By day, Brianne Tushaus works in supply chain management. By night, she dedicates her time to trapping and saving cats.
“Every free moment outside of my day job is dedicated to saving cats,” she said.
Tushaus, a resident of South Minneapolis, trapped between 150 to 200 cats within a two-mile radius of her home last year. After trapping them, she ensures they are spayed or neutered before returning them to their community. This process, known as Trap-Neuter-Return (TNR), aims to control the cat population.
“All of those cats were living outside, and none were neutered,” Tushaus explained. “Without TNR, those numbers would have exploded fivefold within a year.”
Non-profits like Pet Project Rescue and Bitty Kitty Brigade share Tushaus’s mission. Pet Project Rescue alone handles around 500 cats annually through TNR.
“We believe that TNR, we know that TNR is the way out of this problem,” said Jacky Wilson, TNR director at Bitty Kitty Brigade. “We always say we can’t adopt our way out of cat overpopulation, but we can TNR our way out of it.”
However, this mission has recently faced a new challenge. The Animal Humane Society (AHS) started charging $75 per cat for its TNR program at the start of July.
“As you can imagine, the financial burden is huge,” Tushaus noted. “This is why we depend on free spay-neuter services. Access to this is vital.”
AHS itself is grappling with a $3.5 million budget shortfall. AHS CEO Janella Dixon stated that charging for TNR was one of several tough financial decisions.
“We had to make some significant changes to our budget. This was actually a smaller change compared to the other adjustments we made,” Dixon said.
AHS began charging for TNR on July 1, the start of its 2025 fiscal year. Despite the new fee, Dixon assured that AHS remains committed to its TNR program and its goal of 1,000 surgeries a year.
“We are just at a place where we can’t make it totally free anymore,” Dixon explained. “We have to share the cost.”
While recognizing the difficulty of this change, Dixon emphasized its necessity for continuing their work.
“It’s one service among the many we provide,” Dixon said. “We’re impacting the lives of nearly 100,000 animals every year. It’s important to keep a big picture view on how many animals we help and the resource allocation needed to do the most good.”
In response, animal rescue advocates are urging donors to help bridge the financial gap. On Monday morning, leaders in the animal welfare industry came together to highlight the urgent need for support.
“Every city is affected. I’ve heard people say they don’t see feral cats in their city. Tell me your city, and I will tell you where the pockets are because we receive calls and kittens surrendered from every city in the Twin Cities. There are feral cats in every neighborhood; you just don’t see them,” Wilson said.
The Bitty Kitty Brigade, Pet Project Rescue, and independent cat trappers aim to raise $25,000 to sustain their mission through the summer. They are also seeking long-term solutions, such as grant funding and state programs, to ensure the continued success of their TNR efforts.
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