BILLINGS — A Billings woman is still searching for her missing cat after what she describes as a miscommunication between animal control and the Yellowstone Valley Animal Shelter that led to her pet being dropped off in a field instead of taken to safety.
Kallie Cremer’s cat Ollie has been missing for seven days after escaping her home through a tiny crack and wandering into a neighbor’s condo that she described as identical to hers.
Watch Kallie Cremer talk about her frustrations with animal control:
“I went out back behind my condo and was calling for him. And my neighbor came out and said, ‘Are you missing an orange cat?’ And I said, yeah, I am. She said, 'my God, he was inside my house,'” Cremer said Monday.
The neighbor called animal control, who picked up the cat. But instead of taking Ollie to the shelter, Cremer said that the officer dropped him off in a field near Cremer’s home.
“When I called animal control, I called and got ahold of the actual officer who took the cat. She told me that she dropped him off in a field near my house,” said Cremer, an advertising account executive at KTVQ.
What frustrated Cremer most is that her cat is microchipped, but animal control never checked for identification.
“He's chipped, he's microchipped. They never checked for that,” Cremer said. “When I talked to the director, he said that it was his understanding that the cat was acting feral. And so, that's why they couldn't check for his microchip, which is crazy.”
The situation highlights what seems to be a disconnect between animal control and YVAS. Animal control told Cremer the shelter wasn’t accepting animals, but YVAS director Triniti Halverson confirmed she spoke to animal control Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of last week, confirming the shelter was operating normally and providing specifics on capacity.
“They told me that the shelter wasn't accepting animals that day, which it absolutely was,” Cremer said.
The shelter has been in a bind since Sept. 10, when meth burned by the FBI in an incinerator in an adjacent room forced the evacuation of the Yellowstone Valley Animal Shelter. Since then, the shelter has struggled to find housing for strays, until Lionheart Cannabis offered its warehouse on Frontage Road in late September.
Despite conversations between animal control and Yellowstone Valley, confusion persists.
“The director that I talked to said, I don't know who you're talking to because, they'd be lying if they're telling you that they're accepting animals,” Cremer said regarding a conversation with animal control.
“The whole thing makes me so upset,” Cremer said. “They didn't attempt at all to get ahold of me.”
