Maricopa County is seeing a cat crisis. Thousands of cats are without homes and hundreds more are born every year.

Maricopa County Animal Care and Control (MCACC) saw 14,082 cats come through the doors last year. More than half of those cats arrive during the late spring, early summer months, resulting in an overwhelming number of cats and nowhere to put them. Intake increases a whopping 181% from the slowest to busiest months. With only 25% of the cats getting adopted and about 20% getting rescued, there is too large of a gap.

Cat euthanasia is higher than dog euthanasia. Unlike dogs, a small number of lost cats actually go back to their owners. More than 10% of the dogs that come to the shelter get returned to their owners compared with a mere ½% of the cats.

What's more, cats tend to stay longer at the shelter than dogs—nine days versus six. While only a few dogs stay more than a month, a handful of cats stay over three months.

MCACC has dedicated 2010 as the Year of the Cat to change these numbers, in effect, saving more cats lives.