Joy Mattice, The Kind Cat Lady Of NoMi, Passes Away At 79 Advocating For Stray Kitty Cats To Her Last Breath...

Photo, blog post by John Hoff

This blog wishes to mention, belatedly, the passing away of Janet Joy Mattice, the kind-but-controversial cat lady who constantly helped and advocated for all animals, but mostly stray cats. She was 79 years old and passed away April 18, 2015. Click here for a link to her online tribute. Janet preferred to be known by her middle name of Joy. 


In a kind of last laugh directed at the world and those who opposed her feeding of strays, Joy's obituary directs any memorial donations be preferred to Feline Rescue and MN Snap. 

Cat Ladies Controversy Heats Up With Arrest Of "Susan" For Not-Exactly-A-Felony First Degree "Ground Feeding"

Stock photo, blog post by John Hoff

There has been a dramatic new development in the "Cat Ladies Controversy" this blogger previously covered, click here and also here. The cat lady known as "Susan" was arrested in the last few days and jailed.

Susan, whose relationship to Ultimate Cat Lady Joy Mattice is like that of Robin to Batman, or Hawthorne Hawkman to Johnny Northside, was reportedly near 111 22nd Ave. N., on the property of Atomic Recycling, LLC.  Mattice claims she has permission to be on that property and feed an old orange tabby cat named "Leo" who has been around the property for as long as 12 years. However, "Dean and Dale" have a restraining order on Joy Mattice, and live around the corner.

Joy wasn't at the Atomic Recycling property this particular day. Susan was there. And Susan believed she had permission to be on the property...

Kind Cat Lady Of NoMi Receives Minor "Slap On The Wrist" For Attempts To Help Strays (Part One Of Two)

Photo, blog post by John Hoff

"There were four shootings this week," Janet Joy Mattice told me during her criminal arraignment on Halloween, shaking her gray head disgustedly. "And they are on me about feeding cats."

And Then They Were Upon Her

But "on her" they were. Janet (who goes by her middle name, Joy) had a perfect record except for one minor traffic violation. She is the widow of a retired Minneapolis police officer and, during the administration of Governor Rudy Perpich, Mattice received a proclamation in her honor for years of work in the area of animal welfare including changes made in state law as a result of her efforts. In the photo above, Mattice holds a copy of the proclamation in question.

If you talk to Mattice for any length of time she will soon tell you about her rescues of dogs and cats that have been hung, doused with fuel, and all manner of terrible things that happen to the animals she loves and to which she has virtually devoted her whole life. Mattice was born in 1936, so that's a lot of life.

Though Mattice had been helping strays for a long time it appears the mortgage crisis in North Minneapolis has, in the last few years, produced a "perfect storm" of animal overpopulation versus Janet Joy Mattice's energetic and admittedly stubborn attempts to help stray animals. Mattice uses traps to catch cats, has the cats spayed or neutered, and then releases the cats again. Mattice points out (with the paper documentation to prove it) that...