The Blame Game

In ideals, I am certainly no-kill. Wouldn’t it be great if every adoptable animal could have a safe place to live until it finds a home?

I know the numbers support the no-kill initiative – in theory. I’ve heard there are 12 million people looking to add a pet to their home in the next year, and 4 million shelter pets dying. Surely – if we can just reach that 12 million and convince them to adopt, we can empty our shelters!

My experience here in Indy is that no-kill shelters only redirect animals to the high-kill shelter down the road. The private “no kill” shelter stops intake when their shelter population numbers are greater than their budget can support. This forces people who need to relinquish an animal to take it to the high-kill city shelter. Then, we horribly underfund our city shelter and leave them little options but to euthanize for space.

With the sharp increase in the shelter populations this year (due to foreclosures, backyard breeders dumping their unsold pups, etc), rescues are literally BROKE and filled to capacity trying to save animals from the city shelter so they aren’t euthanized for space. (I know, I run one!)

This is a complex problem, to be sure.

I really get frustrated with the finger pointing. Certainly, there are shelter directors who are insane and have no place in animal welfare. They refuse to listen to alternative ideas and defend their euthanasia rates. Those folks need to be called out and their replacement demanded. Agreed 100%.

Then there are shelter directors, like I believe we have here in Indy, who really are trying their best to manage their shelter populations with limited funds, limited staff, limited space and conflicting goals such as the government funds which require a focus on public safety and the public demands to focus on animal welfare. It’s enough to drive a person mad.

I know the struggles I face with choices for my rescue, and I have the luxury of saying no to animals when I don’t have space for them. City run open-door shelters don’t have that luxury.

Do I think the shelter management here is beyond reproach? Of course not. They make poor choices that aren’t in line with shelter or animal welfare best practices. Should we point this out and expect change? Of course.

But to simply lay the blame on them for the killing of shelter pets, is lazy and rude. Sure, they could just stop the killing. Doug Rae did that, and it got him fired. What good did that ultimately do for the animals of Indianapolis?

I guess my point is that we all need to work together to solve this problem. The Animal Welfare Alliance here in Indianapolis seeks to do that. Let’s stop pointing fingers and placing blame and instead look for opportunities to get our whole community out of this mess.