Depleted ASAC Limps into April Meeting

San Angelo's City Council meets April 2nd and will consider board nominations, however none of the candidates are for the Animal Shelter Advisory Committee, which currently has three open slots.  

In January Council reappointed PAWS employee Jen Murphy to a third term expiring January 2026.  The three open positions have been empty from anywhere between 2 and 14 months. 

The current ASAC Chair, Caitlin Wylie, is the latest resignation due to her term expiring.  There is time for Council to appoint new members in its April 16th meeting, two days before the ASAC's scheduled session on April 18th. 

A recent Facebook post stated the Shelter is "full of puppies."  That was also the case in August 2022 when horrific hoarding conditions combined with a roach infestation.

Consider this flashback from February 2017 when the city contracted out adoptions to Concho Valley PAWS:

Right now, (PAWS Director Jenie) Wilson said, the city doesn’t have the resources to enforce the (mandatory spay/neuter) ordinance because it is also working on reducing euthanasia rates.

“By bringing our resources together, maybe we can free up time for animal control so they can go out and enforce the ordinances, which may answer some of the problems of how animals get here in the beginning,” she said.

In addition to enforcing the ordinance, high-volume spay/neuter clinics and adoption events help achieve the no-kill goals.

It's seven years later and despite contracting out adoptions, the city still doesn't have the resources to enforce mandatory/spay neuter.  It took a special effort to follow up on nearly a thousand unaltered shelter pets released to owners in FY 2022.  

Owners claimed 956 cats and dogs from us, 674 of which have yet to prove spay/neuter. 

44 pet owners have since provided proof of spay/neuter. 

24 provided proof of an exemption, such as moved outside city limits, pet is medically fragile, pet has died, etc. 

This leaves 606 pets still reporting as unaltered. We’ve cited or filed a complaint with municipal court for almost 400 animals and are moving through the remaining backlog.

This special effort was remarkably unimpactful spay/neuter wise.  It got only 10%, 68 out of the 674 unaltered pets released to owners.  It did generate 400 citations and that money should be used for low cost spay/neuter for intact shelter pets.

In the words of City Councilman Harry Thomas, "there are more dogs on the street than ever."  That is the product of the numerous changes in shelter operations, managed intake and releasing thousands of unaltered dogs while claiming otherwise.

We'll see if Council beefs up its wounded advisory body in the animal arena.  They may be too busy with the Rodeo and finding the money to expand the City Coliseum and facilities for rodeo animals.

Update 4-2-24:  Council held a proclamation dominated meeting that lasted 45 minutes.  There were no future agenda items identified at the close of the meeting.