding that some board members are against any cats that wander over to the complex. I don’t understand why,” one short-term renter wrote in an email All About Cats provided to the Island Packet. “The kitties provide free rodent control to the condo grounds and aren’t bothering anyone. My husband and I are charmed by the kitty ambassadors and we always look forward to seeing a few visiting on the property.”

Despite positive feedback from some visitors and residents, Capello said some feeders, located on another parcel of forested land just down the road from the sanctuary grounds, were recently vandalized.

Elise Upperman, a long-term Spa resident, said she was issued a $100 fine for feeding cats in the neighborhood. She said the cats she often sees around the complex are seemingly more socialized than the sanctuary cats, many of which have never been house pets.

“You can tell they aren’t the sanctuary’s cats, they’re a bit more social than sanctuary cats, they’ll come up in front of you and want to rub on your leg,” Upperman said. “It might be that their owner died. It’s in The Spa’s benefit to just let the cats who have existed here for ten-plus years, independent of the sanctuary, continue to live their life.”

Despite acknowledging the good a local cat population can do to keep pests away, residents like Hicks and Coco maintain the number of felines is greater than residents should be expected to endure.

“You just can’t enclose them,” Hicks said. “They’re coming over, coming onto the property, and a lot of people on VRBO and Airbnb (read) reports from people saying, ‘We love The Spa, the condo was beautiful, but there are too many cats.’ So, it’s really depreciating the property.”

Town officials promise an ‘investigation’

Before hearing public comments at the May 2 meeting, Town Manager Marc Orlando addressed The Spa residents in attendance for this issue.

“You had asked me a meeting ago to have an update on the cat sanctuary, for us to do a little bit of an investigation,” Orlando said. “That is scheduled for May 16.”

Orlando and Ward 6 Councilman Glenn Stanford, who represents the area containing The Spa and cat sanctuary, could not be reached for comment.

Cappello said she’s been told by Beaufort County Animal Control and Hilton Head town officials, including Deputy Town Manager Josh Gruber, the sanctuary isn’t violating any laws.

“It’s just grumbling,” Capello said. “It’s just complaining.”

While the sanctuary has improved aesthetically over time by installing more visually appealing housing for the cats by replacing the older pens, something Capello said management at The Spa noted as a “wish list” item during one of her early meetings with the group, Coco said the issues outweigh the benefits for her.

“I applaud the fact they are given their shots, and they are neutered, and all the things that are done to keep the cats healthy, but I honestly think you have to consider the people, too, who are finding this to be a nuisance, and not because we don’t love animals.”