STATE COLLEGE, CENTRE COUNTY - A woman who rescued 62 abandoned cats from a house in Centre County is hoping for justice.
Shirley Fonda has been rescuing cats for nearly 14 years, but she says her last rescue was one of the worst she's ever seen.
This room is filled, top to bottom, with old records, pianos, odd little trinkets from travels across the world.
"I usually, when I get very tired, I'll just come in and play the piano a lot," Fonda said.
Shirley Fonda calls it her music room, but now, "There's just no way. I've lost this room," she said.
What you'll find inside this room and throughout other rooms in her house are cats, and lots of them.
"This is where I put all the cats with many more cages after I got them and saw that they were all healthy, I brought them all in here."
Fonda says it all started with a tip.
"Why don't you check on University Drive, a friend says there's lot of cats there," Fonda said. "So I drove by and there were nine young kittens sitting at the end of the driveway. I got another friend and we picked up 15 cats that night."
And then, Fonda says, they all kept coming.
"All in all, I had 62."
Patton Township Police Chief John Petrick says abandoned cats are a growing problem in Centre County.
"It's common sense. If you have a cat, a dog, whatever animal, you have to provide reasonable care. That's shelter, that's food, that's water," Petrick said.
Fonda agrees, and she says keeping those numbers down is important.
"There's just an overpopulation of cats in this area and I don't know, I soon came to realize that I can't rescue all of them," she said. "I've rescued almost 1500 cats in 14 years and there's just more everywhere."
Fonda still has plenty of cats available for adoption and she has quite a few vet bills to pay for all of their care.
Shirley Fonda has been rescuing cats for nearly 14 years, but she says her last rescue was one of the worst she's ever seen.
This room is filled, top to bottom, with old records, pianos, odd little trinkets from travels across the world.
"I usually, when I get very tired, I'll just come in and play the piano a lot," Fonda said.
Shirley Fonda calls it her music room, but now, "There's just no way. I've lost this room," she said.
What you'll find inside this room and throughout other rooms in her house are cats, and lots of them.
"This is where I put all the cats with many more cages after I got them and saw that they were all healthy, I brought them all in here."
Fonda says it all started with a tip.
"Why don't you check on University Drive, a friend says there's lot of cats there," Fonda said. "So I drove by and there were nine young kittens sitting at the end of the driveway. I got another friend and we picked up 15 cats that night."
And then, Fonda says, they all kept coming.
"All in all, I had 62."
Patton Township Police Chief John Petrick says abandoned cats are a growing problem in Centre County.
"It's common sense. If you have a cat, a dog, whatever animal, you have to provide reasonable care. That's shelter, that's food, that's water," Petrick said.
Fonda agrees, and she says keeping those numbers down is important.
"There's just an overpopulation of cats in this area and I don't know, I soon came to realize that I can't rescue all of them," she said. "I've rescued almost 1500 cats in 14 years and there's just more everywhere."
Fonda still has plenty of cats available for adoption and she has quite a few vet bills to pay for all of their care.
