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Mission Conflicts

Many organizations create a mission statement.  Some reduce the mission statement down to a few-word motto.  Like the police, “to protect and serve.”  In the animal welfare business, I used the motto, “protecting pets and people.”  Over the years, that motto has taken on different meanings.

Early in my career, our mission was clearly weighted towards protecting people from the dangers of animals and protecting animals from cruelty.  In that mission balance, people were given first priority.  Our primary mission was to remove stray animals from our streets.  It was a common practice to euthanize animals when the shelters became overcrowded.  We accepted that as necessary.

Our mission began to change during the no-kill movement.  Animals started becoming our first priority and, in an effort to become a no-kill shelter, many shelters stopped patrolling the streets for stray animals and eventually began refusing to accept animals at their shelter, just so that no animals were killed.

Once animal shelters had met the definition of no-kill, by reducing their euthanasia death to 10%, the shelters were pressured to go beyond 10%.  Animal shelters were pressured to keep alive animals that were clearly not adoptable.  Shelters began keeping animals for much longer periods of time.  Animal shelters were no longer able to provide their animals quality care.

Then the pandemic struck.  People started abandoning animals at a higher rate, and shelter staffing hit an all-time low.  Overcrowding became commonplace and the quality of care dropped further.

Anyone who has ever seen the layout of an animal shelter will realize that shelters were never constructed for long-term care.  The cages are too small to preserve the spacing needed to keep an animal sane.  I recently saw an animal shelter come under fire for failing to put dog beds out for their animals.  Pictures of the kennels clearly show that a dog bed would take up the entire floor space of the kennel.  Shelters were constructed back in the time when animals were kept only for days, not months.  Now with overcrowding, many animals have to be doubled up in those small kennels.  It is surprising that more shelter managers are not charged with animal cruelty.

Following the pandemic, we were hit with inflation.  With the rising costs of caring for an animal, we are witnessing an ever more increase in shelter overcrowding as people abandon their pets because of an unsure future.  All the while, the shelter mindset is still to preserve the life of every animal even while the quality of care continues to further erode.  It is a time in which we have lost our ability to protect either pets or people.

As a profession, we have given up on the notion of managing our shelter population.  We are in the era of managing our shelter overcrowding.

It is necessary that animal shelter management make difficult decisions and stop being afraid to do the right thing for the animals in our care.  The bullying that shelters take to save all of the animals is putting those same animals at risk.  You have to ask yourself; can you save them all?  If you said, “Yes”, then you need to ask yourself, at what cost?

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A Great Misperception

One of the greatest misperceptions in the world of animal welfare is that one size fits all. The No-Kill Movement is the best example of this. A community decides that ending the killing of animals in their local animal shelter is a good idea. It just feels good.

They look to no-kill animal shelters and decide to mimic them. So many people believed that the easiest way to end the killing of animals is to just stop killing them. It is this philosophy that caused the current overcrowding crisis in animal shelters today. It was easy for humane societies to become no-kill; they just closed their doors to animals coming in and let the local public shelter take the strain of the pet overpopulation. The humane society could be the good guys while the public animal shelter takes the grief for killing animals.

So? Why can’t a shelter just stop killing animals? The simple answer is space. Once you have filled up all of your kennels and foster homes, space becomes an issue. That seems simple enough; so, why not adopt them? Again, the issue comes down to space; you run out of potential homes or you find that many people don’t want to adopt a pitbull. Pitbulls or their mixes make up the largest percentage of animals in the shelter.

You can say what you will that pitbull dogs are like any other breed, but they are not. In a world of irresponsible pet owners, pitbulls demand the most responsible of owners. Most people cannot live up to that responsibility. The fact that seventy percent of any animal shelter is filled with pitbulls is a testament to the irresponsibility of their owners.

But, let us get back to our original misperceptions. Every community wants to be no-kill, so why can’t ours? The City of Austin Texas is a good example. They were able to reach no-kill status (which is a euthanasia rate lower than ten percent) by throwing money at the problem. It worked for a short time but failed when they ran out of money and people in neighboring communities began dumping their animals on them. Eventually, all of their money went to waste and Austin just found that the pet overpopulation just grew to fill their increased shelter space. Most communities don’t have the funding that Austin dished out to solve their problem and, in the end, to keep their no-kill status, they had to start restricting intakes.

So, it comes down to this: if the community animal shelter is a public service to provide protection from stray animals running in the streets; does closing your doors to accept those strays end the public protection that was your original mandate? It does. The No-Kill Movement is not a public safety protection program. Not only does it put the public at risk, but it places sheltered animals at risk. Each community has to judge for itself as to how humane it is for an animal to be caged waiting for an adoption that never comes.

Is there a solution? You bet, but it demands a mandate to force every pet owner to spay or neuter their pets. Breeding pets are the cause of shelter overcrowding. Breeding pets is the result of irresponsible pet ownership. The first step is to demand that all pitbull and pitbull mix dogs are sterilized, since they are the predominant problem of shelter overcrowded. Let’s face it if we could get the pitbull problem under control, it would be a big step in a community becoming no-kill. If the percentage of pitbulls in an animal shelter would drop below ten percent, then animal shelters would experience a tremendous boost toward ending the needless killing of animals.

Is that even possible? Not likely. Pet owners cannot be legislated into sterilizing their pets. Even if it is for the good of the community. To many pet owners, having a fertile pet is right up there with 2nd Amendment Rights. It is funny to see men come into the shelters to explain that their virility is linked to their dog’s testicles. But there are workaround solutions. A community can make it infeasible to allow a fertile dog to run loose. In Alachua County (Florida) owners of fertile animals were charged a higher impound fee if their pet was picked up. After all, it is these fertile pets running loose that are the problem. We would give the owner two choices, to pay the higher fee or to pay no impound fee if we were allowed to sterilize the animal. The problem is those pet owners found an alternate solution and abandoned their pet at the shelter. At least, in our hands, the pet could hopefully find a new home and not contribute to the pet overpopulation problem.

Too many people, including the No-Kill folks, blame shelter euthanasia on shelter staff. The killing starts at home; with the reckless breeding of unwanted animals. It is like blaming the sanitation workers for filling up your landfill.

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The Problem with Long-term Dogs

With the advent of the No Kill Movement, animal shelters began holding animals much longer so as to facilitate positive outcomes.  Animals were no longer kept for days or weeks but held for months or years.  We began to see new dynamics arise within our walls.

Animals do not respond to long-term confinement the same.  Some accepted their fate, but others did not.  We had to begin wondering if the decisions to hold an animal were in the animal’s best interest.  We called it, “cage crazy” when an animal becomes more aggressive the longer that we hold the animal.

Cage crazy comes in many varies.  In Roanoke, we witnessed several dogs acting aggressive toward our staff but were gentle toward a couple of volunteers who walked them.  The dogs were too aggressive for adoption.  The decision to euthanize the dogs created an outcry from the volunteers.  Our decision to euthanize the dogs was a good decision, but our mistake was not videotaping the dogs to support that decision.

The pressure to hold dogs, even aggressive dogs, forces animal shelters to make bad decisions.  Those bad decisions put animal shelter employees at risk when public safety should be our primary focus.  When shelter staff can no longer safely interact with an animal, the quality of care for that animal is greatly diminished and we have to ask ourselves if we are providing humane care.

The decision to hold an animal should be based on a shelter’s ability to meet the needs of that animal and insure the safety of its staff.  The decision should not be made so as to keep a couple of volunteers happy.   We need to keep reminding ourselves that the primary mission of an animal shelter is to protect the community.  When animal shelters switch their priority to insuring that every animal gets adopted, it then places its community at risk.

I have mentioned previously that in Virginia, it became so common for shelters to lie to potential adopters about an animal’s past behavior that the Commonwealth had to create a law that prohibited lying.   Shelters were willing to give up their integrity so as to claim that they were a No-Kill Organization.  The fact is, that it was actually better for potential pet owners to avoid getting their pet from an animal shelter in Virginia because you couldn’t trust what they told you.  On top of that, the adopters were criticized on social media for returning the aggressive animal back to the shelter.

The fact is, that few shelters know the past history of an animal.  The people who know are the ones that turned in their pet as a stray.  If animal shelters decide to commit to long holding times for animals, then they must be willing to share what little knowledge that they have gained about the animal.  Many jurisdictions have created Pet Lemon Laws that protect an adopter from purchasing a pet from their shelter.  We have learned that what people imagine in their minds as to what it is like to be a pet owner often doesn’t meet the reality of bringing a pet home.

In recent years, animal shelters were sued because they thought it was more important to adopt an animal than to keep the children in a family safe.  Being truthful about an animal should be an animal shelter’s only option.

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Who Do You Serve?

One of the greatest challenges that you’ll face is the constant question as to who do you serve?  Many people getting into the animal welfare profession will tell you that they are “here for the animals.”  That is a noble cause, but are animals all that you serve?

When you start your job, you are going to find competing demands as to who you serve.  You’ll have to have some loyalty to the bureaucrats who hired you, after all that in addition to the salary that they pay you, they control the purse stings for your organization.  You will find it critical to your cause to quickly respond to commission or council members.  Having friendly folks on your commission/council will be advantageous at  budget time.  I had a County Manager in Florida who wanted to drastically cut our budget; fortunately we have several “friends” on the Commission who stopped him and in the end our budget was increased.

Do not forget that you have your community to serve.  Don’t worry, there will be plenty of them to remind you that they pay your salary.  No matter how demanding that they can become, they are your primary responsibility.  Every thing that we do much insure the safety of your community.

Your volunteers may expect that they become your primary focus.  In Virginia we had volunteers that wanted to “drive the boat.”  They wanted animals to supersede our mission to keep our community safe.  They were very vocal  in our community.  In previous posts, you will see that this was a problem for many shelters in Virginia.  Too many shelters gave in to the forces that wanted them to adopt potentially dangerous dogs.  Many of them later faced lawsuits for failing in their duties to protect the public.

Above all else, you have to serve yourself.  You have to protect your personal and professional integrity and that of your organization.  I got into a lot of hot water with my Board because they didn’t like condescension caused by volunteers not getting their way.  Sometimes even your Board of Directors forget who they are supposed to serve.  You must be willing to risk your job in order to keep your community safe.

The most important factor in your career is to constantly maintain the balance to those who you serve.  “Be true to thy own self.”

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Maintaining Shelter Standards

When I began in the animal welfare profession euthanasia rates were over 90 percent.  35 years later, we are experiencing placement rates at 90 percent.  We have come a long way and there are plenty of people wanting to claim credit for our success.  Many animal shelters have euthanasia rates under 5 percent.

Ten years ago, Delaware created a law that prohibited a shelter from having any empty kennels; I was opposed to Delaware’s law, it created a crisis every time that an Animal Control Officer brought in a stray animal, because there were no empty cages.  Experience teaches every shelter manager to know the number of cages that must be empty to accommodate intakes.  In addition to the number of animals that are delivered by officers, the public is at your front door delivering animals.  No one is going to ask a person to hold on to the animal until someone can go back and “make space.”

Colorado decided to go further, animal shelters cannot euthanize, even if they lack cage space.  Since no  kill has become a moot issue in our shelters as the reach or exceed 90 percent placement rates, politicians are eager to move shelters to the next evolution of animal sheltering:  for the shelter to become a “socially conscious shelter.”   A shelter that does not concern itself with the practical side of animal sheltering but look only to the needs of the animals.  On the surface, this sounds like a great idea.  A socially conscious shelter doesn’t have to worry about cage space.  Whether or not there is cage space, you find a spot for the animal.  And then, try to provide care.

The concept of “just one more animal,” is the premise that starts every animal hoarding situation.  I had to oversee a seizure of 700 cats in which the organization started with just a few and just kept accept “just one more” cat.

The politicians like to get their faces in the media showing their support for saving the animals.  When they are done, they leave one more unfunded mandate and leave the local jurisdictions responsible for administering the mess that they have created. Every community is difference; they allocate different budgets and enjoy different mores.  Due to the uniqueness of communities, they should be allowed to enact their own laws.

What role will the State of Colorado have when they have to deal with shutting down rural animal shelters for either failing to comply with the new law or that they have become hoarders and have insufficient funds and staffing to care for the newfound burden placed on them by the State.

Animal Shelters have a responsibility to care for the animals that come to them.  Forcing them to start hoarding animals is going to diminish the general care that they can provide.  Under the right circumstances, this new law will have unintended inhumane consequences as animal shelters are force to hold  animals beyond their capacity of space and staffing.

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Euthanasia Discussion

A few weeks ago, Dave Perry wrote an opinion piece, “End the euphemism for killing unwanted dogs and cats; it’s not euthanasia.”  The point that Mr. Perry was trying to make is that the word euthanasia comes from the Greek meaning “good death.”  Many definitions go further to suggest that the word means to perform this good death to alleviate pain and suffering.  It connotates being a good thing that we administer.

There is nothing good about the fact that we must kill animals because they are born into a world that doesn’t want them.  I know, I know, the no-kill world claims that there is no pet surplus; but, they are idiots.  The surplus of animals differs from community to community.  It is an indicator as to a community’s sensitivity to responsible pet ownership that includes spaying and neutering their animals.

Mr. Perry focused on the usage of the word.  But the act of euthanasia or “killing” takes an emotional toll on the animals and on shelter staff.  Performing this act speaks to the failure that we, as humans, deal with a problem that is caused by us.

I have to agree with Mr. Perry that there is nothing good about the killing of adoptable animals in our shelters.  We can attempt to soften the blow by finding a fancy word to describe our actions, but in the end the animals is dead.  All we have done is to bring the least painful method to killing an animal that is stuck in a small cage.  Those of us who have worked in animal shelters know that the longer an animal sits in a small cage, the more inhumane the confinement becomes.  So the question is to the length of time that an animal must  be held in a cage so that you can justify claiming that you are relieving the animal’s pain and suffering to call its death euthanasia.  The question that is always asked is how long is too long to hold an animal while calling its confinement humane?  That differs from animal to animal and it depends on the enrichment programs that are offered to the animal during its confinement.  The fact that we keep an animal in a cage for two years before it begins to become cage crazy and the animal is “euthanized;” we have to ask if we should look back and claim if holding the animal for such a long period of time, only to be euthanized is humane?  Probably not, but we are always hopeful for a positive outcome.

The no-kill movement doesn’t want us to blame the people responsible for causing the pet overpopulation problem; but, they want to blame the ones who must clean up the mess.

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Free Cats

A couple of the animal shelters in my area are hoping to reduce their overpopulation of cats by offering them free for adoption.  One of the advantages of living in the northern States is that we experience one less breeding cycle due to extreme cold weather.  That benefit does not seem to hold for this winter.  It is odd to see infant kittens entering the shelter in the winter months in which it gives a reprieved to shelters dealing with the excess cats in the community.  But, it appears that the cats are adapting.

Many communities face the problem of surplus cats and the cause is a result of our own good intentions.  We see a hungry cat at our door, we feed it.  As I have always said, “If there is sufficient food, cats will breed.”  Well, we must be feeding the hell out of cats.

Every time an animal shelter starts offering “free cats,” someone will come out of the woodwork exclaiming that by doing so, we are devaluing cats.  A free cat sends the message that cats have no value and people will treat the cats as having no vlaue.  I have never witness anyone mistreating a cat because the cat was free.  Animal Shelters face the problem of people giving away free kittens in front of shopping malls.  An Animal Shelter would be smart to compete and fill the community with spayed and neutered kittens than to push their community to the free unsterilized cats offered for sale by irresponsible cat owners.

The fact that Animal Shelters are offering cats for free is evidence of the following:

  •  The No Kill Movement is lying to us that there is no pet overpopulation.
  •  Low cost spay/neuter programs are necessary to curb the overpopulation problem.
  •  Trap, neuter and release (TNR) programs are a critical component of reducing the feral cat problem in our communities.
  • The community needs to understand their role in creating this problem.

I wish the shelters well in their efforts.

 

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No-Kill Confusion

I recently watched a YouTube video that demonstrats the confusion that people have about no-kill.   The author of the video, Kitten Lady, wrote, “Did you know that baby kittens can still be killed in a “no-kill” shelter? Watch my video to learn about how the standards in the Asilomar Accords fail to protect the tiniest and most vulnerable felines. It’s important for the public to know that even in “no-kill” communities, kittens still need our help and protection! ”

For the most part, Kitten Lady was right on about the struggles that animal shelter faces in trying to find homes for all of their animal guests, but she really missed the boat with she described the Asilomar Accords as an insurance policy.  The Asilomar Accords is a system to describe the health of an animal at intake and disposition.  Its intent is to provide a better understanding of decisions that are made toward an animal.  The shelter makes its euthanasia decisions based on the animal’s health, as well as overcrowding conditions and resources.  As I mentioned in the previous post, kitten season, the decision to euthanize kittens is the result of all of these factors.  The Asilomar Accords only provided a definition as to the kitten’s health condition at the time.  Being no-kill has little to do with whether an animal shelter kills kittens; it is about reducing their euthanasia to 10% of their total intakes.  Many shelters have programs that provide for the fostering of infant kittens.  Many kittens pasted through my home and I’ll be damned if anyone was going to euthanize them.

I suspect that video bloggers “stretch” their story to get people to watch their videos.  If they stretch it far enough, it becomes fake news.  It may also be a teaser for an new book that she is writing.

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Kitten Season

The onset of kitten season is one of the most dreaded times for animal shelters.  Kitten season is one of the greatest factors that makes or breaks an animal shelter calling itself a no-kill shelter.   And demonstrates the nasty side of mother nature by flooding the animal shelter with kittens two to four times each year, many of the kittens being neonatal (unable to eat without assistance).  Factors that regulated the severity of kitten season are access to food, climate, and communicable diseases.

Although population is the primary limiting factor in are area’s carrying capacity, providing an additional food source will extend the carrying capacity beyond its natural limits.  As long as there is an adequate food source, cats will breed.  People who are feeding outside cats are providing the cats with incentive to continue to reproduce.

The northern states are more likely to have fewer breeding cycles due to harsh weather.  Freezing temperatures serve to discourage a breeding cycle or kill any young offspring.   The fewer breeding cycles provide the shelter with few incidents of shelter overcrowding.

Communicable diseases (usually feline panleukopenia) will usually kill off many kittens shortly after birth.  The disease also presents a major risk to the animal shelter as the community and local animal control officers bring in diseased cats at a time when the shelter is at its greatest capacity.  It is not uncommon to read new reports of animal shelter having to euthanize their entire cat population to rid the shelter of potential vectors while the shelter undergoes a disinfecting process.

All of these factors will cause the increase in euthanasia at the animal shelter.  If the number of euthanasias drive the number of total deaths over ten percent, the shelter loses its right to call itself no-kill.

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When Going the Extra Mile is Not Enough

I have had the opportunity to participate in the evaluation  of animal sheltering over the past 30 years.  We migrated from index card record keeping to computer systems that post photos of lost pets on the Internet.  I have always encouraged my staff to go the extra mile in getting a pet back to his or her owner.

The evolution of the pet owner has evolved to recognizing the importance of spaying and neutering (in most of the country); but pet owners have not become better a vaccinating their pets or taking the initiative to look for their lost pets.

Animal Shelters are receiving less annual intakes due to spay/neutering efforts.  Shelters are not less crowded because animals are being held longer in hopes of finding them a new home.  Pit bull dogs are the greatest problematic breed because the breed occupies 50 percent of the kennel space in shelters.

When I first got into the business of animal welfare, a university veterinary professor told me the best way to control disease in an animal shelter is to not overcrowd the shelter.  Overcrowding causes stress to the animals and the maintaining a large number of animals will likely introduce disease.  As a result of the no kill movement, shelters are maintained in a state of overcrowding and as such shelters are frequently battling disease outbreaks.  If pet owners had previously vaccinated their pets, we would see fewer disease outbreaks.

The most notable issue that we see in animal shelters is the failure of pet owners to look for their lost pets.  The usual excuse is that, “He is always getting out and eventually comes home.”   The most important factor in being a pet owners is that the own should be smarter than their pet.  Pet owners should be able to create an escape proof yard.  I suspect that many pet owners are just too lazy to go looking for their lost pet, in many cases pet owners report they learned about their dog being in the shelter through a friend or social media.

In most of the country, animal shelters maintain a three day holding period.  Most reasonable people would realize that their pet is missing in three days and go to the shelter.  The three day period is sufficiently short that the animal is unlikely to breakout with a disease by coming into the shelter unvaccinated.  The owner can deal with the symptoms when they get home.

In an effort to cater to local communities, some shelters extend the holding periods up to 10 days.  Even with the longer holding periods, many pet owners find the time too short.  The problem with longer holding periods is that an unvaccinated pet may start showing symptoms of disease during day 5 or 6.   The animal shelter is then faced with treating the animal’s disease and becomes a risk to other animals.

Nothing is more upsetting than to have an animal owner reclaiming their sick lost dog on day nine and blame shelter staff for the animal’s illness.  It is easier to announce how dirt the shelter is with disease infested animals, than to admit that the owner didn’t see the importance of vaccinating their pet.

Due to the nature of animal shelters, there will ALWAYS be animals with diseases in them.  If you are not going to vaccinated your pet, then you should make sure that your pet never ends up in an animal shelter.  The only way to keep disease out of an animal shelter is to shut its doors to incoming animals.

Most animal shelters recognized the deficiency of pet owners in vaccinating their pets, so they vaccinate the pets on intake.  The problem with vaccinations is that they don’t begin to take effect for six to seven days and it is minimal affect at that.  So why do we bother vaccinating?  It is all part of going the extra mile for the animal.

Now it is time for pet owners to start going the extra mile for their pets.  They can begin by placing identification on their pets and begin looking for their lost pet within the first 24 hours.  The shorter the time an animal spends in an anima shelter the safer the animal will be from disease.