OUT THE FRONT DOOR

Nelson County, Virginia, is a rural county midway between Charlottesville and Lynchburg. The population is about 15,000. Nelson County Animal Control (NCAC) is the municipal agency that takes in strays and owner surrenders for the county. In November 2012, a new animal control director with a background in management took over. The new director stated in a January 2013 interview that euthanasia is generally performed only on animals who are aggressive or sick. The Humane Society/SPCA of Nelson County (HSNC) is a private agency that pulls animals from NCAC and has an adoption center. In an article about its medical fund, HSNC reported that it takes in about 1000 animals per year. HSNC also accepts owner surrenders, but only if they have space and evaluate the animal as adoptable. In addition to its adoption center, HSNC uses transports to rescues to place animals. I confirmed in a phone call to HSNC that all transfers are to No Kill organizations.  HSNC has a stated goal for the county of ensuring that “no healthy, non-aggressive animal is euthanized.” NCAC and HSNC both report to the Virginia state database. In 2014, the combined live release rate for both NCAC and HSNC was 92% (88% if animals who died or were lost in shelter care are counted as euthanasias). This number probably understates the actual live release rate because I did not count any transfers from NCAC as live releases. The purpose of this was to avoid double counting of live releases since the majority of the transfers went to HSNC. In 2013 and 2012 the combined live release rates for NCAC and HSNC were in the 80th percentile. Nelson County has a very high intake of dogs and cats. The combined total intake of NCAC and HSNC for 2014, not counting transfers from NCAC, was 1386, which is 92 animals for every 1000 people in the community. Average intake for the US as a whole is thought to be from 15 to 30 animals per 1000 people. Nelson County, Virginia, is counted in the blog’s Running Totals as a 90%+ community.

[For today’s News Bit and the Running Totals, click here.] The Million Cat Challenge launched on December 10, 2014, and has proven to be wildly popular. I thought it would be fun to see a list of shelters that had signed on as of the 1-month anniversary, and here they are. Every shelter’s participation is valuable, but one thing that surprised me about this list is the number of large, traditional “open admission” shelters that have signed on already. Wow! Alachua County Humane Society Gainesville, Florida Alaqua Animal Refuge Freeport, Florida All About Animals Rescue/Macomb County Animal Control Warren, Michigan Al-Van Humane Society South Haven, Michigan Animal Care and Control Team of Philadelphia Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Animal Friends, Inc. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Animal Humane Society Golden Valley, Minnesota Animal Refuge League Westbrook, Maine Animal Rescue League Marshalltown, Iowa Animal Rescue League of Southern RI Peace Dale, Rhode Island Animal Welfare Agency South Central Ontario Kitchener, Ontario, Canada Animal Welfare League of Alexandria Alexandria, Virginia Animal Welfare League of Arlington Arlington, Virginia Animalkind Inc Hudson, New York Arizona Humane Society Phoenix, Arizona Arlington Animal Services Arlington, Texas Asheville Humane Society/Buncombe County Animal Shelter Asheville, North Carolina Austin Pets Alive! Austin, Texas Barry County Animal Shelter Hastings, Michigan Boone County Animal Care Columbia, Missouri Cache Humane Society Logan, Utah Capital Area Humane Society Lansing, Michigan Carteret County Humane Society, Inc Newport, North Carolina Cat Adoption Team Sherwood, Oregon Cat Depot Sarasota, Florida Cedar Rapids Animal Care & Control Cedar Rapids, Iowa Charleston Animal Society North Charleston, South Carolina Chautauqua County Humane Society Jamestown, New York Chemung County Humane Society and SPCA Elmira, New York Cheyenne Animal Shelter Cheyenne, Wyoming Chico Animal Shelter Chico, California City of Chicago Commission on Animal Care and Control Chicago, Illinois City of Hamilton Animal Services Hamilton, Ontario, Canada City of Sacramento Animal Care Services Sacramento, California City of San Antonio Animal Care Services San Antonio, Texas City of San Jose Animal Care and Services San Jose, California City of Stockton Animal Services Stockton, California City of Waco Animal Shelter Waco, Texas Clay County Animal Care and Control Fleming Island, Florida Cleveland Animal Protective League Cleveland, Ohio Clovis Animal Services Clovis, California Coastal Humane Society Brunswick, Maine Collier County Domestic Animal Services Naples, Florida Columbia Humane Society St. Helens, Oregon Companion Animal Alliance of Baton Rouge Baton Rouge, Louisiana Contra Costa County Animal Services Department Martinez, California Coulee Region Humane Society Onalaska, Wisconsin Dakin Humane Society Springfield & Leverett, Massachusetts Denver Animal Shelter Denver, Colorado Dogs & Cats Forever, Inc. Fort Pierce, Florida Edmonton Humane Society Edmonton, Alberta, Canada Flagler Humane Society Palm Coast, Florida Flathead County Animal Shelter Kalispell, Montana Fond du Lac Humane Society Fond du Lac, Wisconsin Georgian Triangle Humane Society Collingwood, Ontario, Canada Gifford Cat Shelter Brighton, Massachusetts Great Plains SPCA Merriam, Kansas Habersham County Animal Care & Control Clarkesville, Georgia Halifax Humane Society Daytona Beach, Florida Happy Tails Rock Falls, Illinois Harbor Humane Society West Olive, Michigan Heart of the Valley Animal Shelter Bozeman, Montana Helping Paws Animal Sanctuary Saint James City, Florida Humane Society of Polk County Winter Haven, Florida Humane Society Calumet Area Munster, Indiana Humane Society for Greater Nashua Nashua, New Hampshire Humane Society for Southwest Washington Vancouver, Washington Humane Society of Carroll County Westminster, Maryland Humane Society of Huron Valley Ann Arbor, Michigan Humane Society of Kandiyohi & Meeker Counties Willmar, Minnesota Humane Society of Sarasota County Sarasota, Florida Humane Society of Tampa Bay Tampa, Florida Humane Society of the Pikes Peak Region Colorado Springs/Pueblo, Colorado Humane Society of Washington County Hagerstown, Maryland Humane Society of West Michigan Grand Rapids, Michigan Humane Society Silicon Valley Milpitas, California Huntsville Animal Services Huntsville, Alabama Independent Cat Society Westville, Texas Jacksonville Animal Care and Protective Services Jacksonville, Florida Jacksonville Humane Society Jacksonville, Florida Kanawha-Charleston Humane Association Charleston, West Virginia Kenai Animal Shelter Kenai, Alaska Kern County Animal Services Bakersfield, California Kings County Animal Services Hanford, California Kokomo Humane Society Kokomo, Indiana Lawrence Humane Society Lawrence, Oklahoma Lee County Domestic Animal Services Fort Meyers, Florida Lexington Humane Society Lexington, Kentucky Long Beach Animal Care Services Long Beach, California Louisville Metro Animal Services Louisville, Kentucky Lynchburg Humane Society Lynchburg, Virginia Mat-Su Animal Care and Regulation Shelter Palmer, Alaska Miami-Dade Animal Services Miami, Florida Michigan Humane Society Detroit, Michigan Milwaukee Area Domestic Animal Control Commission Milwaukee, Wisconsin Montreal SPCA Montreal, Quebec, Canada Naples Cat Alliance Collier County, Florida Nate’s Honor Animal Rescue Bradenton, Florida Nevada Humane Society/Carson City Carson City, Nevada Norfolk SPCA Norfolk, Virginia OC Animal Care Orange, California Oktibbeha County Humane Society Starkville, Mississippi Oshkosh Area Humane Society Oshkosh, Wisconsin Pasco County Animal Services Land O Lakes, Florida PAWS of Bainbridge Island and North Kitsap Bainbridge Island, Washington Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League of the Palm Beaches, Inc. Palm Beach County, Florida PEI Humane Society Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada Pet Resource Center Tampa, Florida Pets Alive Middletown, North Carolina Pets Alive WNY Pendleton, New York Placer SPCA Roseville, California Potter League for Animals Newport, Rhode Island Progressive Animal Welfare Society Lynnwood, Washington Providence Animal Rescue League Providence, Rhode Island Quincy Humane Society Quincy, Illinois Rancho Cucamonga Animal Care and Adoption Center Rancho Cucamonga, California Rochester Animal Services Monroe County, New York Sacramento SPCA Sacramento, California Saint Louis County Animal Care and Control Services Olivette, Missouri Salem Friends of Felines Salem, Oregon Salinas Animal Services Salinas, California San Diego Humane Society Oceanside, California San Francisco SPCA San Francisco, California Seattle Humane Society Bellevue, Washington Second Chance Animal Shelter East Brookfield, Massachusetts Second Chance Pet Network Dryden, Ontario Silicon Valley Animal Control Authority Santa Clara, California Sonoma County Animal Services Santa Rosa, California South Suburban Humane Society Chicago Heights, Tennesse Southern Pines Animal Shelter Hattiesburg, Mississippi Spartanburg Humane Society Spartanburg, South Carolina SPCA of Brevard Titusville, Florida SPCA of Wake County Raleigh, North Carolina St. Francis Animal Rescue of Venice, Inc Venice, Florida St. Hubert’s Animal Welfare Center Madison, New Jersey Tacoma-Pierce County Humane Society Tacoma, Washington The Animal Foundation Las Vegas, Nevada Town Cats Morgan Hill, California Tri County Humane Society Saint Cloud, Minnesota Trust Again Pet Shelter, Inc. Zolfo Springs, Florida Ventura County Animal Services Camarillo, California Virginia Beach Animal Care and Adoption Center Virginia Beach, Virginia Wake County Animal Center Raleigh, North Carolina Washington Humane Society Washington, DC Wayside Waifs Kansas City, Missouri Westerly Animal Shelter Westerly, Rhode Island Whidbey Animals’ Improvement Foundation (WAIF) Coupeville, Washington Wisconsin Humane Society Milwaukee, Wisconsin Women’s Humane Society Bensalem, Pennsylvania Woods Humane Society San Luis Obispo, California Yavapai Humane Society Prescott, Arizona Yolo County Animal Services Woodland, California

Rio Blanco County is located in the northwestern part of Colorado on the Utah border. The 2010 census counted 6700 county residents, including the towns of Rangely (population 2400) and Meeker (2500). The County has two animal shelters, one serving Rangely and the other serving Meeker. Both shelters also accept animals picked up by the sheriff in unincorporated areas of the county. The Rangely Animal Shelter (RAS) is a municipal agency that handles animal control and sheltering for Rangely. Animals are vaccinated, neutered, and microchipped before being adopted. The RAS manager told me that they have a small, waivable fee for owner surrenders and will either take them in immediately or help the owner place the pet. They have a TNR program and they adopt out kittens born to feral mothers. The statistics submitted to the state by RAS for 2012 show a live release rate of 99%. The live release rate does not change if the one animal who died in shelter care in 2012 is included with euthanasias. In 2013, RAS took in 313 animals and had a 99.7% live release rate. The live release rate was 99.3% if the one animal who died in shelter care is included with euthanasias. The Meeker Animal Shelter (MAS) is also a municipal agency that provides animal control as well as sheltering. I spoke to the animal control officer, who told me that although MAS does not impound cats, she will respond to calls about sick or injured cats and take them to a local veterinarian. MAS accepts owner surrenders subject, at times, to a monitored waiting list. A rescue in Meeker called the Cat Coalition does TNR in the area. MAS took in 107 dogs in 2012 and had a 99% live release rate. The shelter took in 115 dogs in 2013 with a live release rate of 100%. No animals died or were lost in shelter care in 2013. Rio Blanco County was originally listed by this blog on December 9, 2013, based on its 2012 statistics. This post is a revision and update with 2013 statistics.

Kirby, Texas is a community of about 8,000 people in the San Antonio metro area. The city has a municipal agency, Kirby Animal Care Services, that handles animal control and sheltering for the city. The shelter describes itself as open intake and states that “no animal from our community in need is EVER turned away.” The city hired Christie Banduch in June of 2011. Before Banduch was hired, the shelter had a live release rate of 4% (that’s not a typo). In an e-mail to me, Banduch described the challenges she faced when she took over as including workload (she was the sole employee at that time for a facility with an intake of up to 100 animals per month), location (the shelter was hard to find and did not show up on GPS), and sanitation (the shelter was filthy and there were no cleaning supplies, vaccines, or dewormers). Banduch was able to turn things around right away, and statistics she sent me show that in her first full year running the shelter the live release rate shot up to 83%. In Banduch’s second year running the shelter (July 1, 2012 to June 30, 2013) she reported a live release rate of 92%, with an intake of 839 animals. If animals who died or were lost in shelter care are included with euthanasias, the live release rate was 91%. The shelter has good relationships with rescues, who pulled 215 dogs and 240 cats during the fiscal year. Banduch recently sent me uploadable statistics for calendar year 2013, which show an intake of 1040 cats and dogs, with a live release rate of 95%. There were no animals lost in shelter care in 2013. If animals who died are included with euthanasias, the live release rate is 94%. Here is a link to the 2013 statistics: Kirby TX 2013 statistics Kirby, Texas, was originally listed by this blog on July 5, 2013, based on their 2012-2013 fiscal-year statistics. This post is a revision and update with calendar-year 2013 statistics.

A lot has happened in the No Kill world in 2014, and a lot of progress has been made. In fact, I think 2014 has been one of the most important years for No Kill since the 1990s. To celebrate the year I’m going to have a series of blog posts discussing some of the major events and accomplishments of 2014. Today I’d like to start out by listing some of No Kill’s notable people of the year. In coming days I’ll be looking at organizations and particular innovations in 2014. Drs. Kate Hurley and Julie Levy are in the process of revolutionizing how shelters handle cats. They have developed recommendations that combine managed admission and “shelter-neuter-return” techniques for a roadmap to saving every healthy or treatable cat. This has been the huge news story in the shelter world in 2014, and the good news is that this story will be even bigger in 2015, with the recent rollout of the Million Cat Challenge. I will be discussing the Million Cat Challenge in more detail in a post later this month. Bonney Brown and Diane Blankenburg are teaching a certificate course at the University of the Pacific in “lifesaving-centered” animal shelter management. This is the first university-level series of courses in lifesaving shelter management that has ever been taught by people who have actually succeeded at getting to 90% with a large urban shelter. This certificate is extremely important because it can help people get hired as shelter managers who do not have the traditional qualifications of long years in animal control or shelter operations. Rebecca Guinn, founder of LifeLine Animal Project in Atlanta, has proven the “power of one” by forming a non-profit that took over the animal sheltering contract in 2013 for Fulton and DeKalb counties. LifeLine is not at a 90% save rate yet, but it looks like a lot of progress was made in 2014. Guinn is right in the center of two of the most important trends in No Kill. One is that No Kill advocates are forming non-profits and taking over city shelters rather than waiting for shelters to reform. The other is that big cities are going No Kill these days faster than smaller communities. It used to be thought that No Kill was harder to achieve in big cities, but people like Guinn are proving that idea wrong. Rick DuCharme and Peter Marsh have started an effort — Target Zero — to take No Kill to some tough venues, including places where past No Kill efforts have failed. They have had some success already, but to me the most notable point about what they are doing is that they are not shrinking from any challenge. In fact, their “fellow city” list, which includes Waco, Pensacola, Indianapolis, and Baton Rouge, looks as though they deliberately picked the hardest cities they could find. In the past, people have often carefully selected their venues for No Kill efforts. DuCharme and Marsh have blown that approach out of the water. Dr. Ellen Jefferson is another example of someone who picked a very tough city to reform when she expanded her successful Austin program to San Antonio. In its fiscal year ending in 2014, San Antonio had an 81.3% live release rate. This is an enormous accomplishment. Many people were involved in it, of course, but Dr. Jefferson’s formation of San Antonio Pets Alive! really lit the fire. There are many other people who did notable things in 2014 to advance the cause of No Kill, and there have been a lot of incremental changes at the city and county level. It’s a positive sign for the movement when there are far too many people with significant accomplishments to fit into any one list.

2014 was the year when it became impossible for one part-time person to keep up with reporting on all the communities getting to No Kill — at least, it became impossible for this part-time person. I updated over 100 shelters in over 230 communities in 2014, plus several “Worth Watching” communities. I’ve also been watching lots of larger communities that are well on the way to No Kill. There’s been no time to keep track of all the small communities with No Kill efforts because there are so many of them. I’ve been meditating what to do about the “Running Total,” now that it no longer provides a good snapshot of the true total of No Kill communities. I may change it to a population-based rather than community-based total, with a caveat that it includes only larger jurisdictions. With No Kill spreading so fast, the population total may give a better picture of the true situation. Or it might be better to switch to an emphasis on the number of animals killed in shelters each year, which has been steadily declining. There is another trend that may be even more important than the number of new 90% communities, and that is that the median live release rate of shelters that are not at 90% seems to be going up. Just 3 or 4 years ago most knowledgeable people would have estimated that shelters were killing about 50% of intake nationwide. Today, HSUS estimates that we have a nationwide live release rate of about 60%. Actual nationwide data on live release rates does not exist, so I have to go on impressions, but it seems to me based on what I’ve seen in my research for the blog that the HSUS estimate is close to the mark. A 10% increase in the average live release rate may not sound like much, but it means about 700,000 more lives saved per year. If we get another 10% increase in the live release rate in 2015, and 200,000 or more additional lives saved by the Million Cat Challenge, we could easily be under 2 million euthanasias for shelters nationwide in 2015, for a live release rate of about 73%. And that is just if current trends continue. If current trends improve, the 2015 live release rate nationwide could be even higher. So all-in-all it’s a good picture. Not the overnight change we’d all like to see, but moving forward at a good clip on what seems to be a very sustainable path. One caveat is that we may run into a slowdown in improvement when we hit the 70% or 80% mark nationwide. I’ve heard from many people that it gets harder to improve as the save rate goes up from 70% to 80%, and even more from 80% to 90%. One thing that may be key as shelters get to 70% is the aid and support they get from non-profit organizations in the community.

San Francisco is a combined city and county located in northern California. It has a population of about 837,000 people. The city/county shelter is San Francisco Animal Care And Control (ACC). The ACC performs all the functions of a municipal shelter, including animal control and accepting owner surrenders, and it has an adoption center. It has had a partnership known as the “Adoption Pact” with the private San Francisco SPCA since 1994. The SPCA pulls animals from ACC under the agreement, and it also does some intake directly from the public. The San Francisco SPCA has been recognized as a leader in the field of animal sheltering since back in the 1800s. And of course it is well-known for its origination of the No Kill communities concept in the 1990s. The SPCA today continues to be innovative, as with its shelter-neuter-return program for community cats. In addition to animals that the SPCA accepts from ACC under the Adoption Pact, it also takes in many animals from outside of San Francisco, including under an agreement with Stockton. The ACC and the SPCA have reported their combined statistics for years. In the 1990s the Adoption Pact achieved live release rates of over 75%, which was the highest of any major city at that time. In more recent years the combined live release rates have generally been in the mid-80% range. In 2013, the coalition finally broke the 90% barrier, with a combined 92% live release rate (excluding transfers between ACC and the SPCA). The ACC offers owner-requested-euthanasia, and if that number plus animals who died in shelter care are counted as euthanasias the live release rate was 89%.

The Million Cat Challenge was launched on December 10, 2014. Remember that date, because this is going to be big. As Peter Wolf said in his blog about it, the launch “felt like something historic – as if we’ve entered into a new era of animal sheltering where cats are concerned.” I could not agree more. If the Million Cat Challenge initiatives are fully implemented, they will stop shelter killing of healthy and treatable cats. And the initiatives are not difficult, nor do they require any special talents on the part of shelter leadership. Three reasons why the Million Cat Challenge will be so important: the ideas behind it are great, the people behind it are wonderful advocates, and just about every important organizational player in animal sheltering in the United States today has signed on to it. The organizations that are supporting the Million Cat Challenge include Maddie’s Fund, Best Friends, HSUS, ASPCA, Alley Cat Allies, PetSmart Charities, NACA, NFHS, the Association of Shelter Veterinarians, and the Canadian Federation of Humane Societies. Having the agreement of all of these organizations is crucial, because it will give local shelters with conservative directors the confidence that they need to adopt the new ideas. The designers of the Challenge want every municipal shelter in the country to sign on. The support of almost all of the important national organizations should help make that possible. And confidence will be necessary, because the ideas proposed by the Challenge are revolutionary. The Five Key Initiatives add up to nothing less than a complete overhaul of how cat sheltering is done in the United States. Two of the initiatives, alternatives to intake and removing barriers to adoption, are elaborations on ideas that are already fairly standard in No Kill programs. Another initiative, managed admission, has been around for a few years with great results, but is still somewhat controversial. The other two components of the Five Key Initiatives are completely new – using return-to-field for healthy community cats, and insuring that cat impoundment and length of stay are balanced with shelter capacity. Surprisingly, even though these programs are unconventional, shelters are jumping aboard the bandwagon in big numbers. Almost every shelter I research these days that is making any effort at all to increase live releases for cats is using at least one of the 5 key initiatives. And that includes shelters that no one would think of as cutting edge. It’s almost as though everyone has just been waiting for permission to change the way they handle cats. In addition to offering support from virtually everyone who is anyone in sheltering at the national level, the Challenge makes it as easy and inviting as possible for shelters to participate. Shelters can choose to adopt one of the initiatives or all of them. The Challenge asks each shelter to provide only 3 numbers each year, from 2014 through 2018, as well as the same 3 numbers for the baseline year of 2012. The three numbers are cat intake, cat euthanasia, and cat live releases for each year. Shelters report only once per year, with their estimate for the upcoming year and their actual data for the previous year. What could be easier? Although the goal of the Challenge is to save 1 million cats over the 5-year period, the potential is even greater. No one knows exactly how many cats are being killed by shelters every year currently, but estimates are around 2 million per year. If every shelter adopted all five of the initiatives, that number could fall to well under 500,000, since only unhealthy and untreatable cats would be euthanized. Thus, the upside potential of the Challenge is that it could save over 1.5 million cats every year. Any shelter can participate, even if it is very small or is already No Kill. Existing organizations that support local shelters, such as TNR groups, can get their numbers counted by encouraging their shelters to sign on to the Challenge. The proposals in the Challenge ask shelters to recognize something that is intuitively obvious but has never been fully acknowledged by animal shelters in the United States – cats are different from dogs. Animal shelters originally started as dog pounds, and the methods for impounding and releasing cats were simply borrowed from what had always been done for dogs. The average return-to-owner rate for cats is about 2%, and even the best shelters generally do not even hit double digits. For decades people have simply shaken their heads over the pitiful return-to-owner rates for cats, while shelters continued to kill them. One of the saddest parts of my job in researching shelters is to see those tiny numbers for return-to-owner for cats, even in shelters that are trying hard and are very successful at return-to-owner for dogs. The shelter-capacity and return-to-field initiatives that are part of the Challenge will ensure that far more of those cats find their way back home. The Challenge is the joint project of two well-known shelter medicine specialists and their organizations – Dr. Kate Hurley of the UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program and Dr. Julie Levy of the Maddie’s Shelter Medicine Program at the University of Florida. For some background on how Dr. Hurley arrived at her ideas about how shelters should handle cats, this article from a 2013 issue of Animal Sheltering magazine is a good read. My favorite quote from the article – “we can just stop euthanizing healthy cats.” And then Dr. Hurley explains in detail why this is not a crazy idea. The Challenge website has a lot of information on how to get started. In addition, Maddie’s Fund is presenting a 90-minute free webcast and Q&A on the Challenge on January 15, 2015. Dr. Levy has emphasized that resources are being made available to allow participants to network with and support each other, and that the Challenge is designed as a collaborative effort.

Best Friends Animal Society, which is located in Kanab, Utah, has a program to improve save rates at Utah shelters. In 2012, I listed 12 Utah communities in the right sidebar based on statistics sent to me by Best Friends. They recently sent me statistics for 2013, which confirmed that all 12 shelters again had live release rates above 90% and added 3 more 90%+ communities. In addition to those 15 communities this post contains an updated listing for Ivins, which was listed separately in 2012 based on statistics sent to me by the shelter director. I contacted the stray-intake shelters in each community to get information on their specific policies. Some of the shelters have a substantial rate of transfers, and I verified with each shelter that transfers are made only to organizations that have a live release rate of 90% or more. Most of these communities have small populations, which shows that even tiny jurisdictions can have successful shelters. The Ivins Animal Shelter and Adoption Center (IASAC) serves as the municipal shelter for the small town of Ivins, Utah (population about 7,000 people). The shelter was established in 2005 and became a non-profit organization in 2007. IASAC accepts owner surrenders from city residents and does not have an appointment requirement or fee. In 2006, the city council passed an ordinance stating a policy that no savable animals should be killed. That ordinance was renewed in 2010. The shelter’s live release rate in 2011 was 97%. In 2012 and 2013, the shelter reported a 99% live release rate. IASAC did not report any owner-requested euthanasias, and had two animals who died in shelter care in 2013. Kanab and Kane County. Kanab is the county seat for Kane County, which is located on Utah’s southern border. Kanab has a population of 3600, and the county’s population is 6200.  Kanab Animal Control, which also serves Kane County, accepts owner surrenders with a $75 fee. The shelter had a live release rate of 100% in 2012 and 2013. The shelter does not perform owner-requested euthanasia unless it is an emergency, and reported no deaths in shelter care in 2012 or 2013. Most of the shelter’s transfers go to Best Friends. Ephraim. The city of Ephraim has 6100 residents and is located in central Utah. Ephraim Animal Control reported a live release rate of 96% in 2012 and 94% in 2013. Owner surrenders are routed directly to rescues by an informal arrangement, with most of them going to Wag-n-Train rescue. The city reported that no animals died in shelter care in 2012 or 2013. Iron County. Iron County is located in southwest Utah and has 43,500 residents. The Iron County Animal Shelter (which is under the jurisdiction of the sheriff’s department) serves the unincorporated part of Iron County, including the townships of Kanarraville, Paragonah, Beryl, Modina, and Newcastle. The shelter accepts owner surrenders from its jurisdiction with a $100 fee. The shelter reported a 99% live release rate in 2012 and 100% in 2013. The shelter does not perform owner-requested euthanasia, and reported no deaths in shelter care in either 2012 or 2013. In the last two years all of the shelter’s transfers have gone to Best Friends except for one animal that went to a sanctuary. Enoch. The city of Enoch is located in southwest Utah in Iron County, and has 5800 residents. The Enoch Animal Shelter serves the city. It accepts owner surrenders with a $100 fee, although the fee is waived for highly adoptable animals. The shelter reported a live release rate of 96% in 2012 and 99% in 2013. The shelter does not do owner-requested euthanasia. If deaths in shelter care are counted in with euthanasias, the live release rate was 95% for 2012 and 98% for 2013. Parowan. The city of Parowan is located in southwest Utah in Iron County, and has 2800 residents. The Parowan Animal Shelter is managed by a committee set up by the mayor called the Parowan Animal Assistance League. The shelter accepts owner-surrendered dogs from its jurisdiction, but does not impound cats. The live release rate was 98% in 2012 and 100% in 2013. They refer owner requests for euthanasia to a local veterinarian, and had no deaths in shelter care in 2012 or 2013. South Ogden and Riverdale. South Ogden and Riverdale are cities in northern Utah. South Ogden has a population of 14,400 people and Riverdale has 7700 people. South Ogden Animal Services serves both cities. The shelter accepts owner surrenders on a space available basis. They reported a live release rate of 97% in 2012 and 99% in 2013. The live release rates do not change if animals who died in shelter care are counted as euthanasias. Heber City, Midway, and Wasatch County. Heber City is the county seat for Wasatch County, which is located in north central Utah. Midway is a city in Wasatch County. Heber City has a population of 11,400, Midway’s population is 3800, and the county’s population is 25,300. The Heber Valley Animal Control Shelter, which serves the two cities and the county, accepts owner surrenders from its jurisdiction. The shelter is operated by Paws For Life, which has a transport program. The shelter’s live release rate was 100% in both 2012 and 2013. It refers owner requests for euthanasia to a veterinarian. If animals who died in shelter care are counted with euthanasias, the live release rate was 98% in 2012 and 100% in 2013. Hurricane. The city of Hurricane is located near the southern border of Utah and has a population of 13,700 people. The Hurricane Animal Shelter accepts owner surrenders with a small fee. The shelter reported a live release rate of 94% in 2012 and 97% in 2013. They treat owner requests for euthanasia as owner surrenders, and include them in their euthanasia total. Their live release rates for 2012 and 2013 are unchanged if animals who died in shelter care are included with euthanasias. Morgan County. Morgan County is in northern Utah not far from Salt Lake City, and it has 9500 people. Morgan County Animal Control serves the county, and accepts owner surrenders from its residents without conditions. The shelter reported a 92% live release rate in 2013. It does not do owner-requested euthanasia, and reported no deaths in shelter care in 2013. Grantsville. Grantsville is a city of 9100 people in northern Utah west of Salt Lake City. Grantsville Animal Control is a unit within the police department. It accepts owner surrenders from city residents without conditions. The city reported a 97% live release rate in 2013. It does not do owner-requested euthanasia. If animals who died in shelter care are included in euthanasias, the live release rate for 2013 was 96%. Roosevelt is a city of 6,000 people in northeastern Utah. The Roosevelt Animal Shelter (RAS) is run by the city. It accepts owner surrenders from the city and from Duchesne County with no conditions, although they ask for a voluntary donation. The shelter took in 1276 animals in 2013, and had a 91% live release rate. The live release rate was 90% if animals who died or were lost in shelter care are counted with euthanasias. RCAS does not offer owner-requested euthanasia. The shelter transfers most of its intake to rescues, including Furever Buddies Dog Rescue and Ashley Valley Community Cats, which does TNR. These Utah cities and counties are counted in the Running Totals as 90%+ communities.

The San Diego Animal Welfare Coalition rolled out a big announcement this past week that they have reached zero euthanasia of healthy and treatable animals and that, starting with their new fiscal year on July 1st and going forward, they are committed to no healthy or treatable shelter animals in the county being killed. In the most recent fiscal year for which stats are available (2013 to 2014), the 11 shelters that make up the coalition had an 83% live release rate, with intake of over 40,000 animals. Much of what I’m reading about the coalition sounds really good – they work well together, they pool resources, they have a centralized unit for behavior rehabilitation for dogs, and they transfer animals among themselves so that the animals can get the most appropriate treatment. One thing bothers me though, and that is that owner-requested euthanasia has been much higher than I see with most No Kill shelters – in fiscal year 2013-2014, if owner-requested euthanasias are counted with other euthanasias, the live release rate drops from 83% to 72%. In some places (like northern Virginia) there is a tradition of local shelters offering euthanasia services to the public for old and sick pets. Perhaps that is what is going on here, but the problem is that we have no way to tell without detailed medical records on every ORE. The Louisiana Transport Program saved 779 animals last year. This article about their program has some interesting comments from Dr. Elizabeth Berliner, the director of shelter medicine at Cornell. She says that transport programs are lifesavers, but that following best practices, including veterinary involvement at both the sending and receiving shelters, is very important. She refers readers to the best practices recommendations from the National Federation of Humane Societies. Here’s another article about the Chester County SPCA in Pennsylvania and its recent turnaround. Delaware’s First State Animal Center and SPCA (formerly the Kent County SPCA) has held animal control contracts for Delaware’s three counties and the city of Wilmington for a while now. If I am interpreting the shelter’s posted statistics correctly, they had a live release rate of about 75% in 2014, with an actual intake of over 6,000. Things may change in Delaware soon, as it appears that the state is moving to take over dog control duties. Voice for the Animals has received some nice publicity for its Working Cats program, most recently with an article in the LA Times. In a bizarre twist to the case of a Texas veterinarian who allegedly shot a cat in the head with a bow and arrow, it appears that the local DA may have misapplied the American Veterinary Medical Association’s euthanasia guidelines in finding that there was not sufficient evidence that the cat was killed by a cruel method. The DA appears to have interpreted the AVMA euthanasia guidelines as supporting the idea that an arrow to the head from a distance is equivalent to the controlled use of a captive bolt or gunshot at close range. The AVMA says that the DA reached this conclusion without asking their opinion on the issue. In related news, Alley Cat Allies had great turnout and support for their workshops and vigils in Texas in response to the case. It’s not too soon to start thinking about what you will do for National Feral Cat Day, which is on October 16th this year. Another great post from Christie Keith, who is a national treasure for the No Kill movement. This one discusses why adoption promotions should be upbeat – and the exceptions to that rule. One thing I like about Keith’s posts is that she not only explains what works, but why it works. Tawny Hammond has hit the ground running in Austin in her new job as director of the city shelter. That’s by necessity, as Austin shelters have had increased intake due to the recent floods. Hammond wants to raise the shelter’s profile in the community, and she also wants to address concerns expressed by some volunteers that dogs are not getting enough exercise.

San Miguel County, located on the western border of Colorado, has 7600 residents. Ouray County, bordering San Miguel County to the east, has 4400 people. The counties are in a mountainous and sparsely populated area. Ouray County is so mountainous that it’s known as the Switzerland of America. The most populous cities in Ouray County — Ridgway and the City of Ouray — each have about 1000 inhabitants. The largest city in San Miguel County is Telluride, with a population of 2300. The city of Telluride has its own animal control officers who impound dogs for the city and county. Telluride also has an animal shelter that adopts out dogs. The Second Chance Humane Society (SCHS), located in Ridgway, provides animal sheltering for San Miguel and Ouray counties. SCHS takes in strays and owner surrenders, both cats and dogs. I called SCHS and was told that Ouray county does not have animal control officers, and so stray intake is by citizens bringing in the strays. SCHS has a waiting list for owner surrenders. The state of Colorado collects statistics on animal shelters in the state. In 2012, the city of Telluride took in 40 dogs (4 strays and 36 confiscated), returned 35 to their owners, transferred 3, and euthanized 1 for a live release rate of 97%. SCHS took in 294 dogs and cats in 2012 and had a 97% live release rate. One animal died in shelter care at SCHS, but that did not change the live release rate. In 2013, the city of Telluride took in 47 animals and had a 100% live release rate.  SCHS in 2013 had a substantial increase in intake with 380 animals for the year. Their live release rate was 99% as stated in their 2013 annual report. Ouray and San Miguel Counties were originally listed by this blog on November 12, 2013, based on their 2012 statistics. This post is a revision and update with 2013 statistics.

Back in the 1970s it was not common for people to have their dogs and cats sterilized, and it was common for people to allow their dogs and cats to roam as they pleased. This resulted in a lot of dogs and cats. Shelter intakes back then were about 5 times higher than they are today. Shelter statistics from those days are sketchy, but our best guess from the available evidence is that the situation for homeless pets reached a crisis point around 1970 due to their massive numbers. Killing was the default solution that shelters used for the overwhelming number of animals they received. The Lane County shelter in Eugene, Oregon, was receiving 100 animals a day, for example, even though animal control officers did not take in cats. Shelter intake in Lane County today is a tenth of that number or less. Shelter intake relative to human population back in the 1970s was about 110 per 1000 people, if not more. By comparison, average shelter intake today is estimated to be about 22 per 1000 people. But the number of animals coming into shelters was not the only problem. An even bigger problem was the number of animals that were in the streets, that shelters did not impound. For example, James Child did a study on cats in the early 1980s and found 725 to 1813 free-roaming cats per square mile in one northeastern city. If you wanted a cat or dog in the 1970s all you had to do was wait, and before long you would hear of a friend, neighbor, or relative who had a litter of puppies or kittens to give away. Or you would see someone on the street hawking free or very cheap puppies and kittens. Or you might find a litter of feral kittens in your backyard, or be adopted yourself by a homeless stray. There was no need to buy a dog or cat unless you wanted a particular type of purebred, and there was no need to go to the shelter to adopt because animals needing homes were in your neighborhood. Could shelters have saved all of their animals in the 1970s? Of the No Kill shelters I’ve studied, the ones that have intake per 1000 people of 40 or 50 or more generally seem to use transports a lot, or adopt animals to people outside of their own jurisdiction, in order to get to a 90% or better live release rate. In the 1970s all the jurisdictions were full of animals, so transports and out-of-area adoptions would just take homes from other homeless animals. Shelter workers in the 1970s were not enthusiastic about adoptions generally, because with so many animals needing homes, finding a home for a shelter puppy meant only that another puppy was left out. Adoptions in the 1970s were like a giant game of musical chairs, with not nearly enough chairs. A shelter adoption just meant that a different animal was left standing. In order to save all animals who were admitted to shelters in 1970, one out of every three people who currently owned a pet at that time would have had to adopt another one from a shelter. Then in 1971 another one out of three would have had to adopt, and so on. And with shelters putting intact animals into the environment (because back then shelters did not have the veterinary support to spay and neuter all of their animals), the pet overpopulation situation might well have gotten even worse. In a world where most dogs and cats were intact and a high percentage of them were free-roaming, shelter killing was about the only means that communities had to contain pet population. Shelter killing did not keep homeless dog and cat populations from growing, but it probably did make them grow more slowly than they otherwise would have. Could shelters have simply left animals on the street rather than taking them in only to kill them? In the 1970s, many shelters, perhaps most of them, did leave cats in the street. Cats were typically considered free-roaming and were not impounded except in cities where residents considered them to be nuisances, or public health officials considered them to be health threats. As to leaving dogs in the street, or leaving cats in the street in the cities where they were considered to be nuisances, it is doubtful that citizens in the 1970s would have tolerated that approach. A survey that was done in 1973 of city mayors found that animal nuisance complaints were the number-one complaint that mayors received on any issue. In 1970 there were very few spay-neuter programs and veterinarians did not routinely recommend that people spay and neuter their pets. At that time veterinarians were just getting adjusted to new technologies in anesthesia that made spay surgeries safer than they had been in earlier decades. Very few if any veterinarians were doing pediatric spay-neuter in the 1970s, and even people who did get their dogs and cats spayed often did not do so until after their pet had had a litter or two. That is a very depressing picture. Shelter workers who loved animals and did not want them killed faced options in the 1970s that ranged from bad to worse. So what did they do? They started a gigantic spay-neuter campaign. Today we tend to be bored with spay-neuter. We hear about it all the time, and sometimes it seems as though the “spay-neuter” mantra is just being used as an excuse not to put programs in place to get animals out of the shelter alive. But in the 1970s, the spay-neuter campaign changed the culture, and changed the world for homeless pets. We went from a country where only a minority of people sterilized their pets to a country where more than 80% did. And at the same time people began to value their pets more. That probably was not a coincidence, because the spay-neuter movement included an educational component to encourage the idea that the lives of cats and dogs had value. By the year 2000, shelter intake had plummeted by close to 70%, at the same time that the number of owned pets had more than doubled. If you look at shelter intake in 2000 relative to the number of owned pets, it had declined almost 90% since 1970. It was not the spay-neuter clinics themselves that did all those spay-neuter surgeries – what happened was that the free and low-cost clinics that were popping up all over in the 1970s inspired the veterinary profession to start to recommend spay-neuter as a routine part of health care. Even more important than the startling decline in shelter intake was the decline in homeless, free-roaming dogs in the environment. By the year 2000 feral and homeless dogs (as opposed to dogs who had homes and had strayed) were down to a miniscule number in most places, and continued to be a problem only in a few large urban areas and a few very rural areas. The number of homeless cats stayed high, possibly due to migration back and forth between the domestic and feral cat populations. But in the 1990s TNR became common and it offered a way to control community cats and reduce their nuisance behaviors. The decline in shelter intake, the decline in the number of dogs in the environment, and the growing acceptance of TNR were the factors that made No Kill theoretically possible. The growth of the internet, particularly Petfinder, and the groundbreaking work of shelters like the San Francisco SPCA made it possible to implement No Kill as a practical matter. The first No Kill communities appeared toward the end of the 1990s in San Francisco, New England, and the Denver metro area, plus many small communities in Colorado and one in Michigan. In order for shelters to increase their live releases, they had to have a “market” for their animals. The disappearance of homeless dogs from the environment allowed shelters to adopt out dogs to people who otherwise would have acquired their dog from an unwanted litter in the neighborhood or by adopting a stray. TNR provided an alternative living arrangement for cats where they would be tolerated and even supported in the environment, thus increasing their market as well. The number of adoptions from shelters and rescues went up from about 5% or so of intake in 1970 to over 40% today. This appears to have been largely due to the disappearance of “competing” animals from the environment. It is no accident that the No Kill movement started in the early 1990s, because it was at about that time that the pet overpopulation crisis had abated in the most progressive communities. In less progressive communities – those where spay-neuter rates lagged, and TNR was not in use – No Kill has taken a little longer to get a foothold. In thinking about this history, what stands out to me is the massive effort on the part of thousands, if not tens of thousands, of people who devoted a great deal of their time and effort to change the tragic situation for homeless pets. In the 1970s this army of people worked on spay-neuter efforts. Beginning in the early 1990s, with the pet overpopulation problem having been greatly reduced in many places, the army began to work on increasing live releases. No Kill, more than most movements, is made up of lots of individual heroes. It is a true grass roots movement. As Rich Avanzino would say, the founders of No Kill were the American people.