ramento SPCA CEO Kenn Altine says.“ And he will attack every other unaltered male out there.”
The SPCA has recently changed how it accepts owner-surrendered pets: It now uses a scheduling-based program with discounted surrender fees, which has reduced the numbers of such animals coming into their facility by about half. In the last four months of 2015, 1,234 animals were surrendered, and after the change over the same period in 2016, that number was 740.
Not being a super easy out for pet owners,“ really sort of changed that dynamic,” Altine says,“ and people were incented to solve their problem.”
For Front Street, space is always an issue.“ We play Jenga every single day, shuffling animals around,” Knepp says. All of those animals that come in need to go somewhere, which means the shelter has to then have that same number leave daily in order to avoid euthanizing animals.
“ That’ s a horrible reason to put an animal down, just because there’ s too many coming in and there’ s not enough beds at the inn,” Knepp says.
That space, or lack thereof, is continually on Knepp’ s mind, she says.“ Every single night and every single morning I look to see,‘ Do I have enough space to make it to the morning in case the animal control officer brings animals in during the night?”
ANIMAL INSTINCTS The needs of Sacramento’ s animal population also expand past the capacity of Front Street. It uses foster homes, and at one point during last kitten season, had over 900 cats in foster homes. Without those foster owners, these cats would have been put down. Over the course of 2016, over 3,400 cats were in such foster homes. The municipal shelter even transfers dogs to other states to deal with its canine population.
“ I’ m very proud of all of the shelters in our region, because we have really flipped things around,” Knepp says.“ I do not euthanize an animal just because I don’ t have space.”
Front Street isn’ t alone in its efforts, however. Founded in 1993, Sacramento’ s Happy Tails is a no-kill shelter run mostly by volunteers, with an animal focus on felines.
“ Our mission, basically, is to help those animals that can’ t help themselves,” says Sarah Tomaszewski Farias, a member of Happy Tails’ executive board.“ We do try and focus on animals that are in really dire straits.”
Happy Tails accepts animals directly from the community, and their phone rings daily with calls about animals that need new homes.
Happy Tails has around 300 animals every year leaving the shelter as adoptions. And if you have a pet— or more than one— at home, you already know what an undertaking they can be. But Happy Tails has this on scale, and tends to have around 20-30 adoptable cats at its shelter, not including its feral or unadoptable cats housed there.
Younger cats present another problem: some of the kittens still need to be fed by bottle.“ That is a big undertaking because they need to be fed five times a day,” she says.
Other groups assist the organization with the bulk of that feeding, but making space for new animals is also an issue. Sometimes— like during kitten season— it just isn’ t able to take in new animals.
“ Basically, we have a certain amount of foster homes, and when those are all full, we have to wait until animals are adopted out and space is available,” Tomaszewski Farias says. The physical center is limited by space, as well.
Ultimately, Happy Tails’ goal is to be able to help any animal they come in contact with, so that no animal is turned away,“ but unfortunately at this point, we definitely have to do that. And again, we try and prioritize animals that are in the most dire situation,” Tomaszewski Farias says.
While it might be easy to throw stones and condemn pet owners, Lute-Faust, of the Folsom sanctuary, offers up that isn’ t the best course of action.
“ You have to make them see it from the animal’ s point of view, because the animals are the biggest stakeholders here. That’ s why it’ s really important for people to not get judgmental and criticize,” she says.“ If we don’ t change the people’ s behavior and mindset who are doing this, then we will never make a change.” •
Willie Clark is a writer, editor, photographer and co-host of the 8 Bit Awesome gaming podcast. On Twitter @_ WillieClark or willieclark. contently. com..
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