Lynbrook woman making a difference one cat at a time

John Debacker travels around the Town of Hempstead to trap feral cats.

Courtesy John Debacker

For about 20 years, Lorraine Woll has been capturing, neutering and socializing cats. It started, she said, when she was living in Hempstead and found two kittens born in her garage. She then trapped them and brought them into an animal shelter, and later found more cats in her backyard.

“Every time you try to walk away from it, [the cats] come back,” said Woll, 52.

Woll is now living in Lynbrook, where she continues to capture cats as a volunteer and board member for Long Island Cat Kitten Solutions. LICKS is an organization that has partnered with Kitty Cove in Long Beach to provide low-cost spay and neutering for feral cats and pets. Kitty Cove also aims to “rescue as many abandoned and abused cats and kittens as possible,” according to its mission statement.

When a volunteer for LICKS finds a feral cat colony, they clean up the area and get the cats spayed and neutered, which includes cutting off the tip of their left ear for identification purposes. The kittens are then socialized with humans and put up for adoption at Kitty Cove.

Earlier this month, Woll’s son, Robert, found three kittens near Hofstra University and immediately called his mother to trap them, spay and neuter them and get them adopted from Kitty Cove. Two of the kittens have already been adopted, she said.

“Anyone who knows [her], they always contact her,” said Lynbrook resident Sabine Pavone. “She’s the one to go to.”

But Woll said she prefers socializing the cats rather than trapping them. “I wouldn’t consider myself a trapper, but I’ll do it if I have to,” she said.

Instead, she said, people should call Kitty Cove and ask for John Debacker. “He comes in, he cleans up the colony of stray cats and gets the kittens homes,” Woll said.

Debacker, 24, of Seaford, started trapping cats about four years ago, he said, when someone “dumped a few cats a few blocks away from me.”

Since then, he added, he has been trapping cats all over the Town of Hempstead. “There’s too many on the Island and not enough people to take care of them all,” he said. “So I try to control the population.”

Anyone who sees a feral cat without the tip of his or her left ear cut off is encouraged to call Kitty Cove at (516) 594–1721, or visit its store at 126 Austin Blvd. in Island Park.