This story idea is based on narrow evidence, but it seems to be true. Al's Morning Meeting reader Jeff Domenick, editor of the
Valley News Dispatch in Tarentum, Pa., dropped me a note saying:
We did a story a few weeks back about a woman with terminal cancer whose last wish was to find homes for her seven cats, including two that were handicapped.
That led to a call from one of our animal shelters that was quite timely. The woman said that in addition to seeing more dropped-off pets, animal shelters are also seeing a growing percentage of handicapped cats as the economy worsens. We couldn't prove that, but we checked with our other two shelters and that seems to be the case.
This may be true in other places.
We also got some heart-tugging art, but only one photo appeared in the story online. The other two show a three-legged cat and a one-eyed cat.
I have seen a lot of stories about shelters getting overwhelmed by pets
whose owners have lost their homes to foreclosure.
