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Social media. Many of us use it. Many of us hate it. It can be a wonderful thing when it comes to keeping up with family and friends. It can be a terrible thing when it comes to the sharing and re-sharing of information that may be at best misleading or at worst plain wrong. I personally believe that social media has eroded people's critical thinking skills to the detriment of us all. It encourages short and often meaningless interactions with people we don't know and will never meet. And it is easier to go along with someone who presents themselves as an authority on a topic - or even some organization that does the same - than it is to educate ourselves and think for ourselves in forming our opinions. The topics of animal welfare, animal protection and animals shelters are affected as negatively by this follower mentality and lack of critical thinking as any other subject. This was made abundantly clear during the last legislative session in the state where I live as people (who no doubt mean well) supported bad legislation related to companion animals just because a well-known personality told them to and while knowing little to nothing about existing laws or how the bills would negatively affect those laws. People were clamoring for more laws without knowing what laws are already on the books and how efforts to change the laws may actually weaken those we have. Some held a protest on the steps of the state capitol in support of a bill they had not yet read and which ultimately would have weakened existing law. Many who supported the bills referred repeatedly to the state's "ranking" by a national nonprofit organization with the stated mission to, "protect the lives and advance the interests of animals through the legal system."  Ranking of states is nothing new. U.S. News ranks states every year and there are state rankings related to health and education. So what are these state rankings all about when it comes to animals? There was a time years ago when both the Humane Society of the United States (now known as Humane World for Animals) and the Animal Legal Defense Fund both published annual state rankings. HSUS last published a report years ago, leaving ALDF as the organization to which people are referring when they talk about state rankings regarding animal protection laws. After reading (or hearing) for the 200th time that Alabama is ranked 49 out of 50 states related to our animal protection laws, I decided I had had enough. To a person, the people talking about the rankings did so with an apparent belief that the ranking means Alabama essentially has no laws at all. Which is just not true. Is there room for improvement in Alabama? Absolutely. I grew up in Southern California and I sometimes joke that time travel really is possible depending on where you go in Alabama. There is no shortage of issues about which the state can improve, many of which are hindered by the fact that ours is an agricultural state (in which Big Ag = Big Money = Big Influence) and hindered by the culture of some resident regarding how animals should be treated. We have laws that are very strong, some of which do not exist in other states. We have laws that are optional when they should be mandatory. We have laws that are not enforced in some cases because law enforcement officers are not trained on animal laws or don't care about them. We have prosecutors who charge people using the wrong statute which sometimes leads to "evidence animals" being housed in shelters for months when a disposition hearing about them can and should be held within 20 days of them being seized. We have elected officials whose opinion is that companion animals should be given no more consideration than single celled organisms, some of whom reportedly participate in cock fighting (which is a felony offense in more than 42 states and the District of Columbia). My review of the 2024 ALDF rankings report was enlightening. It includes a rankings map (shown below) and information about the method used to rank states and territories based on 4 primary categories and 20 different categories. The rankings focus primarily on enacted animal protection laws and not on enforcement of those laws (which is perfectly understandable). The rankings also do not take into consideration administrative codes like exist in Alabama to regulate professions (from accountants to the Youth Services Department). The top 5 states in the 2024 report are Oregon (1), Massachusetts (2), Maine (3), Illinois (4) and Colorado (5). The bottom 5 states in the report are Mississippi (46), Kentucky (47), Idaho (48), Alabama (49) and North Dakota (50). The report includes data sheets for those 10 states. The ALDF website has an individual page for each state that includes a report for the state and information specific to the state.  (image from page 3 of the 2024 Animal Legal Defense Fund Ranking Report) When I began comparing the report details about Alabama, it became clear to me that the rankings are not what I thought at all. There are laws that are lacking in Alabama that are also lacking in the states ranked 2 through 5. There are laws in top ranked states that make some actions optional but not mandatory and yet Alabama is faulted for not having mandatory laws on the same subjects. My analysis of the data appears in the images below. You can see a pdf of my analysis by clicking on the first image.    A senior staff attorney with ALDF graciously took time out of her busy schedule to talk with me about the rankings and the effect of those rankings on legislative efforts in my state. She said ALDF uses a point system to rank states and has for many years. I spoke about the issue of equity in fairness in the rankings. She said the primary goal for ranking states is to help identify gaps in animal protection laws across the country, call attention to areas that can improve and to focus on strong laws in some states that could be implemented in other states. ALDF only looks at the state code. To the extent there are professional requirements in an administrative code (like in Alabama) they do not consider that at all. If something considered important is not codified, a state does not get credit for it. If something considered important is part of the ordinary enforcement of laws by a court, but is not explicitly required by state law, a state does not get credit for it. In the end, my impression is that it is not really possible to rank states equitably using the criteria on which ALDF relies which is understandably limited. There are certainly other states with stronger laws than mine, but since ALDF cannot speak to enforcement in any state, there is no way to determine if those laws are enforced and better than ours are enforced. I explained how the ALDF rankings negatively affect legislative efforts in the state and spoke specifically to the problems with two bills filed in the last legislative session that were promoted by a well known shelter director in the state for reasons I will not elaborate on here so I lessen the risk of being sued. I told the staff attorney the rankings make it seem like the lower ranked states have no laws at all which leads people not familiar with the laws to latch onto any bill thinking it must be a good thing. When it often is far from that. The attorney conceded the state rankings are not a zero-sum situation where states ranked high have thorough laws and states ranked low have no laws. I told her that is, unfortunately, what people think and that most people promote any animal bill they hear about, presuming it must be a good thing. She said she would speak to her director about messaging and to make the purpose of the rankings more clear. I asked that the messaging include encouraging people to learn about existing state laws and to educate themselves so they have a better understanding of the effect of proposed bills on existing laws. I appreciated her time and her offer to help in the future if there is a particular bill in my state viewed as problematic. The Animal Legal Defense Fund does a lot of good and helps a lot of people. It is supported by thousands of dedicated attorneys and hundreds of thousands of members and supporters. It is involved in filing lawsuits to stop animal abuse and expand the boundaries of animal law, it provides free legal help to prosecutors handling cruelty cases, it works to strengthen state anti-cruelty statutes, is encourages the federal government to enforce existing animal protection laws, it supports student chapters, has an animal law program and provides public education. Those are all wonderful contributions to society. From where I site, the state rankings are a terrible idea. I would much prefer that ALDF stop ranking states as if it is a competition in which those states ranked near the top are applauded and those who rank low must just not give a damn. ALDF could still provide information by state, as it does now, to focus on what good things are happening in the state and where there is room for improvement. Ranking a state 49th has real world consequences. We are fortunate neither of the bills filed this last legislative session passed. They will likely be back in some form in 2026 as people continue to talk about the state rankings while still not understanding what we have on the books, how to focus on elected people who will enforce the laws and how to seek local laws to help improve the quality of life of companion animals in their own back yard.  Before you use the rankings for your state either to support or to oppose legislation in your state - or to talk about how wonderful or terrible your state is - please educate yourself. Learn about existing laws and how they are enforced, if they are enforced. If they are not enforced, get active at the local level to try to change that. Most district attorneys and sheriffs are elected by the public. If existing laws are not enforced, there is no reason to believe new laws will be enforced. When bills are proposed, please take the time to read them and think for yourself. If you have trouble understanding the laws, reach out to advocates in your state who can help you.
What would I like to see in the short-term for Alabama that I think is realistic considering the culture here?
I would also like to see all certified law enforcement officers trained on the animal laws in the state code (there is currently no training) and a mandatory training curriculum for animal control officers who assist certified officers. Dare to dream.
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Animal problems are people problems.
I make these points because I was reminded again this week of the level of hatred displayed by some in the animal shelter and animal rescue communities toward the public. Some attitudes rise to a level I consider toxic. People who lead or work in shelters where the lives of healthy and treatable animals are ended as a population control measure do not want to be called killers and they should not. Applying the act to the actor is inflammatory and counterproductive. Yet those same people who do not want to be faulted for destroying animals (needlessly, I would argue) do not hesitate to blame the public for the fact that animals die at their facilities. Most of them remain ignorant of (or refuse to acknowledge) proven programs that have been available for the taking for 2 decades and which can and should be used to keep more animals alive. This is what I read and hear weekly if not daily.
But here's the problem with that us v. them attitude. It does not serve shelters and rescue groups well and it certainly does not serve the public well toward resolving the very issues that cause animals to be in need. Animal sheltering and rescue is not what the public thinks. Or even understands. I blame that in part to television shows and documentary films that have highlighted animal control/shelter operations and on rescue groups that have led the public to have entirely unrealistic expectations of those animal care agencies. Add to this the fact that we all live within the bubble of our own reality and we focus on what is in front of us, what affects us and what we value no matter the subject. Politics. Money. Our troops. Disease. Animals.  Whether people in the shelter and rescue community want to acknowledge it or not, most of the public has no clue of the challenges faced by shelters and rescues related to companion animals because it's just not on their personal radar. Should the public know more about what is happening when it comes to how their personal behavior affects shelters and rescue groups? Probably. But. They. Don't. I once spoke to this in a podcast for which I was interviewed years ago and referred to the divide between the public and animal agencies as like a gorge. On one side of the gorge are the animal loving public. Most of them mean well. They think they are doing all they can but they do make bad choices, they sometimes wait too long for pets to be spayed/neutered and accidents happen that cause dogs to get loose. Most of those people on the public side of the gorge believe animal shelters keep all healthy and treatable animals alive. They also have developed an unreasonable belief that rescue groups are prepared to drop what they are doing and absolve them of responsibility for their pets, a belief that is bolstered by the fact that many in rescue will do just that. On the other side of the gorge is the animal shelter and rescue community that have such loathing for the public they can hardly function. They are certain the public is entirely to blame for the fact that animals die because people are irresponsible and don't care enough. I'm not sure who all these irresponsible people are. Apparently everyone other than the people who work at or volunteer for the shelter. I firmly believe that the culture in our communities toward companion animals changes when the shelter leads the way and invites the public they serve to be part of something bigger than themselves. In places where the culture related to shelter animals has changed and more lives are saved, the "irresponsible public" did not move out only to be replaced by more responsible people. Unless and until those in the animal shelter and rescue community stop vilifying the public they expect to behave differently, nothing will change. It is totally counterproductive to say, "it is your fault animals die, but oh, by the way. Can you adopt, volunteer, donate and foster?" You cannot slap someone across the face with your words and expect adoration or cooperation in return. If you want to modify public behavior, please suspend your judgment and check your attitude at the door. Instead try helping people so they make better choices and so there are fewer animals entering shelters or in need of rescue.
 And some suggestions for everyone involved that are a reality check. For animal shelters:
 This week I have been called insane, clueless, delusional and told to "F off" multiple times. Name calling and profanity by those who refuse to acknowledge that animal problems are people problems are tactics of desperation. One woman told me to "hush." Alrighty then. I have also been told I am not allowed to have an opinion about tax-funded animal shelter operations if I have never done that job myself. I simply do not agree. I have plenty of contacts across the country who do run animal shelters and with whom I have interacted for years. And I think we can all agree I am not expected to fill potholes, mow city parks or stand in the street and direct traffic to have an opinion about how tax dollars are spent by other municipal departments that do not make life and death decisions daily.
 People who are passionate about helping companion animals mean well and that includes some (but certainly not all) of the people we elect to represent us at the state level, senators and representatives alike. Every state is governed by laws that cover subjects ranging from agriculture to aviation to banks to corporations to counties to courts to education to elections to eminent domain to housing to insurance to professions and public works. You get the idea. Each state also has laws about animals some of which relate to animals generally (containment, livestock, rabies vaccination, dangerous dogs, sterilization) and some of which relate to crimes against companion animals specifically like torture, cruelty and neglect of dogs and cats. Each state has its own process for how laws get enacted but the process is similar: a bill is filed by a state elected official - a senator or a representative - and it is assigned to a committee for consideration. It can either die in committee (meaning no action is taken) or get a favorable vote (with or without changes being made) and then it is considered by the chamber in which it was introduced (house or senate). If it makes it through that chamber, the process repeats itself in the other chamber where it the bill may die or move forward. If the bill gets through the second chamber, it goes to the governor to sign or veto. The process is more detailed than that and involves more steps, but that’s the general sequence. If you are not familiar with the process in your state, please learn about it. This is the information for my state that is published by the American Civil Liberties Union. In my experience, very few people who want animals treated better know the laws in their own state. Some are written more clearly than others and all laws are open to some degree of interpretation which is why courts sometimes get involved. This lack of knowledge often extends to the very elected officials who promote bills they think will help animals. A contact of mine at a state attorney general’s office told me that state elected officials often do not know the existing laws, often do not write the bills they file and may not understand the effect their proposed bill may have on existing laws, often weakening laws that have been on the books for decades. So, how do we animal advocates or concerned citizens know if a bill is a good bill or a bad bill? We need to examine the following things:
A Good Bill  Like many states, Colorado sells license plates to the public for causes the public supports. One of those license plates is the “Adopt a Shelter Pet” plate. Funds collected from the sale of the plates goes into the “pet overpopulation fund” to be used by animal shelters to have animals spayed/neutered and to support education programs. Prior to the promotion of House Bill HB25-1137, shelters seeking money from the fund had to agree to not use the phrase “No Kill” related to their shelter operation or marketing. The Humane Society of Fremont County - which holds 7 municipal contracts - has proudly upheld the highest open-admission save rate in Colorado for 10 consecutive years and is considered a leading animal shelter in the country. Because it refused to comply with the requirement to ditch the “No Kill” label, it was prevented from receiving crucial funding. The primary purpose of the bill was to prevent funds being withheld from shelters that support the No Kill model of animal sheltering. A portion of the bill language states: (c) The adopt a shelter pet account in the pet overpopulation fund receives money donated through the sale of the adopt a shelter pet license plate to be used for spaying and neutering animals in animal shelters and rescues and to support overpopulation education programs; An incredible amount of work was done by the primary supporters of the bill: No Kill Colorado, the MaxFund No Kill Animal Shelter and Adoption Center, and the Humane Society of Fremont County, This bill represents a long-overdue correction to an unfair funding restriction that has penalized shelters like ours for standing by our no-kill values,” said Doug Rae, the Director of the Humane Society of Fremont County. “We are proud to lead this fight for fairness and transparency, but we need the public’s help to get this across the finish line.” Proponents of the bill fought hard for its passage after it was introduced in the house in late January. It passed the house in February and passed the senate in March after gaining support from the Colorado Department of Agriculture. The bill was being signed into law by Governor Jared Polis on April 17, 2025. This is an example of a good bill. It sought to remove obstacles to receipt of funds by animal shelters that were based not on helping animals, but were grounded in the personal opinions of the members of the Colorado Pet Overpopulation Authority, some of whom are hostile toward No Kill philosophies. The law as enacted states, “the Colorado Pet Overpopulation Authority must not favor a particular shelter model when allocating money from the Adopt A Shelter Pet Account.” A Bad Bill  Most states have laws about animal cruelty that are part of the criminal code. Such is the case in Alabama. The laws were enacted at different times in the history of the state and law enforcement officers are not trained in animal laws in the academy instruction they received to be certified. Laws about cruelty to animals (generally) and aggravated cruelty were enacted in 1977 and 2013, respectively. Laws about cruelty to dogs and cats (specifically) were enacted in 2000 as part of the Pet Protection Act. There were two problematic animal bills filed in the 2025 legislative session which has now ended without either bill making it out of the chamber of origin. Both bills were promoted by the CEO of nonprofit organization based in Birmingham that holds numerous municipal contracts (and continues to seek more) despite the fact that it has a dismal live release rate for dogs and a less than stellar rate for cats. House Bill 149 was originally filed on February 4, 2025, and a substitute bill took its place on April 2, 2025 without the public having an opportunity to review the substitute. The bill did not seek to amend existing laws (which should have been the case) but was a stand-alone bill called the Alabama Dog Tethering and Outdoor Shelter Act. The original version of the bill would have reduced what was a Class A misdemeanor to a Class B misdemeanor. It includes provisions regarding food, water, shelter, collar size, enclosure size, enclosure height that are unenforceable as written. Here are some examples: (1) ADEQUATE FOOD. Food that is sufficient in amount and is appropriate for the particular type of dog to prevent starvation or a significant risk to the dog's health from lack of food. The term includes palatable, uncontaminated, and nutritionally appropriate food that is fed according to species requirements or is fed as directed by a veterinarian. This is an example of a bad bill. It sought to achieve too many things at once, many of which would have been unenforceable. It would not have outlawed chaining of dogs as many people thought; it would have allowed dogs to be chained using a chain designed for dogs which are sold widely on the internet and at pet supply stores. The provisions in the bill related to "shelter" might have been of some value, but the state has a history with that one word. There have been multiple attempts over a period of many years to define the single word shelter in the criminal code (three of which were brought by a former state representative who is now the state auditor). All failed. The senate chair of the Agriculture and Forestry Committee told me years ago that as long as a dog can get under a mobile home, that's shelter. His personal views aside, I'm not sure why proponents of the bill thought that having a new bill to define that one word combined with numerous other things would make it through the legislative gauntlet. It would be like a tenant asking a landlord to fix a window, being told no, and then asking the landlord to fix the window, renovate all the rooms in the house and pay for landscaping. Not. Gonna. Happen. In addition to issues with provisions of the bill being unenforceable, perhaps the more concerning issue is that the bill would have given authority to animal control officers to perform duties typically performed by certified law enforcement officers. The requirements to be an animal control officer in Alabama typically consist of having a high school diploma or GED and a driver's license. Most animal control officers are not trained in their animal control duties, much less trained in animal laws, investigative techniques, de-escalation techniques or probable cause determinations. Giving untrained civilians authority to seize animals could be dangerous – someone is apt to be shot and people in the vicinity of the property could also be endangered. Giving ACOs authority to seize animals could also result in unwarranted taking of animals in violation of the 4th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution because they do not know the laws of the state and this could lead to litigation. As my husband said very clearly when we were taking about the bill: “if you come on my property to take my dog, you better have really good health insurance.” I am relieved this bill did not make it out of the house of origin, a fact that has put me at odds with some of my contacts in Alabama who mistakenly believe the bill would have done amazing things to help animals in our state. I understand they mean well but their failure to learn about existing laws and to think for themselves was a recipe for disappointment. Many people supporting the bill took their cue from the CEO of a nonprofit organization I mentioned above. She has an huge following in the state and speaks with the voice of authority regarding animal issues - including proposed legislation - even thought some of her comments were inaccurate. She has a lot of support by members of the business community in her area and is favored by the founder of a large nonprofit organization with national reach. All of this is despite the fact that more than half the dogs impounded by her organization in 2024 did not survive the process. I'm not sure that anyone with a record that poor should be considered a voice of authority on any issues related to companion animals. Including new laws. I would like to think there will be lessons learned from the fact that the bills she promoted did not leave the chamber of origin. I'm not so sure that will happen. It is easier for people to take the default position that state legislators don't care than it is to examine why the bills failed to better promote effective bills in the future.  For those in my state who are upset that House Bill 149 (and House Bill 249) did not survive this legislative session, here are a few things to consider.
 Do you think you know about the history of animal sheltering in the United States and what the No Kill movement represents? Let's see how you do. Pop quiz (the answer key is found at the end of this blog). 1. Who was the founder of the modern animal protection movement? a. Richard Avanzino. b. Nathan Winograd c. Henry Bergh. d. George Angell. 2. True or false. The same person founded the first Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals AND the New York Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children. a. True. b. False. 3. How many animals were being destroyed in American animal shelters each year in the 1960s and 1970s? a. 30-35 million b. 20-25 million. c. 16-17 million. d. 10-12 million. 4. Where was the location of the first No Kill animal shelter in America? a. San Francisco, California. b. Austin, Texas. c. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania d. Tompkins County, New York. 5. What does the phrase "No Kill" mean? a. No animals die in the animal shelter under any circumstances. b. The shelter saves the lives of all healthy and treatable animals who enter the shelter. c. The shelter saves 90% of the animals who enter the shelter. d. The shelter only ends the lives of animals when it is overcrowded and to make space. 6. True or false. The No Kill movement promotes warehousing animals for long periods of time and leads to abuse and neglect of animals. a. True. b. False. I tend to blog not to read my own words or make a name for myself, but when I have something to say. Today is one of those days and is perhaps long overdue. As we head into Spring of a new year, I am seeing more and more toxic rhetoric against the No Kill Movement as people (and organizations) seek to make this social movement into something it is not or find other ways to describe ending the lives of healthy and treatable animals in our nation's shelters using tax dollars ("low kill," "community pet heroes" or "Saving More Animals Responsibly Together.") The first thing about these voices that surprises me - and which is different than years past - is people (and organizations) declaring the No Kill movement outdated, as if it served its purpose for a while but is no longer effective. Hardly. The No Kill movement has been a fast moving vehicle of change that has drastically shifted not only how many shelters operate but has also served to educate the public on how their tax dollars are spent so they can seek better. That was true decades ago and is still true today. The second thing about these voices - that does not surprise me at all - is there is no indication most of the voices behind these positions have done anything to educate themselves on the history of animal sheltering in the United States or the history of the No Kill Movement other than a few Google searches. It can be hard to take these people seriously because they profess to know something about a subject they genuinely know nothing about. But we ignore them at our own peril because many of these voices are heard the loudest 1) because the positions are put forth by a huge organization that rakes in millions of dollars from people who think their donation will help animals; 2) because of the identity of the speaker who has some form of notoriety; or 3) because of the self-validating nature of social media where people share and comment and share and comment and share and comment on posts about animal sheltering and the No Kill movement that support their current world view without doing any fact checking or better yet - thinking for themselves. I typically try to engage directly with the people who oppose the No Kill Movement in an effort to educate them if I think there may be a conversation to be had. I spent an hour on the phone a few weeks ago with a prominent figure whose family rose to prominence at the time of Henry Bergh (and who now leads a well known nonprofit organization) after she wrote a blog critical of the movement. I spent the same amount of time on the phone last week with an individual who engages with animal shelters and animal control personnel nationally because he is on the speaker circuit for conferences and he provides consultant-based training. Sometimes these calls achieve little, but I tell myself I tried. There are other times I don't even try to engage with the person if the hatred for the movement is so obvious there is no conversation to be had. I pick my battles. I have long said that an educated advocate is an informed advocate and I believe there is no shortcut to avoid doing our homework. How can we possible speak to the validity of a philosophy like the No Kill movement if we know nothing about the history that created the movement and about the challenges we face today? We cannot. This blog is intended to help two groups of people. The first group is people who genuinely want to learn about the history of animal sheltering in our country and the No Kill movement but don't know where to start. There is so much information on the Internet it can be easy to get lost. The second group is people who chose to parrot an opinion as a follower of someone else without taking any time to develop an informed opinion. Consider this a challenge issued. You cannot possibly say you know that you are talking about (or commenting about) unless you have invested time to learn, learn and then learn some more. If I was teaching a class called No Kill 101 for Everyone (Not Just Dummies), the first semester would start with the following assignments. Class is in session. Let me know if you have any questions.  Lesson 1. Read "Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America" (time - approximately 10 hours) Redemption was first published by Nathan Winograd, the founder of the No Kill Advocacy Center, in 2007. A second edition was published in 2008. The title of the book took many people by surprise when it was published, including many with decades of experience advocating for shelter animals. Why? Prior to having bubbles burst, almost everyone was certain animals died in shelters due to "pet overpopulation." We had been told that same thing over and over for so long that we believed it had to be true (when it is not). The book is almost 20 years old but the content stands the test of time. It is part history book and how "how to" book as it introduces us to the No Kill Equation which I consider to be a DIY solution for any shelter or any community seeking to balance public safety with saving the lives of shelter animals. Reading this book changed my life and put me on a different life path. To use a word from my legal career, it is a treatise. I refer to it often. I consider it the foundation to any education about animal sheltering in America and the No Kill movement.  Lesson 2: Watch "Redemption: The No Kill Revolution in America" (time - 56 minutes) This 2014 documentary film is based on the book Redemption and is described as follows: "This is the story of animal sheltering, which was born of compassion and then lost its way. It is the story of the No Kill movement, which says we can and must stop the killing. It is about heroes and villains, betrayal and redemption. And it is about a social movement as noble and just as those that have come before. But most of all, it is a story about believing in the community and trusting in the power of compassion." The film is still available on DVD if you want a personal copy but can be viewed on Youtube for free. It contains no graphic images.  Lesson 3: Watch "The Myth of Pet Overpopulation" (time - 21 minutes) This short film was published by the No Kill Advocacy Center in July 2019. It explains logically why it is a myth that "pet overpopulation" is the reason why animals die in American shelters (as opposed to shelter overpopulation). This is one of two short films I share most often with rescuers, fellow advocates and elected officials to explain that what people think is happening in animal shelters is, well, not true. In any given year, many millions more people will bring an animal into their home than the number of animals killed in shelters. This is not an overpopulation issue. It is an issue of market share.  Lesson 4: Watch "No Kill 101" (time 28 minutes) This film was published by the No Kill Advocacy Center in 2020. It is probably the most succinct explanation of the No Kill Equation in visual form. It takes us through each element of the Equation to explain how using that program serves to reduce intake, shorten length of stay and get animals out of the shelter faster. I share it with elected officials and shelter leadership often because it is short, logical and engaging. It also sets the stage for me to explain to those officials how the elements of the Equation can be implemented in their own community, often using existing resources and no (or very little) additional spending.  Lesson 5: Read "Not Rocket Science: A Story of No Kill Shelter Advocacy in Huntsville, Alabama (time - approximately 5 hours) This is my book published in April 2019. It is part my story and part the story of the political advocacy of No Kill Huntsville which formed in January 2012 to promote the City of Huntsville, Alabama, ending the outdated practice of killing healthy and treatable animals for space. I wrote it primarily to help the public learn about animal sheltering and programs and also to help people outside our area learn about our path, including what we did right and what we did wrong. It explains the No Kill Equation and how we used the Equation to help take an animal shelter than was destroying most of the animals who entered the building to a shelter that now saves the lives of most of the animals, while still focusing on public safety. The book is available on Amazon for just over 5 bucks if you want a book you can hold in your hand, but you can also read the pdf if you want it for free.  Lesson 6: Listen to the Winograd's Substack Series entitled, "Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow: Animal Sheltering in the United States" (time - approximately 9 hours total) In late December 2021, the Winograds began sharing a 5-part series of Substack podcasts about the history of animal sheltering and current challenges in response to what they considered significant backsliding by organizations and individuals associated with the No Kill movement which is damaging the movement as a whole. I blogged about the series in September 2022 using the word "gobsmacked" because it was the only word I could find to explain my reaction to the series. Because I shared my thoughts about the series in my blog, they are not restated here. I have included a 6th podcast that is not part of the original series but which I feel is important related to the other podcasts. The series is nothing short of amazing; I learned more from this series than I had in a very long time and I now consider if as important to the education of anyone interested in animal sheltering or animal shelter reform as is Redemption. Some of the episodes are long but I found them captivating. They are conversational between Nathan and Jennifer (who does not get enough credit for your advocacy with Nathan) and easy to listen to. I recommend listening while traveling, driving, exercising or some other task. I listened to most of them while doing other tasks and had a pen and pad of paper handy to take notes. I have encouraged the Winograds to put the series in book form and I hope that will be possible at some point in the future. Part 1: Regarding Henry. The birth and betrayal of the humane movement in America (51 minutes) Part 2: A House of Cards Divided: The fight for the heart and soul of America’s animal shelters (1 hour, 52 minutes) Part 3: All of Them: No Kill moves from the theoretical to the real (2 hours, 5 minutes) Part 4: A glass half full and half empty: we’ve made tremendous progress but we still have a long way to go. (1 hour, 52 minutes) Part 5: What’s Past is Prologue: To best serve animals, humane societies must recapture their roots (1 hour, 9 minutes) Winter is Coming: The movement faces dangers that threaten to erase the gains of the last three decades and increase animal homelessness, abandonment, neglect, abuse, and killing (1 hour, 12 minutes) My advocacy is in honor of our dog, Snake, who left us on Earth Day 2006. Pop Quiz Answers. 1c, 2a, 3c, 4d, 5b, 6b. *The dummies reference relates to a very popular series of books to help people which is a Wiley brand.
I first learned about the killing of healthy and treatable animals in our nation's "shelters" in the summer of 2006 when I had an unwelcome epiphany, thanks to the veterinarian who was the director of the tax-funded animal shelter in the city where I work. I was like most people back then. I though the only animals who died in shelters where those who were too sick or injured to save and the other animals were all reunited with their families, adopted into new homes or helped by rescue groups. I was wrong. The killing of healthy and treatable animals in our nation's shelters has continued for decades while the people doing the killing blame the deaths on "the irresponsible public" and on "pet overpopulation" while acting as though there is no other way to function. This awakening angered me so much that I began learning more about animal sheltering in America from those advocating for change and those leading the best performing shelters in the country. My education put me on a path I never expected and changed my life. I continue to learn new things to this day. Despite what some of my critics think, I am capable of admitting when I am wrong and I am capable of engaging in civil discourse with people who do not share all of my values. The cure for the disease that is shelter killing has been known for almost 2 decades and is there for the taking: the No Kill Equation. I am a member of the No Kill movement and I am an unapologetic supporter of the No Kill Equation for one simple reason: it works. Shelters that have stopped killing healthy and treatable animals for space or convenience have not done that because all the irresponsible people moved away and were replaced by people who care more. The shift from ending lives to saving them is the result of a change in the culture at the shelter which embraces proven programs that reduce shelter intake, shorten the amount of time animals are in the shelter, help the public make better choices and still protect public safety. I am bombarded every week by content from people who oppose the No Kill movement, promote the idea that shelters have no choice but to end the lives of animals and are more focused on how words are used than they are on the unnecessary deaths of animals that either were, or could have been, someone's beloved companion. Blogs. Social media posts. Media articles. I have historically spent a lot of time trying to reach out to these people, trying to start a conversation, only to find there was no conversation to be had in most cases. Some of these people are household names in our country (at least within animal welfare circles) and some are people who promote dangerous ideas online (like the photographer who administers a Facebook page called "Kill Shelters Care Too"). The reality is that large national animal welfare organizations - and people with lots of money or lots of followers - are heard the loudest. Folks like me in the trenches of animal welfare will never have the same reach and trying to connect with opponents individually is often of little value. This blog is about what I believe. If you are open to the idea that shelter animals don't have to die, would not want your own healthy and treatable animal to be killed in a shelter, support reform of our nation's animal shelters or just want your tax dollars spent consistent with public values, I hope you will share my blog. I am happy to engage on these topics with anyone who is interested.  What I Believe
So. That is what I believe based not on something I saw shared a dozen times on Facebook or because I have heard it so many times that I believe it to be true. These are some of my beliefs based on 2 decades of education and networking for the benefit of companion animals in my own community and across the country and for the benefit of people I believe want to do right by those animals. You are welcome to contact me if you have questions about this blog or want to learn more to advance your own education. People just never cease to amaze me. People who defend the killing of healthy and treatable animals in municipal animal shelters never cease to infuriate me. I was tagged on a social media platform recently related to a new page that openly and repeatedly defends the killing of healthy and treatable animals in tax-funded shelters. At first I thought I read the name of the page wrong. After my initial reaction of shock, I was reminded yet again that time travel really is possible depending on where you go in America and about which subject you are speaking. The views of this person may have been more easily understood had she stood on a wooden crate in the town square during the days of Henry Bergh. But this is 2025 and not 1875 so her insistence that municipal shelters have no choice but to end the lives of animals for space - and her stories about having personally participated in this process - made me both sick and angry. I have chosen not to share the name of her page here because I don't want to promote it. For me it is the social media written equivalent of a "stuff film." It is a "pro kill" page.  But back to the social media page. I tried commenting on a couple of the posts to see if I could get the attention of the page administrator and did not have much luck. I messaged her instead and implored her to learn more about the difference between "pet overpopulation" and "shelter overpopulation" which are not the same thing. She agreed to watch the 27-minute No Kill 101 video from the No Kill Advocacy Center and I offered her a free copy of my book so she could read about how the Equation was used in my area to take the municipal shelter from one that kills the vast majority of animals to one that saves the vast majority of animals. So much for that idea. She watched 3 minutes of the video, reached the point where Nathan Winograd talks about the concept of pet overpopulation being a myth, stopped watching and declared that I am wrong and have no idea what I am talking about. She continues to this day to post on an ongoing basis about shelter killing treating it as a fait accompli when it is not. I tried. I understand there are plenty of shelters that kill healthy and treatable animals while remaining either willfully ignorant or catastrophically uninformed despite the progress achieved by the No Kill movement to prevent that from happening. I also understand there are people that really believe that animals die in shelters due to "pet overpopulation" and "the irresponsible public." They have heard these excuses so many times for so many years that they hold tight to their beliefs with no allowance whatsoever for the fact that they may be wrong. When the Winograds first posited almost 20 years ago that pet overpopulation was a myth, people just could not believe it. They had heard so many times over so many years that animals die in shelters because there are just too many of them that the fact that animals were being killed seemed to confirm that belief. But pet overpopulation is a myth and is not the reason healthy and treatable animals die in shelters. In any given year about 30 million people are looking to bring a new companion animal into their homes and in any given year less than a million animals die in shelters. This is not an issue of too many animals and not enough homes. It is a marketing issue because people get animals from sources other than shelters. Shelter overpopulation is a separate concept and it does lead to the deaths of animals. When a shelter does not take steps to help reduce intake and move animals out faster, it becomes overpopulated. This leads to the antiquate practice of ending lives as a population control measure. If more animals enter the shelter than leave the shelter, the "excess" are destroyed. That may not matter to many people when looking at statistics on a form. But every one of those animals belonged to someone and you would not want that dog or cat killed if he or she belonged to you. As I have written about for years, the cure for the disease that is shelter killing is known and has been know for decades. It is found in the programs and services of the No Kill Equation which provide a DIY solution for any shelter to: 1) reduce shelter intake; 3) shorten length of stay (the phrase used to refer to the amount of time animals stay in the shelter); 3) help the public make better choices which affect how the shelter functions; and 4) focus on public safety so that dogs that are cognitively impaired and genuinely dangerous do not leave the shelter. This is not just something I read about and said, "hey, that sounds like it would work so that is what I believe and will promote." I know the No Kill Equation works because I have personally seen it work from Colorado to Texas to Alabama to Florida and and so very many places in between.  I have written about the concept of cognitive dissonance and shelter apologists related to shelter killing of healthy and treatable animals before so I won't restate the whole explanation here. The short version is this. Cognitive dissonance theory states that we routinely resolve the conflict in one of four ways: 1) we change one of the thoughts to alleviate the conflict; 2) we change our behavior to alleviate the conflict; 3) we add new thoughts to rationalize our behavior; or 4) we trivialize the inconsistency. As it applies to people who defend the destruction of healthy and treatable animals in shelters, an example of how cognitive dissonance works goes like this: Belief: healthy and treatable animals should not be destroyed in shelters is in conflict with Behavior: I support a shelter that destroys healthy and treatable animals Method 1 Change a belief - the shelter I support has no choice but to destroy healthy and treatable animals Method 2 Change behavior - I will not support the shelter because it destroys healthy and treatable animals Method 3 - Add new thoughts to rationalize - the shelter I support destroys healthy and treatable animals because the public will not spay/neuter, there are too many breeders and the public is irresponsible AND I know that the people who work at the shelter I support are good people who don’t want to destroy animals and are doing the best they can Method 4 - Trivialize the inconsistency - this happens across the country and there really isn’t any way to change it The methods I see used most often to alleviate dissonance are adding new thoughts and trivializing the inconsistency. Such is the case with the administrator of the pro kill page. She is not the only voice to defend the killing and she will not be the last or the loudest. While I was typing this I learned about a blog written by the founder of a nationally respected "pet foundation" who claims the "kill" label is killing our nation's pets. Uh, no. They are being killed at shelters that could stop that process by municipal officials and shelter leaders learning there are other ways to function instead of defending a process that is nothing short of an utter betrayal of the public trust. 2025. Not 1875. There are just no excuses since the ways to save lives are known and have been for a very long time.  I recently listened to a lengthy podcast on Youtube in which the former director of an animal shelter in Texas was interviewed on a variety of subjects related to animal sheltering. This person has a demonstrated history of hostility toward the No Kill Equation I have long promoted as the cure for the disease that is the killing of healthy and treatable animals in our nation’s shelters while the public is blamed for that process. I did not agree with much of the discussion which included the typical opposition to the No Kill movement. Two topics discussed bear clarification because the information stated in the podcast was false. I think it is important for people to know correct information and not continue to parrot things they have heard in the past as if they are true because they are repeated over and over and over again. As the saying goes, you are entitled to your own opinion but you are not entitled to your own facts.  The Source of the 90% Reference There are organizations (and people) that profess that once a shelter saves the lives of 90% of animals, it is a No Kill Shelter. This is false. A No Kill shelter is one that does not kill healthy and treatable animals and which euthanizes animals who are suffering or who are irremediably ill. A No Kill community is one in which the lives of all healthy and treatable animals in all shelters are saved. So, where did the 90% reference come from anyway? The people participating in the podcast jokingly said it “came out of nowhere” and challenged the listening audience to share the source of the 90% reference. Challenge accepted. The 90% reference came from Nathan and Jennifer Winograd almost 20 years ago at a time when there were no metrics of success put forth by national animal welfare organizations – many of which firmly opposed No Kill programs that are now considered commonplace. The Winograds were saving more than 95% of animals in Tompkins County, New York and the few No Kill shelters that existed at that time were saving about 92% of the animals. Nathan said they “rounded down” to say that 90% was an ordinary byproduct of saving all healthy and treatable animals at that time. It was never intended to be a rule or a goal, after which the lives of the other animals did not matter. The Winograds have since called the 90% reference their "Frankenstein’s Monster" because it has been used in ways they never intended. National organizations use the 90% figure to raise millions as they tell the public a certain area (like Los Angeles) will be No Kill by __________ (fill in the year) as they continue to kick the can down the road year after year. People want animals to be saved so they donate (and donate and donate) thinking they are doing good when very little of that money actually changes anything at local levels and the stated goal is never reached. Other organizations fixate on the number and modify their statistics to make it look like they are saving 90% of animals when they are not. There is a shelter in my state that claims to be a No Kill facility and says it saves 90% of animals by not counting animals it deems unadoptable in a self-fulfilling use of language. If an animal is not adopted, that means the animal was unadoptable. It is as if they never existed. Yet other shelters and organizations claim to have reached the 90% level to gain public favor while warehousing and neglecting animals, leading people to claim the No Kill movement is a bad thing. In other places, use of the 90% figure has led to what some call a "killing budget." Development of progressive shelter programs and advances in veterinary medicine have led to live release rates as high as 99% in some places in municipal animal shelters. The current model shelters to watch are in Lake County, Florida; Williamson County Texas; and Fremont County, Colorado. You can learn more about the source of the 90% reference by listing to a portion of episode 4 of the Winograd’s 5-part Substack series called “called “Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow: Animal Sheltering in the United States.” The part of the discussion about the 90% reference starts at about 16:03 goes to about 38:30 in the link provided above. You don’t need a subscription to listen.You can also listen to an excerpt from episode 4 which is the sound file below. I highly recommend the whole series about which I blogged before. I am hoping the Winograds put it in book form as a follow-up to Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America. excerpt from episode 4 of Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow  The Asilomar Accords The person interviewed in this podcast erroneously stated that the Asilmoar Accords are the source of the 90% reference and went on to speak about the Accords as if he is fully familiar with them. The Accords do not refer to a percentage at all. I have long referred to them as a cop-out that have done more harm than good to shelter animals, providing political cover to end lives while making it seem like there was no alternative. So, what are the Accords? In 2004, the Humane Society of the United States, the American Humane Association, the ASPCA, Maddie’s Fund, some original members of the Best Friends Animal Society and others met in Asilomar, California with the stated goal of finding “solutions” to the killing of dogs and cats in shelters. What they came up with instead was a document the title of which includes the phrase, “saving lives and not pointing fingers” which pretty much sums up the tone of the Accords. It was a meeting of self-proclaimed shelter industry leaders not to truly focus on saving animals but to instead focus on not offending people, including the very people killing animals while refusing to acknowledge the validity of the No Kill programs already working successfully to save lives. Once you get past the self-congratulatory language about why the Accords were convened (and the fact that they are not regulatory in nature) what people focus on the most are a series of definitions that have been used for decades not to save the lives of animals but to end them. If you have ever seen a shelter report that includes categories of “healthy,” “ treatable-rehabilitatible,” “treatable-manageable” and “unhealthy and untreatable” that report is based on the definitions of the Accords. The problem with using the Accords definitions are many. Just like a shelter can say an animal who was killed and not adopted was “unadoptable,” it is easy to use the definitions to end the lives of animals by labeling them anything other than “healthy.” Using the Accords shelters can end the lives of neo-natal animals, community cats and animals with minor injuries or conditions. Even if the definitions were universally understood and used ethically at the time they were magically created, they were developed 20 years ago so they have not kept pace with advances in veterinary medicine and shelter veterinary medicine. A condition that may have been considered untreatable decades ago is now entirely treatable. To learn about what conditions really are treatable and not treatable based on modern veterinary medicine, this Animal Evaluation Matrix published by the No Kill Advocacy Center in cooperation with veterinarians is the key. Nathan Winograd wrote this about the Accords in Redemption: “Sanctioning or allowing for local practices that permit killing to continue is no way to bring an end to the killing. As a result, the No Kill paradigm and the Asimolar Accords are irreconcilable. When two philosophies are mutually exclusive, as No Kill and the voices of the status quo are, agreement can only come about when No Kill’s hegemony is firmly established and the old philosophies and practices are abandoned. In the end, this is not a war of ‘ideas.” It is a life-and-death struggle for saving shelter animals. Either they live or they do not. No Kill demand that they do.” Nathan covers the Accords in detail at pages 146 to 155 of Redemption which I consider compulsory reading for anyone who cares about the lives of animals. The Accords themselves, including the list of “signatories” to the Accords, is found at this link.  About that Podcast If you are wondering why I watched the almost 2 hour podcast in the first place, the answer is one I am still trying to come to terms with. The guest speaker for the discussion was a former shelter director from Texas who has since been hired by the city in which I work – and where I have advocated for animal shelter reform regarding the municipal animal shelter for almost 20 years. I’m still not sure how he got the job. Much of his employment history is outside the animal shelter industry working with primates and wildlife, having first become an animal control officer in 2018, six years after our advocacy group formed in Huntsville. He has openly opposed the No Kill Equation, opposes free speech by the public about how shelters function, was in direct conflict with the public at his last shelter and claimed he had been tapped by the Texas Governor or “fix” things at the Houston shelter which is still having tremendous problems. I marvel when I think that no one bothered to fact check that one. We did not learn he was being hired until it was too late. We were alerted by our contacts in Texas he had been chosen for the job about 36 hours before the city council was scheduled to vote on his appointment as the shelter director. We put our a call to action to the public to rally the troops to call and email the council to try to get the appointment tabled, but the efforts failed. The public outcry did result in a lengthy discussion at the November 7, 2024, city council meeting, but the decision had already been made and there was nothing we could do about it. We have been told to give him a chance, as if we have a choice. I personally advised him that his opinions about the source of the 90% reference and the Asilomar Accords are inaccurate in advance of a meeting with him in just over a week. Time will tell what the future holds for Huntsville, Alabama. I stand by our advocacy because it worked, taking the city from a time when more than half the animals entering the building were killed to a time when the mayor said the shelter was “practically No Kill” at the end of 2021. The new guy will have to get on board with use of that phrase even if he hates it. And our members who live in the city will continue to promote the new version of the HAPA as a way of trying to save the city from itself. To use a space analogy in what is called The Rocket City, we helped the city get to the moon. It knows what to do. But the city has to want to get back to the moon. It makes no sense for us to stand on the launch pad with a fully prepared rocket and a proven operational plan if the city doesn't show up or allows the mission to be thwarted by someone who claims our moon landing was a hoax.  I was connecting with Liz Stockton of X-Port Paws recently about No Kill philosophies and specifically about how some people say that if we just did ________________ (fill in the blank with one thing) the problem would be solved and all the healthy and treatable animals in our nation's tax-funded animal shelters would be saved. I wish it was that simple. Really. I do. If you are familiar with this blog or my website at all, you know I promote the No Kill Equation and have since I first learned about it almost 20 years ago after reading Nathan Winograd's groundbreaking book: Redemption: The Myth of Pet Overpopulation and the No Kill Revolution in America. The short explanation is that the Equation is a DIY series of programs that work together to help reduce the number of animals entering shelters (while helping the public) and that help animals who do end up in shelters to be placed faster (know of as a shorter "length of stay"). All shelters can and should learn about the Equation and take immediate action to stop the outdated (and I would argue unethical) practice of ending the lives of healthy and treatable animals for space or convenience. There are other ways to function and to the extent any shelter purposefully remains mired in the past, I view that a betray of the public trust. After speaking with Liz, I wanted to address the "If We Just Did This One Thing" theories I hear about most often.  Spay and Neuter. Not a week (often not a day) goes by when I do not learn of someone saying, "if people would just spay and neuter their pets, animals would not die in shelters." It is absolutely true that if more people spayed and neutered their pets in any given community, there would be fewer animals in the community which may mean fewer animals entering the tax-funded animal shelter. I know some veterinarians charge hundreds of dollars for the surgery and a lot of people just can't afford that while trying to pay rent and feed their families. We can tell them that it costs more to care for a litter than to just have animals sterilized but that's a hard sell when your kids are hungry and there doesn't appear to be an immediate risk your dog will cause a pregnancy or become impregnated. Access to high volume/low cost spay neuter is one of the 11 elements of the No Kill Equation which helps keep pet populations low which, in turn, reduces intake. In the city where I work, there is a nonprofit spay/neuter clinic that is open to anyone no matter where they live or how much money they make. The city also funds a spay/neuter program for low-income residents so they can have pets sterilized for $5. This program, the availability of the nonprofit clinic and other factors have helped cut the shelter intake at the tax-funded animal shelter in half over a period of about five years. Communities that make an investment in programs like this are getting ahead of the issue by spending to prevent births as opposed to spending to impound, house and then destroy animals. I also support laws that require any animal adopted from a shelter or rescue group to be sterilized. I know there are some animal shelters and rescue groups that transfer ownership of animals old enough to be sterilized who are still intact. For shame. I know this happens a lot and it is irresponsible. The "promise method" some shelters use to try to get people to have animals sterilized after they are adopted seldom works. People may agree to have the animal spayed or neutered and may even sign a document in which they agree to do that. Once ownership is transferred, enforcement of the promise method is practically impossible. People often mean well and plan to have the surgery performed but then other priorities (either financially or based on busy schedules) prevents that from happening. Once ownership has changed hands, the shelter can't just demand the animal be returned and even if someone signed a document promising to have the surgery peformed, it becomes a civil issue to be handled legally, something I have never seen a shelter attempt. Ever. I do not support mandatory spay neuter for owned animals, often called MSN. This is punitive legislation that tries to force people to have all owned pets sterilized. Even in places that have MSN, there are exceptions for breeders, exceptions for people who do not want their pet sterilized on advice of their veterinarian and enforcement is almost impossible. I blogged about this fairly recently and will not cover this same topic in full again. I do encourage anyone who believes forcing people to have pets sterilized (as opposed to making it easy and affordable) to read my blog linked above. If you still support MSN after having read it, feel free to contact me so we can talk about your position. As Nathan Winograd says in his video No Kill 101 (which I share with elected officials often): "for decades, spay/neuter has been hailed as the singular solution to shelter killing, though it alone has never successfully created a No Kill Community. Why? Because spay/neuter focuses primarily on those animals who have yet to be born, leaving the animals already in shelters and who are under an immediate death threat with no protection from killing. In other words, while a significant investment in sterilization can reduce intakes over the long term, and that is important, it is no substitute for saving lives today."  Rescues and Transports. There are those who profess that the single solution to end shelter killing is to get more rescue groups to help get animals out of shelters to transport more animals to different parts of the country. I've read a number of blogs recently that say just that. Rescuers are some of the most hard working people in the country and are to be applauded by us all. But for rescue groups, many more animals would die in tax funded shelters than do now. I clash with some people in animal rescue circles because their adoption fees price the animals they are trying to place out of the market (as they try to recoup veterinary costs through adoption fees alone), because they refuse to limit their efforts to a geographic area (in their efforts to help more animals than they can responsibly care for) and because so many of them have such loathing for people. Animal problems are people problems and it really is not possible to help animals without helping people in some way. In progressive communities, shelter liaison with rescue groups is incredibly important and is one of the 11 elements of the No Kill Equation. Rescue release should typically be just a fraction of all live outcomes with the other live outcomes being the result of returns to owner and adoptions. I know some in rescue refuse to adopt animals locally because they say the people in their area are too irresponsible, can't be trusted, etc. I once had a contact who drove dogs about an hour to a pet store location to hold adoption events. When I asked her how she was ever going to connect in a positive way with the people in her own community if she acted like they could not be trusted, she could not respond. When I hear or read that THE solution to keep more animals alive is for rescues to pull most of the animals (in most cases to transport them to other areas) I simply cannot agree. There are cases in which nonprofit organizations with a physical shelter contract with one or more municipalities for animal control and sheltering. Most rescue groups, however, are foster-based and function off of donations and grants with no tax-funded support. Rescue groups cannot carry the burden of life-saving for any community not only because they have a limited amount of space to house animals and limited funds to help animals, but also because doing so enables the failures in leadership that create unreasonable reliance on the in the first place. If a rescue group in any particular area is pulling the vast majority of animals, what incentive is there for elected officials to take responsibility for how their shelters function and how money is spent? None. I know a lot of people in the rescue community view saving animals as a life calling. My argument is that they should be considered part of the solution and not the only solution. The No Kill Equation is not rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release, rescue release and rescue release. I know a lot of rescuers are frustrated now, particularly those who have historically relied on transports to other states to move animals. That became abundantly clear during the pandemic, when receiving states would no longer take animals from the source states. I know there are times when people find an animal on a site like Petfinder located hundreds or thousands of miles from them or otherwise learn about an animal on social media who is located far away and decide to adopt. I do not oppose transport for the sake of getting a specific animal from Point A to Point B for those long-distance adoptions. I do oppose mass transports from source locations to receiving locations where the lives of animals are already at risk. One such example is the pipeline between northern Alabama and Chicago. People may like the idea of saving southern animals from what they consider a fate worse than death by shipping them north. But news flash. There are plenty of animals in Chicago already who need help and importing them from other states only makes it harder to place local animals in need. And when nothing is done in the source location to address the reasons why so many animals need help, it is another enabling behavior. I know thousands of animals are transported from Texas to Colorado every year. Every life saved is a wonderful, positive outcome. But if we aren't doing anything to stop the flow of animals from Texas we are doing a disservice to the people who live in Texas and the animals being shipped north. A contact of mine who is the president of a local nonprofit phrased it this way years ago and I have always remembered what she said: the number of animals needing help is like the flow of water through a faucet. If we ever hope to stop the volume of need, we have to turn off the faucet. Yes, Jane.  Stop dog breeding. The third solution I see most often, particularly on social media, is the way to keep more shelter animals alive is to "stop people from breeding animals." I do not discount that the volume of animals bred in our country, particularly commercially, contributes to the volume of animals in shelters. Millions of puppies are born and sold each year; it is a multi-million dollar industry. I am not aware of any study that shows a direct connection between dogs bred in Missouri with dog intake in Florida or Tennessee or California. It is logical to assume, however, that because millions of dogs are bred in the U.S. and are sold on websites and by brokers using creative marketing that appeals to consumers, people looking for a dog to add to their family often buy dogs through those methods like they would by a laptop or a sofa. I've written many times about issues related to the commercial dog breeding industry which I oppose and which is often supported by the rescue community. I have also written about the fact that dog breeding is legal and as much as people chant, "don't breed or buy while shelter dogs die," that is just not realistic. I always encourage people to adopt as a first option; I do all I can to persuade them they can find a great fit for their family and that shelter animals are not damaged. As much as I would never buy a dog from a hobby breeder (someone who breeds dogs on a small scale for the love of the breed) or small-volume breeder, many people do and that is their right. A co-worker of mine recently bought a Jack Russell from a breeder in Georgia. Do I wish he had adopted instead? Of course. But it was his choice and not something I was able to influence in any way. For people who genuinely feel that breeding is an issue in their community and is leading to more shelter intake, I encourage those people to create and advance local legislation that requires breeders to pay fees for their business, that creates standards for those operations, and that provides criminal penalties for failing to adequately care for the breeding dogs and the dogs they sell. I also encourage them to get involved on the state level to advance similar legislation for the sake of not only the dogs being bred, but the people who adopt them to make sure the dogs are healthy (something severely lacking in many dogs bred in commercial operations). Local ordinances that prevent pet shops from importing dogs for sale in a retail setting are also important to keep businesses like Petland from setting up shop; once a store is open and is selling their puppies, it is almost impossible to stop.  Fires and How to Extinguish Them. In thinking back about my conversations with Liz, there is one other issue I want to touch on related to solutions to shelter killing. I am aware of people who spend a lot of time traveling around the county to bring awareness to what happens in our nation's animal shelters, who blog on that topic and who post about it on social media. I firmly believe that awareness leads to education leads to action leads to change. As much as people in animal advocacy and rescue circles believe the public should know about what is happening at their local shelter, most people just don't because it is not on their personal radar. It's incredibly important that we let the tax-paying public know what is happening at the shelter in their community so they know what they are paying for while they are, in most cases, blamed for a process that leads to the death of healthy and treatable animals. Only when people know what is happening can they participate in the political process and let elected officials know what they want and expect, perhaps even voting them out of office.
What I take issue with is the functional equivalent of yelling fire in a crowded room. Don't raise awareness - on any platform - to the needless deaths taking place nationally without also providing information and tools people can use to understand how we can change our society related to how shelters function. And without claiming it will just take __________________ (fill in the blank with one thing) to fix systemic issues. Don't yell "fire!" (animals are dying) without also pointing the way to the exits and explaining how the fire can be extinguished (saving animals using proven programs). The solutions have been known for almost 20 years and are available for the taking. The No Kill Equation can be implemented in any community and will always look different from location to location based on resources, challenges and the amount of public support. If, for some reason, you are not convinced the Equation works anywhere it is fully implemented, fine. Then develop or find some other solution that actually works and which does not rely on the "If We Just Did This One Thing" theory. I think you will find that to be incredibly difficult but am capable of learning new things. If someone can convince me another methodology works better than the Equation, I will consider myself schooled. If you live or work in a community where the tax-funded shelter ends the lives of healthy and treatable animals, speak out. Seek better. It may be necessary to become politically active as part of a group to try to "fight city hall." Don't wait for a large national animal welfare organization to come to your area to save the day because that's just not gonna happen. If you don't hesitate to complain about potholes in the road, timing of traffic lights, garbage pick-up and police response i your area, you can (and should) also be clear about how you want your money spent when it comes to balancing public safety with saving the lives of companion animals. Nothing changes if. . .nothing changes. As Margaret Meade once said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world: indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has." I was contacted by a friend of mine recently who shared a blog she had seen on social media about myths related to No Kill animal shelters. This particular author said that animal welfare is her life but it was also making her lose her mind. How every unfortunate not just for her related to her mental health, but because she chose to share information that is not accurate. I presume she means well. I also presume she has read information to cause her to be hypercritical of the No Kill movement. There is no shortage of negative information to be found online. Opposition to progressive animal sheltering has existed for decades back to the early 1970s when large national animal welfare organizations (or so they claim) promoted the idea that killing was kindness and there is much opposition even today by organizations like PETA. I reached out to the author to try to start a dialogue with her in hopes of advancing her education. Will it work? I'm not sure. Cognitive dissonance abounds in animal shelter and animal rescue circles and it can be really hard for people to recognize what they believed for years was, well, just wrong. I will not link to the blog here. I originally planned to write a blog to counter most of the author's claims, but ultimately decided that would not help many people. I've decided instead to talk about myths and truths so the information can be used by others as they advocate for animal shelter reform in their own communities. And so they can counter false information when they see it. As the saying goes, everyone is entitled to their own opinion but we are all bound by truth and share one set of facts. I won't cover the myths already addressed in my book because they have already been covered. If you want a copy of my book and are not a "hold it in your hands" reader, let me know and I'll share the pdf with you for free. No money is being made on the book when you buy it from Amazon (you are paying to have it printed ) so I share it as a pdf file often.  Shelters exist because of the negligence of the general public. If every member of a community were mindful and responsible, shelters would sit empty. This is not true. Shelters in most states exist related to public safety laws that require a place for animals not vaccinated against rabies to be housed, to house dogs running at large and to house animals in suspected cruelty cases pending due process determinations by courts. The fact that the best shelters also function as animal care facilities and not disposal facilities is a response to public expectations. Just because a dog is found running at large does not necessarily mean someone has been negligent. There are some people who let dogs run loose in more rural areas which is clearly irresponsible; that's a huge problem where I live and I see the results of that every time I get in my car. Most loose dogs are lost or displaced due not to negligence but due to some unforeseen circumstance. Doors get left open by children, gates get left open by contractors, dogs dig under and climb over fences, fireworks startle dogs, vehicle accidents happen and natural disasters happen. Ask Davyd Smith of No Kill Colorado how many times his dogs have gotten loose and he'll tell you his stories. Cruelty cases often end up related to a form of mental illness called "Noah Syndrome" about which I have written before and while these cases are tragic, they often result in no criminal consequences. As for the claim that shelters would sit empty, that is an incredibly naive statement. There will always be animal shelters and they will always be needed for both public safety purposes and to help those animals who either were, or could be, someone's beloved companion. That is what the public expects and I just don't see that changing any time soon. In fact, as time goes by more and more people are learning about animal sheltering and about No Kill philosophies as they seek better use of their tax dollars consistent with public values. Shelters are forced to make hard decisions to remain available to the public, including euthanizing for space. This is not true. The only hard decision any shelter need make it to stop killing healthy and treatable animals while calling it euthanasia and behaving as if there is no other way to function. The cure for the disease that is shelter killing has been known for almost two decades and it is the No Kill Equation, a series of programs that work together (thus, use of the description "equation") to reduce shelter intake and increase shelter output while helping the public instead of vilifying the public. To the extent any shelter has not learned about proven programs to help resolve systemic issues that lead the unnecessary killing of animals, that shelter is mired in a past that has not kept up with public expectations and advances in shelter medicine. Theirs is a betrayal of the public trust.  Rescue organizations should not boast about being No Kill. I honestly know of no rescue organization that is NOT no kill. Rescue groups function off of donations and grants. Exceedingly rare is the non-profit organization that receives any type of funding from tax dollars unless that organization is contracted to handle sheltering as is the case in Fremont County, Colorado led by the inspiring Doug Rae. To take on more animals than the organization can actually care for and place would be irresponsible and is a kind of hoarding. Yes, rescue organizations sometimes euthanize animals who are suffering, irremediably ill or present a genuine public safety risk and we should expect no less of them. But they don't end lives as a from of population control killing. Having said that, I am the first to admit that some tax funded animal shelters describe themselves as being No Kill operations when they are anything but. They do so to garner public favor and even donations while at the same time either warehousing animals or ending the lives of healthy and treatable animals while claiming they were "unadoptable" or "aggressive." That is why it is up to all of us who care about how animal shelters operate (or at least about how tax dollars are spent) to learn about how shelters can and should operate so we can see through use of the phrase No Kill by bad actors and call them out of those false claims. Animals who end up in shelters are unwanted, thrown away and forgotten. As explained above, just because an animal enters a shelter does not mean that animals is not wanted, has been forgotten or has been thrown away. When shelters take that type of attitude, the public becomes the enemy when it is that same public the shelter needs to adopt animals, foster animals, volunteer at the shelter and at events and even donated to the shelter. Doing so is totally counterproductive toward the goal of modifying public behavior = helping people make better choices. When the public becomes the enemy, it creates a divide between the shelter and the public being served (or rescue groups and the public) in an us v. them way that is just not helpful. Change comes when you first demand it from the members of your community. This is not true. Demanding people behave differently presumes they are doing something wrong in the first place. Whether people in shelter or animal rescue circles want to acknowledge it or not, most people give very little (if any) thought to their local animal shelter or how their personal choices affect how shelters operate when it comes to having pets spayed and neutered, making sure pets can be identified if displaced and making plans for someone to care for their pets in the event of their death or some live crisis. It is up to us to help educate the public so they can make better choices that help keep animals out of shelters. A couple of the websites I manage have content for this very purpose. To help people. In places where the shelter went from ending the lives of most animals to saving most lives, the public did not suddenly move away to be replaced by more responsible people. What changed was the culture that the shelter which decided to save lives instead of end them and be seen as places not of judgment but of help and positive outcomes. Think about it.  I received a call from an animal control contact of mine that was quite disturbing. It still upsets me just thinking about it now. My contact (we'll call her River for purposes of this blog) was trying to help a citizen who had trapped a free roaming cat, also called a community cat. The cat was believed to have an upper respiratory infection. The city does not have an animal shelter. Thinking she was doing the right thing, River took the cat to the local animal hospital with which the city has a contract. She thought the cat would receive veterinary care, would be kept at the animal hospital for the requisite hold period and she would later be able to make the cat available for adoption or get it to a rescue group. What happened next could not be further from what she expected. A vet technician said the cat had to be euthanized and used a heart stick to end the life of the cat while River stood watching in horror. The veterinarian was not on site; the tech behaved like this was common practice. For shame. It is possible the cat may ultimately have been euthanized. Upper respiratory infections in cats are caused by a virus or bacteria and it targets the upper airway instead of the lungs. Having said that, ending the life of the cat by heart sticking without the cat being unconscious is illegal in this state. The vet tech who ended the cat's life this way should be discipline and should lose her job. River reached out to me because she wanted to know about the legality of what happened and because she didn't want it to happen again. Euthanasia can be part of her job for animals who are genuinely suffering or irremediably ill but not like this. We talked about how she could pivot and find different solutions in the future to help cats with the help of local non-profit organizations and the veterinarians with whom those organizations work. We talked about how cats are part of the ecosystem and how it can be impossible to determine just from looking at a cat if he or she is social to people or feral (although there are some behaviors which make it easier to spot a feral cat). It is easy to tell the difference between a domesticated dog and a wild canine. The same cannot be said for cats. At all.  River and I talked about Trap - Neuter - Return as the only humane way to manage community cat populations. I have written about TNR before so I won't go into much detail here. The simple explanation is that TNR is a process in which free roaming cats are trapped, sterilized, left-ear tipped for identification (while they are sedated for surgery) and then placed back into the ecosystem in which they were found to stop the breeding cycle and address problem behaviors (mating, marking and yowling). If you want to learn more about TNR, the sources I rely on most are Alley Cat Allies, Million Cat Challenge, Neighborhood Cats (this is specific to New York but has a lot of wonderful information), this 2013 article written by Dr. Kate Hurley and Dr. Julie Levy and this 2019 presentation by Dr. Hurley called Rethinking the Shelter's Role in Community Cat Management. We have been doing TNR at the office where I work for fifteen years with the help of a wonderful organization called Forgotten Felines. It has made a tremendous difference not just for free roaming un-owned cats but for pet cats. We have a feeder station where cats are provided with food and water 365 days a year and near which we do our trapping. Because our close to a housing community, many of our cats come from that community and are social to people. Once those cats are trapped, they are scanned for a microchip, sterilized, vaccinated and made available for adoption. Some of those cats (like Sky, the blue-eyed car you see here) were seriously injured and were able to get the veterinary care they needed because they were attracted to the food source. Those cats who are not social to people are put back into the ecosystem where they are monitored for body weight and general health. When we see an ear-tipped cat, we know it is part of our small colony. There have been a few cats over the years who were so ill they had to be euthanized. We had a old tomcat we tried to help recently who had an infection that was just too advanced to be saved. As sad as it was that he was euthanized, he knew comfort in the last weeks of his life and he avoided what would have been a prolonged and very painful death. River and I also talked about a newer concept called Shelter - Neuter - Return, a subject about which I have engaged with the experts at UC Davis in California. This is similar to TNR but relates to cats entering shelters and how we best help them. Amanda Newkirk shared the following information with me a few years ago: The vast majority of communities have far more cats living outside than adopters looking to bring them inside. For years we trapped cats, brought them into the shelter, tried to adopt as many as we could and, sadly, euthanized the ones that weren’t so lucky. That is until we found out there are an estimated 60-80 million cats living outside and this strategy for managing cats was not one that was ever going to be successful. In fact, removing a small percentage of cats from an environment has actually been shown to increase the number of animals born during the next birthing cycle. I am contacted often by people who oppose TNR or who just don't understand how it works. Most of the opposition is from people who believe the cats they see outside are suffering or who treat cats as an invasive species that pray on birds and other wildlife and would rather have the cats destroyed. People a lot smarter than me have done extensive studies on this topic and I remain unconvinced that the opposing arguments have merit. Removing cats from areas where they are found creates something called the vacuum effect in which other cats take their place. Large-scale efforts to eradicate cats like have been attempted in other countries have never worked and have often endangered other species. I invite anyone who opposes TNR to educate themselves on the facts and not based on sensationalized media hype or emotional arguments. A good place to start is here. On to how it works. It should be obvious: when cats are sterilized, they no longer produce offspring. But the benefits of TNR go way beyond that because of how the presence of those cats in the environment affect other cats around them. My communication with River led to to revisit Dr. Hurley's presentation from 2019 to refresh on what I had learned years ago. It was time well spent. I encourage everyone who is interested in the well-being of all cats to watch the full presentation. This excerpt gets to the heart of why TNR works and last about 4 1/2 minutes. I was very pleased to see a recent Facebook post from another wonderful organization in our area that focuses on TNR and helping people get their pet cats sterilized. They helped River recently with a feral male cat so she could find her pivot. She did not take the cat to the animal hospital where his life likely would have been ended, perhaps in an unspeakable way. River trapped the cat and took him to a veterinarian who agreed to help. This veterinarian sterilized, vaccinated and ear-tipped the cat with the expenses paid by the local nonprofit. The cat was released back into his habitat to live out the rest of his days. He had healthy body weight and it is possible he will live for many more years and will no longer be the "rolling stone papa" he once was. My personal hope is that this new relationship between River and the nonprofit organization means community cats will get the help the need in a way that is humane and which also helps the community.
Thank you for your compassion, River. Thank you for taking a terrible situation and using it to find a humane solution for the future. |
AuthorI am an animal welfare advocate. My goal is to help people understand some basic issues related to companion animals in America. Awareness leads to education leads to action leads to change. Categories
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image courtesy of Terrah Johnson
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