One of the things that irritates me the most in our profession is states issuing unfunded mandates. Animal control services are funded at a local level, they receive no funding from their state. But that doesn’t stop the states from telling us how animal control should operate.
California, of course, is one of the first to butt its nose into our business. The mandates issued by California made it impossible for humane societies to continue their contracts with government to provide housing. As with everything that California does, it created a crisis for the housing of animals. It took years to eventually throw out the mandate, but a lot of damage was done in the meantime.
Delaware created a mandate that animal shelters could not euthanize animals unless the shelter was beyond capacity. They gave no thought to an animal control officer bringing in strays, but finding all of the kennels full. They’d have to sit around waiting for someone to euthanize an animal so that they could find cage space for the new arrival. I think you can see the stupidity of this mandate.
I climbed back on this bandwagon when I discovered that Utah was in the process of putting controls on animal shelters when dispositioning their animals. If a rescue showed interest in an animal, the shelter was forced to hold the animal. Anyone with any brains can see the problem with this.
If states are going to create financial hardships on animal shelters, they should give the shelters funding for the costs associated with their mandates. Of course, they never do. And they are unable to think through the problems that they cause. States should just stay out of business that are provided at the county or city level. They know nothing of our business and should not cower to the animal rights groups that have their ear.