THE EDITOR,
When will the City of Richmond recognize that established policy sometimes needs to be amended for the safety of its citizens or their pets?
When a raccoon attacks your pet in your backyard in broad daylight, alarms must start going off in your head.
Raccoons are nocturnal and are rarely, if ever, observed on our streets in Richmond during daylight. Raccoons normally run away when confronted.
Raccoons normally do not hunt small dogs or cats.
So what happens when a raccoon that is missing a tail and is limping because of a wound to its rear quarter comes in your backyard and stocks your harnessed cat at 10 a.m. in the morning of a bright sunny day?
You grab a broom and try to scare it out of your yard. After a lot of noise from both sides, the raccoon climbs over the fence and runs away.
Our cat was not hurt but if I had not put the run on the raccoon, I am sure our cat of eight years would be dead (we have no kids, only the cat).
When the excitement is over and the raccoon has run away towards the Lord Byng elementary where kids are playing on the swings, I do the next logical step and call the Richmond city hall and am promptly put through to bylaws. I get a non-committal standard response, advising me that I can call a pest control agency to handle the issue.
At this stage I suggest that the city has the issue with a particular raccoon and not all raccoons. I explained that this raccoon does not live in our yard and it was only there to enjoy the opportunity of having a cat dinner.
Do you know that the our city council will not be sitting until September and that there is no way that anything can be done if your concern is not already set into our city's established policies and bylaws? Our city's bylaws do not address nuisance wildlife. The policy on wildlife is to live in harmony. What if it was a black bear or a rabid skunk?
After numerous phone calls, with all the same responses, I suggest that all parents watch their young children when they are outside and tell them to stay away from those very cute raccoons if they see one.
If you have a small pet, keep your eye on them even if harnessed and on a leash in your backyard as the City of Richmond does not have a policy for nuisance wildlife.
As all of the fine people working for our city on our behalf have said, 'this is your issue to deal with and not ours.'
John Austin
Richmond
