CAT LOVER, HAMILTON MOUNTAIN TEACHER BETH KORUNA HONOURED BY HBSPCA
Source: Hamilton News (Extract)
Posted: Nov 11, 2019
Beth Koruna receives Dr. Jean Rumney Memorial award at AGM, which honours those who have shown outstanding commitment and dedication to the animals and community served by the HBSPCA.
Beth Koruna is a lover of all animals, especially cats.
“I love that they all have their own personality,” said the 37-year-old Grade 3/4 teacher at Gordon Price Elementary School on the west Mountain. “You don’t really know them unless you spend a good amount of time with them.”
It was her love of felines and her desire to help do something about the overpopulation of cats in Hamilton that saw Koruna and some like-minded folks establish the Hamilton Community Cat Network three years ago.
She is now chair of the network.
The group’s mission is to help humanely capture, neuter, vaccinate and microchip feral or stray cats in the city, and then return them to their neighbourhoods.
Koruna says she has helped capture and return hundreds of cats over the years and this past summer, network volunteers captured and returned about 50 cats from an alley on Wentworth Street North between Barton and Cannon streets.
All the cats that are captured are taken to the HBSPCA (Hamilton/Burlington SPCA), a network partner, for treatment and any kittens they find are put up for adoption.
The group also lines up registered partners in all the neighbourhoods they serve, who feed and keep an eye on the cats after they are returned.
Her volunteer efforts to help city cats was recognized at the annual general meeting (AGM) of the HBSPCA in September when Koruna was presented with the Dr. Jean Rumney Memorial Award, which honours those who have shown outstanding commitment and dedication to the animals and community served by the Dartnall Road shelter.
The award is in memory of Jean Rumney, an animal-lover and first female to graduate from a veterinarian college in Canada.