Here is what I said at the BOCC meeting: Good evening Commissioners and Mr. Arnold, I am speaking to you in regards to Sumter County Animal Services. Our kill rate in this county for the month of August is atrocious.For dogs it was 40% and for cats it was 69% with a combined figure of 55% average for the animals in your care.The adoption rate is even more abismal, in August Sumter county only adopted out 5% of the total animals brought in. This figure is unacceptable to me as a resident of Sumter County, Florida when there are dozens of communities representing roughly 500 towns and cities across the U.S. saving better than 90% of the animals at their open admission animal services. There is quite simply no excuse for Sumter County not to do the same. Remarkable things will happen when 1 leader believes it is time to stop the killing. Implementing easy changes to policies and procedures alone can make a huge difference and stop the defeatist mentality that seek to give legitimacy to the killing, easy changes such as hours to make it more accessible to the public, longer holding periods and utilizing social media in a more efficient and effective manner. If a community is still killing healthy, treatable, adoptable animals, it is because its animal services has fundamentally failed in its mission. The first step towards reducing kill rates is taking responsibility. Those of us who are animal advocates in the Central Florida area care deeply about the animals in Sumter County. We would like to see a humane, rescue friendly, solutions oriented director put in place. Animal Services under the right leadership can be a model for other communities to follow, not a source of ridicule, embarrassment, needless death and a sad black mark on the map instead of a facility in which the residents can be proud of. The 7 day kill policy must be changed. Limiting the number of days a homeless, adoptable animal can live is merciless, absurd and antiquated. The shelter insists they are doing everything possible to find the animals in their care for seven days a home. No theyre not. Change the hours, open on Saturday and close on Monday. With over 300 rescue organizations in the state of Florida to ask for help, why then, for almost three and a half months, for the period June 1, 2014 - September 10, 2014, did Sumter County Animal Services utilize only 8 rescue organizations to help save the lives of shelter animals under their care? And thats stretching it. One of those only pulled one dog, two of those pulled only three dogs, and another pulled just four dogs. Out of 88 dogs saved by rescue organizations, HALF OF THEM - 44 - WERE SAVED BY ONE RESCUE GROUP ---MISFIT ANIMAL RESCUE OUT OF GROVELAND. H A L F . Why didnt shelter personnel reach out for help from other rescue organizations? They had over 300 organizations in Florida to start calling and emailing. So when were told youre doing all you can, ....... No Youre Not. especially when you limit the life of an animal under your stewardship to only seven business days before killing it.
Posted on: Wed, 24 Sep 2014 01:13:46 +0000
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