Owner of 25 cats removed from Lancaster County home tells his story: ‘I cry every day for them’

After learning the identity of the person who had their cats taken recently in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, I made the decision to ask for his side of the story. I’ll refer to him as Kenneth for privacy reasons.

Kenneth and his family have been rescuing furbabies for years and found homes for many of them. As many of those in rescue have experienced, slowly people stopped taking them and the family kept them all. The cats were all spayed/neutered and well fed. In fact, there were times the cats ate before the family did.

A lot of their babies were bottle fed and on deaths door upon arrival. They were cared for and loved. That’s easily seen in the photos on Kenneth’s Facebook page. There are also photos showing the home was clean. This was never a case of feces all over the place or dead and starving cats.

The landlord is allegedly a bum who never fixed anything. Numerous times Kenneth complained to him and to the codes department, but as long as the landlord did a patch job on things, codes let him go.
This has been going on for six years.

Recently another codes inspector came out and condemned the apartment and all of the cats were taken. Everyone involved made it look like they were hoarders living in a condemned apartment. When I wrote the article, I went by five references saying the same. Hoarding.

This isn’t the only tragedy the family has gone through. Their car was recently totaled by a drunk driver. Kenneth says they’re now homeless and staying on a couch while living out of a bag. They do have some money for rent and a security deposit.

It’s hard because of credit, and the wreck didn’t help matters. Kenneth works his tail off for these cats, who are now gone. Hopefully, a fundraiser can be set up over the next few days and I’ll be able to post the link here.

Kenneth is very emotional right now and told me:

“We have a friend holding our 6 cats they left us keep. But it not the same, it was hard to choose from all our furbabies. I cry every day for them.”

People everywhere are messaging me saying they’re willing to help financially. We just have to get all of our ducks in a row to make that happen. It will be your choice as whether or not to donate. This article isn’t a push to collect funds, but rather to clear up the news media stories.

I urge you to take a good look at the photos. I’ve done a few hundred of them on hoarding situation. This is NOT how a hoarders home appears.  Take a look at the kitchen photo above. The cabinets are a bit “off,” but the counters and floors are spotless.

I hope this has cleared up any confusion on what the news reports are saying. I wish Kenneth and his family well and hope they can find a home where abandoned cats will be welcomed.

Elisa