 I was recently invited to participate in a round table discussion about animal issues in Alabama next month for an Emmy-winning public television series created and hosted by naturalist-educator Doug Phillips called "Discovering Alabama." It will be the third part in a series he first created in 2022 called Animal Friends. The scope of part 1 and part 2 of the series covers a variety of topics that include animal intelligence, values in Alabama related to animals, animal laws, lack of enforcement and prosecution of those laws, lack of humane education, lack of services in different parts of Alabama (shelters and animal control), puppy mills, spay/neuter, stray animals and challenges to keeping pets. Doug covered a lot. There are a many problems in our state when it comes to companion animals, but I know Doug wants to talk not so much about what is wrong and more about solutions to the issues we face. The other participants in the roundtable have almost 200 years of experience between them in a variety of capacities that include animal shelter leadership, animal control leadership, cruelty investigation, law enforcement training, legislative expertise and veterinary medicine. I'm sure ours will be an interesting discussion. Most of us interact on a pretty regular basis already and we're a pretty lively group. I started thinking about what I will bring to the table when we talk about solutions. I suspect the other participants will talk about things like having our certified law enforcement officers trained on the state laws (animal crimes, dangerous dogs, dog fighting), having animal control officers receive some level of mandatory training on those same subjects, state funding of the legal mandate that every county have an animal shelter, and perhaps making the state dog confinement law mandatory instead of optional. My experience is that of an advocate with a focus on political advocacy based on the foundation of my decades in the legal field. As I ponder what I hope to contribute to the discussion, I am sharing some thoughts here in the "for what it's worth" category with a mindset toward solutions as we try to be the change we seek.
 Seek change locally first. People talk all the time about stronger state laws to protect animals. Laws and enforcement of those laws are two different things. A strong state law is of no value if it is not enforced. I genuinely believe that change begins locally and is based on the values of the people who live in each community. If you want the animal shelter in your community to do a better job of saving lives, learn about programs that help that happen and engage with the shelter leadership and elected officials to seek support for some changes. If you want better conditions for dogs who live outside in your community, consider promoting a local law that sets standards that will be enforced by local law enforcement as a priority of the elected officials in charge. In any given state, the more communities that embrace progressive ways of functioning, the more that culture may spread and then make enacting meaningful state laws more likely. In seeking local change, keep in mind that your values may not represent those of your community and you may be in the minority. If the predominant culture in your community is that animals are disposable, are easily replaced, and are not worth spending tax dollars to help them, there is little you can do to change that. It is worth trying, but realize that magical thinking will not help bring about the change you seek. I am proud of the positive changes made in Huntsville, Alabama (where I worked), regarding how the animal shelter operates which was made possible through political advocacy. Despite 2 years of effort, I failed to convince the county commission where I live to modify a shelter SOP that says all shelter animals will be destroyed after 60 days. I tried. And I will try again if and when the culture changes or new people are elected who may be more willing to listen.
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I believe local laws related to companion animals can have two indirect consequences: 1) good laws can be infectious in a good way, encouraging other cities and counties to embrace a similar law or laws; and 2) bad laws can spread like a disease, infecting other cities and counties with laws that do not help animals and do not help people. I recently learned of two cities in south Alabama considering breed specific restrictions regarding pit-bull type dogs, one of which is the City of Geneva which is located in Geneva County. The name of the second city isn't important for purposes of this blog at this point. I'll explain why later. In my experience, it is not uncommon for cities to consider breed specific laws in the wake of a dog attack that caused injuries or a dog bite-related fatality. Such is the case in the City of Geneva. A man was attacked by a pack of dogs and died in March 2021; the media report of that incident references the previous death of a child but does no indicate when that happened. In March of this year, a woman was attacked and injured by three dogs. The owner of the dogs was charged with a misdemeanor because the injuries did not rise to a level to be considered serious. People want to be kept safe, so the default action is often to try to control dogs that look like the dog who either seriously hurt or killed someone even if that dog (or dogs) have already been determined not to be dangerous (because the negative contact was provoked or the dog was defending its owner or property) or the dog was already destroyed. I believe that focusing on laws that target dogs who look like the dangerous dog is more of a reaction to a specific event than a genuine focus on public safety moving forward. The ordinance enacted by Geneva is one of the most draconian I have seen in years. It applies to dogs that even look like pit bull type dogs, requires dogs to be registered with the city, requires people to post signs that they own a dangerous dog and if people don't comply, their dogs will be taken from them and most likely killed because they are deemed dangerous just because of how they look. It also imposes a pet limit which requires people to re-home animals they have in excess of the limit and charges a $250 penalty for someone to reclaim a lost pet as a first offense and $500 for a second offense (in addition to daily fees). I reached out to the city to ask if I could submit some questions after the ordinance was enacted and was told I could. When I submitted my questions I extended an offer to gift city officials four copies of Bronwyn Dickey's seminal book about pit- bull type dogs so they can educate themselves on a topic about which they believe they have sufficient knowledge to create new laws. I don't really expect to hear back from anyone. I don't live there. I don't vote there. It should be noted that the City of Geneva is in Geneva County which has failed to adopt the state's dog confinement law. Neighboring counties have not adopted the statute either which means dogs are essentially roaming around like its 1870. Dogs don't know jurisdictions. If areas surrounding the City of Geneva allow dogs to run loose (perhaps forming packs) that presents issues related to public safety when dogs cause vehicle accidents or injure or kill someone. Despite what you may read on some websites and find in an AI search on the subject, dog bites are rare events and the vast majority of dogs targeted by breed bans or restrictions will never bite. Dog bite related fatalities are also exceedingly rare events. The one dog bite fatality case in which I helped defend an Alabama City just over a decade ago involved not pit-bull type dogs but Rottweilers who attacked and killed WWII veteran Donald Thomas when he went to check his mail. I interviewed the neighbors, all of whom felt threatened by the dogs running loose, but who did not report the dogs or their concerns to the city because they didn’t think it would do any good. One woman who did call the police department after having been chased by the dogs (a few years before the attack that killed Mr. Thomas) failed to go to city hall to engage with a magistrate to swear out a warrant. All the neighbors with whom I spoke regretted they had not done more that may have prevented Mr. Thomas’ death.  This contact with cities about breed restrictions caused me to go back and look at one of the original pages of my website written many years ago called Breed Bans: Bad for Us, Bad for Them. Fast forward over a decade and I stand by what I wrote. They are still bad for us and bad for dogs. Not much has changed other than we now have new sources to use to help educate those considering banning or regulating dogs based on breed. This is what we know:
(click on each image to see a larger copy; you can also view all the flashcards here) My questions to the City of Geneva about the ordinance included the following:
Like I said, I don't expect to hear back from the City of Geneva even though I was told I could submit questions about the ordinance. I do expect the city to be sued and I expect people's dogs to be killed because they don't register them or they can't afford reclaim fees that amount to ransom. Back to the second city I was told was considering banning or restricting pit-bull type dogs following a dog bite related fatality in which a teenager was attacked and killed by dogs owned by his neighbor who were reportedly pit-bull type dog mixes. I spoke with City of Daleville Mayor Jayme Stayton yesterday after I heard his city was considering following in the steps of the City of Geneva to ban or restrict breeds of dogs. He confirmed his city is not considering laws that target dogs by breed. He also confirmed that a recent dog bit related fatality took place not in his city but in the county, adding "all kinds of dogs can bite." He was open to revision of his city code regarding vicious and dangerous animals which was last updated almost 20 years ago and open to contacting the Dale County elected officials to encourage them to adopt the state's dog confinement law. I shared some information to help him with that subject and others related to the animal code he and the city council can consider. It was refreshing to have a conversation with someone focused not on breed but on behavior and how to keep his constituents safe.  (presentation images and flashcards courtesy of Animal Farm Foundation; yard sign image courtesy of City of Geneva resident Donna Antolic)
In my June 7, 2026, blog I invited followers to send me questions on a variety of topics. I was surprised at the range of subjects people wanted to know about. Thank you to all who submitted questions and the time you took to participate. If you don't see your exact question here, it is because someone else submitted a similar question or I answered your question directly. You are welcome to contact me any time to ask questions about animal welfare advocacy and the topics I cover on my website as long as you are not seeking my help to take or place specific animals; I lack the ability to do that. Q: The city where I live just made a new law that makes people pay a $250 penalty to reclaim a lost dog and also charges a daily fee. The reclaim penalty goes up to $500 for a second offense. How are people supposed to afford to pay that much money? M.G. in Alabama A: Fees like this are often put in place by elected officials whose focus is more on punishing the public than helping the public. The theory is that if fines are high enough, people will work harder to keep their pets from getting loose. The problem with this approach is that not every dog we see running loose is the result of people who do not care. Accidents happen. Gates get left open by contractors, children leave doors open, dogs flee their property when scared (by fireworks or other loud noises), dogs dig out from under and climb over fencing and the batteries in dogs’ electronic fence collars wear out. A lot of people simply cannot pay what amounts to ransom to reclaim a lost dog because they cannot afford it. It doesn't matter how much they love their animals - when making decisions about what may be limited resources, paying rent, feeding children and keeping the power on will always take priority over paying hundreds of dollars to reclaim a lost pet. This means the city in which you live will no doubt end up spending lots of money to impound, house and care for an animal before ending the life of that animal which is absurd. Every instance of a lost pet should be addressed on a case by case basis to determine what happened and how to keep it from happening again, even if that means setting up a fund (perhaps using donations) to give people resources like run lines and pavers (to reinforce fencing) to keep dogs from getting loose. Cities like yours should also create a fee waiver policy so that people who genuinely cannot afford to pay reclaim fees and penalties can get their dog back when the alternative is the city spending money to end the life of that dog. Any city that treats the public like the enemy will never gain the cooperation of the public and be able to encourage them to make better choices or accept help to prevent animals from entering the shelter. I encourage you to band together with other residents of the city and engage respectfully with members of the city council to get this new policy reversed. It is not uncommon for a city to charge a nominal reclaim fee, but these amounts are so punitive that it will affect not just citizens but the shelter operation.  Q: I know there are rescue groups who go to dog auctions to buy dogs and I know you don't approve of that. Don't you think the lives of those dogs are worth saving? P.C. in Florida A: I think the lives of all dogs have value. In my opinion, the problem with your question relates to use of the word "save." There was a time when dog auctions were attended by two groups of people: the breeders selling dogs and the brokers buying dogs. There were people in rescue circles who acquired unsold "stock" after auctions ended based on relationships they had curated with breeders and with no money changing hands. It was a quiet exchange out of the pubic eye that put a dog or puppy in the hands of a rescuer while doing the breeder the favor of taking a dog who may be sick or lacking certain breed traits while keeping the breeder from using a bullet, a shovel or a bucket to end the life of the dog. All that changed years ago when people in the rescue community began attending auctions to buy dogs and calling it rescue. As Kim Kavin explored in depth in her Washington Post article, the presence of rescuers in the auction tent forever changed the commercial dog breeding industry for the worse. Much worse. There was nothing quiet or curated about this new relationship as rescuers made not only their presence at auctions known but also their willingness to pay whatever it took to buy dogs from the auction block. Rather than giving unsold dogs to rescue groups after the auction and as part of a quiet exchange, breeders began to see rescuers as a potential revenue source, sometimes breeding dogs specifically for the rescue community to make huge sums of money. According to Kavin's April 2018 article, one particular Alabama-based breed specific rescue paid more than $400,000 to buy 172 dogs over a period of four years for, "an average price of $2,365 per dog. Last year, more than half the dogs the nonprofit group says it saved were bought at auction." The article goes on to recount an event in which an Alabama rescuer offered to pay $24,000 for two dogs a breeder named Will Yoder had just bought for a little over 8k. And she did. Sounds crazy, right? Since the article was published in April of 2018 with who knows how much money being spent to buy dogs in the last 7 years. I shudder to think how that money was used to expand breeding operations to be able to breed more and more dogs. I don't see this as "saving" dogs at all. I see this as enriching the very industry rescuers claim to abhor, making it more profitable than ever and leading to the breeding of more and more puppies while the breeder "stock" potentially suffers out of view of the auction tent. It may not be popular to say so, but I will: I think it is the height of human arrogance to focus solely on purchasing a specific dog (or dogs) at an auction to be able to say that dog was "saved" or "rescued while remaining willfully ignorant of the fact that the money used to buy that one dog will be used to breed or purchase many more dogs in its place, thereby perpetuating the industry. Rescuers can and should focus on saving animals most in need of rescue in their own areas and without going to auctions at all.  Q: Why are you against mandatory spay neuter since there are states in the northeast where it is mandatory? P.B. in Wisconsin. A: Despite what you may have been told, there are no states in the northeastern part of the United States where spay/neuter is mandatory for owned animals. The reason more pets are sterilized in those places is because promotion of spay/neuter has been a priority for years and it is more easily accessible than it is in other parts of the country. There are some areas of the country where there are veterinary deserts and there is no veterinarian to which people can take a pet to be spayed or neutered. That is not the case in the northeast. There are also places where veterinarians charge hundreds of dollars for a procedure which can be done for much less at a non-profit clinic that focuses on just spay/neuter. Most states mandate spay/neuter of animals adopted from shelters and rescues as a means of controlling animal populations and to avoid having the offspring of adopted animals enter the shelter, leading to more spending. Even though spay/neuter of adopted animals is the law in most places, there are numerous animal shelters that adopt out intact animals using "the promise method" (in which people promise to have the surgery performed but never do). There are also numerous rescue groups that fault the public for "pet overpopulation" but allow unsterilized animals to be adopted and then lament the number of animals they are asked to help. To learn more about opposition to spay/neuter which extends far beyond my website, please take a few minutes to read about it here. If we are prepared to punish people who can least afford to have their pets "fixed," we do better to just help those people instead and create relationships with them that extend beyond a single surgery. Q: What is the biggest mistake you've made when it comes to your advocacy to try to help animals? J.S. in North Carolina A: I've certainly made a lot of mistakes along the way as I've advocated for animals and systemic change. The mistake that bothers me the most was more of a calculation than anything. I totally underestimated the former shelter director of Huntsville Animal Services in Alabama which was the focus of much of my advocacy for more than 2 decades. Like most people, I presumed that her status as a licensed veterinarian meant she would would be open to ideas on how to save the lives of more animals; there were years when more than 7 thousand animals died in her facility under her leadership. Yes, you read that correctly. I failed to appreciate how fiercely she would fight to maintain the status quo for what was likely the sake of her own mental health. It must be incredibly difficult to realize that so many animals died when they could have been saved. Had I known how hard it would be to get her to embrace a new culture for her city department, the approach used by No Kill Huntsville to try to affect change might have shifted somewhat. We still would have focused on municipal accountability, but could have used different methods to try to gain her cooperation with more sensitivity to her struggle between her past actions and the potential future of Huntsville as a No Kill community. I am proud of what was achieved in Huntsville which is now one of the safest places for animals in the state and even in the country. Did we do the hard work? No. But we changed the history of the city by banding together, speaking out, harnessing the compassion of the public and pushing the city to create a new culture which made it possible for a newe director to be hired whose values are in keeping with those of the public he serves. Q: I'm worried about the number of puppy mills in the state where I live. It's not obvious where they are located. What's the best place to get information to learn more about mills in my state? A.M. in Wisconsin A: This is an easy one. Bailing Out Benji, led by Mindi Callison from Iowa. I first learned of Mindi a few years ago through a mutual contact who was saving mill dogs (not by purchasing them) and then when she appeared in a film executive produced by another contact of mine called Dog by Dog which I blogged about before and I recommend everyone watch. The film is just as relevant today as it was when it was released and has national implications. You can watch the film on Google play, Pluto TV or Youtube. Bailing Out Benji has become one of the most reliable sources of information about the commercial dog breeding industry (as is Harley's Dream) and provides a national map that tracks USDA licensed breeders and brokers by state. Each brown circle on the map represents a broker and each blue circle represents a breeder. You can see details about the licensee by clicking on the circle. For example, the Fairmont Acre Kennel in Ephrata, Pennsyvania, has 154 adult dogs and a history of compliance issues. If you know of a breeding operation that is not on the map, that means it is not licensed by the USDA (although having a license is not indicator of how well the dogs or their offspring are cared for). Humane World (formerly the Humane Society of the United States) tracks the 100 worst dog breeding operations annually.  (capture of interactive map courtesy of Bailing Out Benji) Q: I see a lot of negativity on social media about the No Kill movement, some of it by very prominent people. they have called the movement a scam that has led to animal suffering. Why is this happening? J.F. in Texas A: Let's get to the scam part first. The No Kill movement is a social movement for which we should all be grateful. We have the movement to thank for the fact that our country no longer kills 16 to 17 million animals in animal shelters every year and that number is now less than 1 million. That is still too many, but we've come a very long way. In my opinion, the negativity about the movement is led by people who have not learned the history of animal sheltering in our country to better understand how we got to this point in history and the obstacles overcome to get here. There are opponents of the movement who associate it with a specific organization or platform like the Best Friends Animal Society or Human Animal Support Services. The movement does not belong to those organizations no matter how much money they have or how large their platform may be. They do not own it. The movement is made up of people like you and me. People in the trenches of advocacy seeking change in their own communities because they view saving the lives of shelter animals as a moral imperative. Focusing on specific organizations and then faulting the movement takes the focus off of our core values in which there are no excuses for killing healthy and treatable animals and the focus is not on math (the 90% reference) but on method. Nathan Winograd of the No Kill Advocacy Center addressed in a recent Substack article in which he wrote: I am hearing rescuers and advocates regurgitating excuses for killing we debunked in the 1990s and 2000s: pet overpopulation, irresponsible public, need for a 'no birth' and not No Kill nation. . .When we call for a No Kill nation, we are specifically referring to the promise and success of open-admission No Kill Equation sheltering. We are referring to a shelter in the dictionary sense of the word: “an establishment providing food, protection from danger, and temporary housing for stray or unwanted animals.” The door is always open and animals find a new beginning, instead of the end of the line. We are NOT referring to the fundraising scam where “managed intake,” “community sheltering,” and “Human Animal Support Services” are euphemisms for “no entry” and increases in placement rates are dependent on animals being turned away, abandoned, and left to suffer.  Q: I've heard there are countries where having a pet spayed or neutered is considered barbaric. Why does the U.S. focus so much on that?
A: You are correct. Some German and Scandinavian countries (including Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden) have restrictive policies on neutering. In Germany, the Animal Welfare Act prohibits neutering, except for health reasons or to control populations. In Norway, neutering is illegal unless strictly necessary. The removal of ovaries and testicles is considered to be mutilation, no different from cropping ears and docking tails. The focus on spaying and neutering in the United States is based on our history. There was a time when 16 to 17 millions animals died in animal shelters every year, regardless of age or health. Focusing on spay and neuter as a positive way to keep pet populations from growing while potentially extending the life of the sterilized pet has become a cultural norm while still allowing pet owners to make choices for themselves. Q: You say that every place is capable of becoming a No Kill community but not every place is ready for that. What does that mean? C.V. in Georgia A: Every community has limited resources and every community has collective values that represent the priorities of the people that live there. I believe every community in which the lives of companion animals are valued has the capacity to save all healthy and treatable animals - regardless of resources - by inviting the public to create a new culture that balances public safety with saving lives. Many of the programs that save the lives of shelter animals cost nothing and even those that do require some cost can be addressed using the "pay me now v. pay me later" approach. An example is investing funding into making spay/neuter of pets accessible and affordable (or free) for low income residents. Communities that invest in population control pay up front for surgeries, but pay less long-term because fewer animals enter tax-funded shelter. Not every place is ready to be a No Kill community because there are many places where the lives of dogs and cats are not valued. If animals are treated as expendable, and the public supports that, there is no incentive elected officials to ensure the tax-funded shelter is managed differently. If a shelter even exists. People who live in those places who do value the lives of animals can focus on getting people elected to represent their values and do what they can in the present to help animals in need. But sometimes we have to follow the advice in the book Twelve by Twelve to see, be, do as we wait for a time when change is possible. Animal shelter reform cannot always be forced through logic, respectful dialogue and political advocacy no matter how much we want it. I am sometimes contacted by followers of my website asking why I focus so much on No Kill animal shelter philosophies and animal welfare advocacy. The answer is two-fold: 1) because those subjects are important to me; and 2) because I hope to educate others from things I have learned in the last couple of decades. I became an animal welfare advocate following the passing of our dog, Snake, and had the very unwelcome epiphany about how most animal shelters in our country operate and it changed my life in ways I never expected. I've learned a lot along the way; I was wrong about many things and oblivious to others. I firmly believe that the best way we can all help companion animals is to educate ourselves on issues that affect them. I also believe the best way we help reform our animal shelter system is to learn the history of that system so we don't repeat mistakes from the past and we don't get fooled by people who claim to seek better for animals when they are actually engaged in virtue signaling or focused on self-promotion. My website includes content related to puppy mills, breed bans, aggression in dogs, chaining, adoption, spay and neuter and animal politics because all of those subjects are all related in some way to the subject of what takes place in our animal shelters using our money. Which often bears no relation to what people think happens at their local shelter. Unless you live in what is called a No Kill community (a place where tax dollars are not used to destroy healthy and treatable animals), your shelter is likely destroying the vast majority of animals entrusted to its care and is blaming you for those deaths because you are part of "the irresponsible public." Animals enter the building, some are adopted out and the rest are destroyed, having been given no individual consideration at all. Repeat, repeat, repeat. Unlike many other bloggers, I do not use AI to write. I confess that I sometimes use AI generated images because I lack any graphic design skills and it can be fun to use something other than a traditional photograph - like the image you see here that looks a lot like our dog who obviously cannot type. I realize AI is here and is not going away; I chose to share content I write and research myself so I know it is accurate and is based on facts and real-world experiences. Call me old school, I guess. Like my book, I make no money from my website and I seek only to share with those interested in reading and perhaps learning something new. When the time comes that I am no longer helping people, I will stop writing and will go on about my life, knowing that I made a difference in many ways and that I left things better than I found them. I am taking questions from followers to share in a future "ask me anything" blog including (but not limited to) these general subject areas.
 Please submit one question per person no later than Friday, June 26, 2026 using the form below. I plan to answer 10 questions depending on the complexity of the questions. I plan to share questions and answers using your initials (unless you allow use of your full name), organization (if applicable) and your city and state. NOTE: Please keep in mind that I am not a veterinarian or attorney (although I worked as a litigation paralegal for more than 30 years) and I cannot address questions about individual animal placements, behavior or health challenges. The Alabama 30-day legislative session ended on April 9, 2026. It was exhausting even though I never set foot inside the Montgomery State Capitol. As I process what happened in the last couple of weeks, I wanted to write about those events to help myself decompress and to also share for the benefit of others so they can consider state laws being promoted, modified or passed where they live. I am working on a local ordinance in the city where I live and will write about that process in a later blog. The short story is that this session was filled with passion on the part of animal welfare advocates, much bad behavior toward people by those same advocates, lessons about the legislative process and lessons about unintended consequences when seeking new laws. Since my goal is to help others, I'll cover lessons learned first and will then share about what happened here. But a little background first.  Law LevelsThere are three levels of animal laws, all of which are separate (much like other legal issues related to people).
How Laws Get EnactedI feel pretty confident that a lot of people aren't familiar how most laws are enacted at state level, including laws that may be important to them on a variety of subjects: animals, children, voting, education, criminal laws, driving and transportation, business and commerce, public health and safety, etc. We all vote and we all see ballot measures when we vote, but the vast majority of laws are not put to a vote and are handled by those we elect to represent us. Many laws are enacted without people knowing about them at all and they may only learn about them if the see or read a story on the news or they end up on the wrong side of a new law they knew nothing about. The process by which a bill becomes law varies by state but is pretty similar for the most part: 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 using a mirror image bill which must be the same. The bill then dies or advances. 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. Some bills seek creation of new laws. Many bills seek to amend - or change - existing laws. Learning about the laws in your state can take time. Time many people lack. I have issues with the state rankings issued by the ALDF each year, but I applaud the research done by ALDF to make the laws readily available to anyone interested in reading them. When laws are handled by the state legislature and not put to a vote, it can be easy to go along with something you see on social media or are told by another person, even if that information is wrong. Our bonds with our animals are emotional. It stands to reason that the subject of laws about how animals are treated is equally emotional and it doesn't take much for people to lose sight of the goals of some laws. Most people with whom I interact believe that any law about animals must be a good law. As I wrote about last May, some bills are good and some bills are bad. Some bills have both good and bad and when that happens we have to weigh the risks of changing laws we have which is not always for the better. Lessons LearnedIf you are interested in new laws (or changes to existing laws) in your state related to companion animals, I encourage you to consider the following. No one expects you to be an attorney. I do hope you will learn and speak for yourself if you want to be taken seriously and you want to help companion animals in your state.
My Issues with Beau's Law (SB 361) Alabama enacted a law called Beau's Law which was named after a dog named Beau who was found outside in the snow in Jefferson County, Alabama, with only cardboard for shelter. The law sets standards of care for dogs who are outside, conditions for tethering dogs, provides exemptions to the law and provides punishments. The process that led to this new law was complicated and I won't try to explain the whole thing here because it's not important for the sake of trying to help others. The following summary may be of some value to you. Through the end of 2025, Alabama had criminal laws regarding livestock, regarding cockfighting, regarding animals generally and regarding dogs and cats specifically. Crimes against dogs and cats were punishable by a Class A Misdemeanor (punishable by up to one year in county jail [or hard labor] and a maximum fine of $6,000) at least and Class C Felony (punishable by 1 year and 1 day to 10 years in prison and fines up to $15,000) at worst. The Pet Protection Act (PPA) which is specific to dogs and cats was enacted in 2000. It took 12 years to get the PPA passed. The law regarding cruelty to “animals” which is not specific to dogs and cats was first enacted in 1977 and was later amended in 2013 to bring the penalty level in line with the PPA. Representatives Phil Ensler and Neil Rafferty brought House Bill 446 that set certain standards of care for dogs outside, required certain methods be used when confining or tethering a dog and would require criminal penalties for violations. The bill did not seek to amend the PPA. Senator Garlan Gudger brought Senate Bill 361 almost 20 days later. It covered the same subjects but still not seek to amend the PPA. The Senate bill made it through committee and the Senate in 3 days, crossed over to the house and became the leading bill. The bill was amended in the House committee before being brought to the House floor on the 29th day of the session. Eleven amendment to the bill were proposed, 6 were adopted, the bill crossed back over to the Senate and was signed by Governor Ivey as Beau's Law. People were told this was the first time an animal law had made it through the legislative gauntlet in 26 years (which is not accurate) and began making plans for it to be enforced when it goes into effect on October 1, 2026. People celebrated. People cheered. I was not one of those people. Each time a bill was filed or substituted, I read it thoroughly, compared it to existing state laws and communicated my concerns about each bill (both HB 446 and SB 361) to bill sponsors and my own legislators based on my knowledge of statutory law from more than 30 years in the legal field. I felt the bills could weaken existing laws, may have provisions that were unenforceable, may be confusing and may be ignored in some places. To be clear, I fully support adequate care of dogs. That should go without saying. I wrote and promoted an ordinance in the city where I live about a decade ago that covers many of the same topics as these bills which has been in effect a long time and is working well. There is, however, a world of difference between a state law and a local law that has been considered by the city council and adopted as setting forth the standards inside the city that will be enforced by the police department. I expressed concerns about the following topics in the bills:
Simply put - my concerns with the legislation outweighed even the love I have for dogs. I’m worried most issues with animal cruelty is lack of enforcement of current laws. That’s not a criticism of law enforcement, it’s just the reality. Most law enforcement agencies prioritize human crime that they deem is the most important to address with their limited resources. Most counties and cities cannot afford to increase their animal control staff. I was worried this bill could be an unfunded mandate on cities and counties. I also feel like some of the awful stories I heard about dogs not having proper shelter and tethering should fall under our existing cruelty laws. I’m not sure adding more regulations would fix the issue. In fact I was worried about people just abandoning their dogs to avoid dealing with the new laws. And animal abandonment is an issue you and I communicated about before and tried to solve because we both know it’s an issue. Like with the animal abandonment bill, I noticed animal rights advocates not fully agreeing if SB 361 was good or bad. I also just had practical application concerns about private property, probable cause, etc that lead me to eventually vote no. "  Despite rumors to the contrary, I never tried to "kill" a bill. The fact that people accused me of that, as if I have that type of influence, is comical. I communicated with elected officials about bills (which is an exercise of my Free Speech under the First Amendment) just as I have in past years. Sometimes I received responses, sometimes I did not. The officials to whom I wrote no doubt shared my messages with primary supporters of the bill. I would expect no less. What I did not expect was to be subject to cyber libel on social media. Allison Black Cornelius (the CEO of the Greater Birmingham Humane Society, an organization that does not have a good track record keeping dogs alive) accused me of being a negative, ignorant, jealous, bitter extremist, causing our state to be stuck and helping special interest groups in their opposition to new animal laws. Wendy Michelle Montealegre (a rescuer who does tremendous work saving animals in Blount County) accused me of going on a secret campaign to kill and sabotage the bill by calling shelters (which I did not). Chapel King (who was recently elected to the City of Florence City Council) wrote that if I was not willing to support the bill that I should not take actions to harm the bill. My requests to her to remove defamatory comments about me on a social media page she admins have gone unanswered. A woman who goes by Patricia N TheMutts wrote that I was creating dissension, chaos and bad feelings, defeating the cause of helping animals. Deanna Nicholas (who works with Rock Creek Rescue in Madison County) called me selfish, saying I was upset because I did not get anything done when I was in animal rights advocacy so I was standing in the way of forward momentum. When I reached out to Ms. Nicholas to ask her to remove her social media comment about me, she went further, calling me an attention seeking, washed up, non-effective person who was blocking a bill that could save lives and accusing me of wanting dogs to die on chains. She also claimed that because this is America, she can say anything she wants about me. Uh, wrong. I have long believed that personal attacks are desperate attempts by people who would rather result to defamation than to address the actual issues at hand. I really am allowed to have my own opinions about proposed laws that are not in lockstep with the opinions of others and as they misrepresent - intentional or not - existing laws. Enforcement Issues With Beau's LawThe laws in Alabama regarding companion animals are quite strong no matter how the state is ranked compared to other states. Our dog fighting law is considered the third most strict law in the country. What is lacking is enforcement of existing laws. There are different cultures in Alabama regarding dogs as pets compared to dogs who perform a service function or protect livestock. One state representative who spoke on the House floor about the bill said, "no one should go to jail for a damn dog." I was hopeful the bill sponsor would point out that people already go to jail for animal crimes that have been punishable as a Class A Misdemeanor for not less than a quarter of a century. He did not. In areas of Alabama where existing laws are not enforced, it seems illogical that more or newer laws would be enforced more. Certified officers currently receive no mandatory training on the state's animal laws (even though they are part of the criminal code) and most animal control officers receive no training at all. It is typical for an ACO to only be required to have a driver's license and a high school diploma or GED before being handed a catch pole and told to go to work. There are certainly certified officers and ACOs who have sought out training for themselves but there is no standard training curriculum for either position. As is the case in every state, every law enforcement agency has a finite number of certified personnel on duty at any given time and calls are prioritized. Responses to crimes against people will always be handled before crimes against animals and laws viewed as "lesser" laws will always receive less attention than crimes considered more serious. The same goes for prosecution. There are finite resources to make and bring cases before courts and decisions on those cases are prioritized based on the culture in the jurisdiction. A former city fire captain is facing trial in Madison County for killing a puppy and was charged with a Class C felony under 13A-11-14.1 which applies to animals generally. The ADA told me he used that statute because the dog was dead and he wanted to be able to use the Habitual Felony Offender Act. Would the same crime be charged at all in Washington County? Perhaps not. Add to all of this that of the 67 counties in Alabama, 39 counties have not adopted the state dog confinement law. This means dogs essentially run loose, even in counties where there have been human deaths in dog attacks. Of the 67 counties in Alabama, 29 counties have no animal control services and no pound as required by state law. A 30th county has animal control services but no pound. Where do dogs seized under the new law in those places go and what happens to them? I have long believed a bad bill is worse than no bill. If we can all agree that animal problems are people problems and that we want the best possible care for animals, it is worth our time to develop laws that do not compromise those we already have, that are enforceable and that actually help animals. Beau's Law already reduced the criminal penalty. Will it prove to be enforceable and help animals not just in some counties but across the state without leading to the death of more dogs in animal shelters? Time will tell.  (image courtesy of Kristin Yarbrough of Alabama Animal Advocates)
We all face crossroads in our lives. Events which create what we consider a "before" and an "after." Life milestones. The loss of someone we love. A choice we make that puts us on a different path. I encountered one of my many crossroads almost 20 years ago when I learned that the animal shelter in the city where I worked - Huntsville, Alabama - was ending the lives of the majority of the animals entering the building for what amounted to the status quo. It had always been done and so the destruction of animals continued despite the shelter being located in one of the most progressive cities in the country. Huntsville, Alabama, is located in the northern part of the state and is the largest city in the state. It is home to the Army's Redstone Arsenal, NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, and Cummings Research Park with an economy internationally recognized for research and technological innovation. The city is considered as a great place for families due to its strong school systems, affordable cost of living, and a thriving job market. All these great things about Huntsville admittedly make it atypical of the state and the region. I sometimes joke that time travel is possible; it just depends on where you go in Alabama and who you interact with. Like many places in the state, however, it was once home to a tax-funded animal shelter that killed thousands of animals a year not far from the shadow of the Saturn V replica on the west side of the interstate. I first lived in Huntsville in 1982 when I was assigned as an Army Spec 4 to what was then called "the school house" on the Arsenal, used to train "special" weapons and EOD troops. It was not until 16 years later that I returned to Huntsville to work at a civil law firm from which I retired just over a year ago. And it was not until 2006 that my heart was broken after I learned the terrible truth about the operation of the animal shelter that serves what is often called The Rocket City.
The live release rate (the number of shelter animals leaving the building alive) at Huntsville Animal Services in 2008 (the first year for which I have data) was 33% for dogs and 13% for cats. The lives of healthy and treatable animals were ended along with animals who were suffering and the irremediably ill as the process was blamed on the "irresponsible public" and the shelter director dismissed the killing of healthy animals with no more regard than the destruction of a paper plate or a broken shoelace. Both actions were called euthanasia as the shelter functioned with a first in, first out mindset in which the building was less a shelter and more of a disposal facility. The shelter director at the time was a city department head who earned a 6-figure salary and was afforded an assumption akin to "do no harm" because she was a veterinarian. "Surely," said city leaders, "the lives of animals would not be ended unless there were no other options." This level of death was not uncommon in Alabama and not uncommon at many shelters across the country due to a calcified and archaic mindset which promoted the idea that killing was kindness and that there were fates worse than death. Why were so many animals dying in this proud and progressive community? For no good reason at all. Fast forward to 2025 when the live release rate at Huntsville Animal Services was 93% for both dogs and cats. So, what changed? Did the irresponsible public move away to be replaced by more responsible people? No. Did the shelter director or city officials examine how the shelter operated and decide to make saving lives of animals a priority? No. What happened was the functional equivalent to a slap across the face of city officials (because there is no polite way to say, "please stop killing animals needlessly") and it came in the literal form of political advocacy. A few like-minded people who were fed up with the killing got angry and then got smart and then banded together to speak with one voice to say, "we are better than this. If we can support the space program and our troops, we can keep animals alive." I formed No Kill Huntsville in January 2012, inviting dozens of people to form a coalition to seek change. It ultimately became a small group of animal advocates who worked hard to make sure the public knew what was happening using their money (through events, billboards and with the help of the media) and who had the audacity to fight city hall to change behavior that was inconsistent with public values. It wasn't easy, it wasn't pretty, it wasn't perfect and for many years it was a 7-day a week effort to promote shelter reform in the face of opposition not only from city officials, city employees and shelter volunteers but from an unlikely source: people in the animal rescue community. But our advocacy worked because we spoke publicly with one voice, we stayed on subject, we focused on municipal accountability (as opposed to specific people) and we never wavered from promotion of the programs and services of the No Kill Equation as the cure for the disease of shelter killing. I firmly believe that any community has the capacity to become a No Kill community - a place where the lives of all healthy and treatable shelter animals are saved. Saving lives is not about the shelter building or even about spending. There are beautiful shelters across the country that cost millions of dollars to build and where most animals entering the building do not survive the experience. Saving lives is about a culture in which there are no excuses for killing healthy and treatable animals which can and should be saved and where every animal is treated as having been or being capable of being someone's beloved companion (with the exception of dog who are cognitively impaired and present a genuine public safety risk). Having said that, I understand that not every community is ready to become a No Kill community and political advocacy on behalf of shelter animals doesn't always work. It only succeeds on the foundation of public support in places where the lives of companion animals are valued. No amount of advocacy will force change through magical thinking in places where the mindset is that animals are disposable and not worth saving even if that means no additional spending. In more progressive places like Huntsville, however, advocacy can often be the difference between maintenance of the status quo and a future in which a city or county make the highest and best use of tax dollars not just for the sake of public safety but for the sake of the people served and the animal companions with which they share their lives.  I, and the other members of No Kill Huntsville, always said we sought not to be recognized but to be made irrelevant and we have for the most part. It was never about us and it was always about the animals. Always. As Shirley Marsh so aptly wrote in her March 2011 Yes Biscuit blog about what it takes to reform a community to save animals: “In reality, [animal shelter reform] takes a group of dedicated animal advocates willing to stir things up in their own community by challenging the status quo and refusing to accept killing as a means of population control. There are consequences to such actions: old friendships may be broken, egos may be bruised, glass houses may be shattered. This ain’t no fairy tale. It’s hard work, which will be met with resistance by some. You will no longer be able to ride the I Love Everybody and Everybody Loves Me bus. You will not be nominated for homecoming queen. No soup for you. Like all things in life, working to end the killing in your community is a choice you must make for yourself. You can choose to carry on with the ‘save a few and kill the rest’ status quo. You’ll get to keep all your Facebook friends and play Farmville with them in between posting pets from kill lists. Or you can choose to reject the idea of needless killing as justifiable in any way. You’ll make some people feel uncomfortable, and they will resent you for it. But you’ll have the opportunity to educate and learn from others who are on the same path. No longer will you feel an awkward compulsion to defend those who kill friendly pets in shelters while simultaneously advocating to save shelter pets. You will have the clarity of mind that comes from knowing where you stand.” The members of No Kill Huntsville have absolute clarity of mind. We stand behind our advocacy despite underestimating the length to which people would go to defend ending lives, despite making some people feel uncomfortable, despite having been compared to terrorists and despite having lost some people along the way we though were friends. We've made peace with that. I've made peace with that. Huntsville is now one of the safest cities for companion animals not just in Alabama and not just in the region, but in the country. We see this as the result of advocacy which led to public awareness which led to public pressure on municipal officials which led to a realization that something had to change. It was our "slap across the face" that began the process, as unwelcome as that action may have been. The city first began making progress by the end of 2014 when city officials declared healthy and treatable animals were no longer being destroyed in the shelter. The process was sustained through the first couple years of the pandemic before some decline related to "dangerous dogs" that begin in the Spring of 2022 and continued until late 2024 when the current shelter director was selected to fulfill the commitment of city leaders to make life-saving a priority in partnership with public safety. We were worried when the current shelter director was hired; we were told by contacts in Texas he opposed No Kill philosophies and we found some content online that supported that. What we learned instead was he believed the phrase No Kill had been weaponized, but he agreed with the programs and services of the No Kill Equation we had promoted with city officials for more than a decade. The new director called 2025 a "triage year." He has done an incredible job as the leader of Huntsville Animal Services and we look forward to him not only holding the line but helping other shelters in the region become more progressive.  As we come to the end of an era of advocacy and I look back at the hard times, the lost sleep and the self-doubt, I'm proud of what we accomplished. I proud of our audacity and our commitment to the cause. Huntsville, Alabama, will never be the same and I consider our advocacy part of my personal legacy. I wrote about the advocacy of No Kill Huntsville in my book first published in 2019 on the anniversary of the passing of our dog, Snake. I uploaded a new version recently with some post-pandemic notes and a new cover just because I wanted it to have a fresh look. The book is available on Amazon if you like to hold a book in your hand (both paperback and hardcover), but is also available as a pdf you can download. No money is made on the book so it makes sense to just give it away. I consider it an easy read. Because it was originally published before the pandemic, I am sometimes asked if anything changed as a result of the pandemic. The answer is no as it relates to the solutions we promoted. The value of the No Kill Equation which was the focus of our advocacy not only remains relevant today but we were reminded during the pandemic that the programs and services of the Equation were more important than ever to help both people and animals to keep pets in existing homes, get them home quickly if lost and get them into new homes or placed with rescues quickly. Animal problems are, and have always, been people problems. It makes perfect sense to engage in positive ways with the people who live and work in the community by providing help, providing answers and treating all people with dignity and respect. If you oversee, lead or manage a tax-funded animal shelter where most of the animals entering the building do not survive the experience, I implore you to try something new. The public expects no less. You can spend money on a new building, but that changes little if you do not change your culture. The methods available to any community to end the needless killing of healthy and treatable animals have been known for almost 2 decades and there are just no excuses for doing the same thing over and over while blaming the public for the loss of life. Even if you implement the programs and services of the No Kill Equation over time, that is better than doing nothing. As the saying goes, nothing changes - - if nothing changes. If you live or work in a community where most of the shelter animals are destroyed while that process is called euthanasia, please educate yourself about the No Kill Equation and consider banding together with like-minded people for the sake of your community and the animals with whom you share your lives. Every healthy and treatable animal destroyed in an animal shelter belonged to someone. That someone could be a neighbor, co-worker, your dentist or even you. The deaths are just numbers on a page until they become personal and people put their outrage into action.  We suspended our Facebook page last year and have unpublished our website (which costs money to host) but you can find it using The Wayback Machine which archives web content. The archive goes from January 14, 2013 through October 13, 2025. You get bonus points if you know the name of this internet archive is based on the characters Mr. Peabody (a dog) and Sherman (a boy) who originally appeared in a 1960s cartoon series and later in an animated film in which Sherman was Mr. Peabody's adopted son.
Your values are expressed through the choices you make. This is the tagline I chose for my website almost 20 years ago when I decided to shift the focus of my animal welfare advocacy from creating videos to help nonprofit groups to creating a platform to try to help other people like me - people who care about companion animals but may not be well versed in issues that affect them. That tagline guides my decisions to this day as I ask myself what I value. It is in the spirit of this self-reflection that I have chosen to leave Facebook despite the following I developed there over many years. Social media can be a great thing. Social media can be a terrible thing. I originally created a presence on Facebook as a way to reach a larger audience and lead people to my website. Some of my posts reached hundreds of thousands of people and I would like to believe I at least caused them to think and at best encouraged them to become advocates themselves related to what is happening regarding companion animals where the live, work and play. Facebook was It was a great tool for many years. Until it wasn't. With the passage of time and changes to algorithms and advertising by Meta, I no longer reached the same audience I once did. Like most people, my news feed was full of reels, ads and recommendations. I was tagged dozens of times a day about animals in need and was often called upon to defend my support of the No Kill movement which has changed our society to save the lives of millions of shelter animals each year, but which is painted in a negative light by those who have not taken the time to educate themselves about history. There were times I could reach people and help them learn something new. There were more times I could not. I ultimately was on the receiving end of profanity-filled rants, name calling and veiled threats. Which meant it was time to go. I have left Facebook completely. If you find yourself with mixed feelings about that platform, I encourage you to consider what value it brings to your life compared to how much it affects you negatively. If you find yourself checking Facebook not only daily but multiple times a day, the addictive nature of the platform is likely not good for your mental health and that can ultimately affect your physical health over time. When I made my decision, I was reminded of the iconic line spoken by Morgan Freeman in the movie The Shawshank Redemption: "it's time to get busy livin' or get busy dying." I choose to get busy livin'.  You are welcome to subscribe to my Paws4Change blog if you don't already. I blog not to make myself relevant, but when I feel I have something valuable to share. I do not use AI when I write like some do to create "clickbait" or create controversy. I make no money off of my advocacy and my focus is on awareness and education. If I learn something I think may be of value to others, or I feel the need to reinforce information I have shared before, I blog. I can also be found on Instagram as Paws4Change Official (since I hold a trademark on the name). I realize Instagram is also a Meta product. Most of my family is active there so it allows me to keep up with their lives and adventures. It also allows me to continue my Paws4Change outreach beyond my website but using a platform I find easier to control and navigate. If you have a topic about which you would like me to blog, reach out so we can chat. I am also open to creating short videos to promote organizations that function consistent with my values. That was how my advocacy began and I still have access to copyright cleared music that comes in handy. As we head into the holiday season, I wish all of you the best and thank you for your years of support. The hardest lesson we learn from losing those we love is that what we value most - or regret most - at the end of our lives is time. Time spent. Time not spent. Time wasted. I hope as you look to the new year you will focus on being more present in your life with your family, with your friends and with your animal companions as you focus on your choices reflecting your values. Let go of things that bring you down and get busy livin'.  "Surrender" courtesy of Fisher from their album "The Lovely Years"
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 that one of the participants was chosen to be the new executive director for Huntsville Animal Services in Alabama following what I can best describe as a troubled tenure at a shelter in Texas. I, and the members of No Kill Huntsville, were very concerned about the selection. 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 had openly opposed the No Kill Equation, opposed free speech by the public about how shelters function and was in direct conflict with the public at his last shelter. We were told by members of the city council to give him a chance and we have. Since the time this blog was first published, the new director has proven us wrong. He has shown to be open to communication with the public and with advocates like us. He is using creative and innovative ideas to reach the public served and perhaps most important, he has filled a leadership void which existed for many years when the shelter director was a veterinarian who seemed to lack many of the core competencies needed to run the shelter for the largest city in the state. We are in talks with the new director about the the new version of the HAPA we have promoted since October 2022 and which we hope he will support. We look forward to what the future holds for Huntsville for the first time in many years. We would like nothing more than for the HAPA to be codified and for us to move past our advocacy, having left the operation of the shelter in the capable hands of the mayor, city council, city administrator and shelter director. Dare to dream.  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." |
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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