Interview! Keith Williams, C5 (Community Cat Coalition of Clark County)

“C5 has exactly one program: we trap, neuter, and return free-roaming, unowned cats for colony caretakers.”

In this interview, Keith Williams of C5 in Las Vegas joins Stacy to discuss the group’s founding and how they have managed to trap 35,000 cats in just 10 years of operation. You may remember hearing about C5 in Stacy’s recent interview with Nikki Martinez as well. The all-volunteer group was started in 2009 by just a handful of people and has played a major role in dropping the county’s euthanasia rate a whopping 90%.

Keith holding the 35,000th cat trapped in just 10 years.

Like many community cat advocates, Keith got his start after a group of cats began having kittens in his backyard. Not long after, the county passed a TNR ordinance that not only set up free-roaming unowned cats as separate from owned cats, but also provided a framework for managing those cats through registered colonies. (The registration requirement has since been dropped.) Previously, the only option for those cats had been for people to take them to local shelters, where they were often euthanized.

Keith served as the colony registrar and as such, had contact with everyone who was involved with community cats in the area. When he realized that more resources were needed for free-roaming cats, he hand-picked a few of the people he’d come into contact with to meet and discuss the issue. Eventually, this group became C5.

Keith and Stacy talk about how the ordinance allowed TNR efforts to become much more efficient, and about how C5 is different from other groups. As Keith puts it, “We are the ultimate one-trick pony: we trap, neuter and return free-roaming cats.” They don’t foster or adopt (though they do partner with other local groups who do); they simply focus on trapping cats—and more specifically, on colonies of cats. Keith feels that the group’s focus on trapping entire colonies, not just a cat here and there, has made all the difference in the remarkable success they’ve had in making a difference for community cats in Las Vegas and Clark County.

Keith goes on to offer some advice for others looking to set up a similar program and explains the logistics of how their operations work. He also talks about how critical keeping good data records is, particularly if you want to apply for grant funding.

To learn more, visit C5’s website. From there, you can email Keith or others in the group—they are glad to share what they have learned with others!

Listen to Episode #297 Now