SWAMPSCOTT – In an effort to curb coyote attacks, Town Administrator Sean Fitzgerald proposed a new bylaw to the town council that would prohibit residents from feeding wildlife on Tuesday.
The key to solving the issue, said Fitzgerald, is to educate the public on dealing with the coyotes responsibly.
“We have habitat areas that can support pockets of wildlife, and we want to educate the folks to really deal with wildlife responsibly,” said Fitzgerald. “The last thing I want to see in Swampscott is coyotes be euthanized somehow because somebody was trying to feed them.”
Fitzgerald introducing the bylaw comes in the wake of two coyote attacks in recent weeks in the Swampscott Mall area on Paradise Road. On June 13, a man was bitten by a coyote near the Santander bank after pulling over to use his phone on his way to work. Later, on July 2, Kathy Ellis was bitten after exiting a Bertucci’s restaurant.
In both cases the animals were not approached by humans, and they were not harassed in any way.
“We feel that it’s a public health issue,” said Board of Health Chair Marianne Hartmann.
One of the reasons the Board of Health decided to hold a meeting discussing the issue, Hartmann explained, was because the town got tips that residents were feeding the coyotes in public spaces, which “habituates them to the people, and it poses a hazard for both the animals and the people.”
“We should not be feeding animals at all … nature knows how to do it,” said Hartmann.
Fitzgerald said that it is still possible for Swampscott to safely live with coyotes and other animals in the habitat that really supports human beings and the pockets of wildlife. He explained that data from MassWildlife said that coyotes tend to be shy, elusive, and to avoid human contact. To that end, the problem that the town is facing now can be partly attributed to the incorrect practices of human behaviors.
“There is a situation where some bad practices are going to lead to some unfortunate outcomes,” said Fitzgerald.
Fitzgerald said the fact that residents put out food for the coyotes creates unnecessary conflicts, because coyotes generally avoid human contact. Last year, “a number of programs on living with coyotes” were held in the community.
The town also ran several public statements “to help folks to really appreciate the importance of balancing responsibilities to the environment,” he said. Those programs and statements might be helpful in avoiding the hazards of “being too friendly and creating too much of a connection with these coyotes.”
However, residents still held to the incorrect practices. Geographically, the region has the open space that connected the communities within it, the wildlife traveled down as part of the region’s ecosystem, and it was impossible and unnecessary to prevent coyotes’ migrations within the region, said Fitzgerald.
To that end, several days ago the town administrator introduced a bylaw to the town council to prevent “understandably good intentions leading to some very bad outcomes,” as he put it. He said that human efforts to feed wildlife, although based upon good intentions, were detrimental to the wildlife.
“Because there is nothing more tragic than to see an animal just trying to survive, because somebody wanted to feed it and make it reliant on human connections that posed a threat to public health,” said Fitzgerald.
He said that while residents thought that they were doing a good thing, they were in fact creating a very unfortunate situation.
“We have to be more mindful about looking at some of the bad behavior that leads to some of these animals being habituated or connected to humans,” said Fitzgerald.
He said that since it was unusual for the coyotes to approach humans and wander about during the daytime, he encouraged residents to contact the town and the animal control officer if they met an animal in these circumstances.
“They are a wonderful part of our wildlife and ecosystem,” said Fitzgerald.
Oksana Kotkina can be reached at [email protected].