Thursday, June 02, 2022

Large Dogs Have Long Stay in Animal Shelter


City adoption coordinator Concho Valley PAWS regularly informs citizens the shelter is full.  It's full of dogs who've been there for years.

The City of San Angelo Animal Shelter set its "No Kill" goal in July 2016.  Thirteen dogs in the shelter were admitted prior to that date.

The median admission date for shelter dogs of 5-12-2020 is over two years ago.  Half of the shelter's dog residents were admitted prior to May 2020 and half afterwards.

The majority of shelter dogs are large, mixed breed canines.  Many of them are pit bulls.  


City Council talked about Animal Shelter capital needs in its recent strategic planning session.  Citizens may not agree with spending hundreds of thousands in taxpayer funds for a department that provides little service to citizens in need.  

The shelter stopped taking owner surrenders in April 2019 via managed intake, a Pets Alive core strategy..  Volumes dropped significantly as the shelter choked off intake.  The Shelter plans to restrict intake even further.

The way to "No Kill" is to spay/neuter every animal in sight.  Over time this should result in fewer unwanted pets.  San Angelo has people who move in and out of town.  It has elderly residents who may need to move into assisted living.  People with pets die.  The shelter no longer helps people or pets in these predicaments. 

The city used Pets Alive's data driven approach to wall off the shelter, keeping it full of large, long stay dogs.  It hired an adoption contractor.  Despite a chronically full shelter, adoptions have decreased.  It spent significantly more to accomplish those strategies.  This doesn't sound strategic to me.

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