MANATEE — Every Thursday, staff members from the Humane Society of Manatee County drop by the county pound to select dogs and cats to put up for adoption.
They conduct behavior tests and rudimentary health exams to make sure the animals are safe to offer a family looking for a pet.
That’s the easy part.
The hard part is leaving other animals behind to face an uncertain future, especially considering 61 percent of the dogs or cats that entered Manatee County Animal Services, also known as the pound, in 2008 were euthanized.
It’s merely a matter of space.
“They go in knowing how many vacancies we have and what we can take,” Humane Society Executive Director Denise Deisler said. “For our staff, that’s the hardest job.
“They’ve got tough decisions to make. But we focus on the positive: If we weren’t there, they wouldn’t be getting out.”
As the animal services department works with area shelters and rescue groups to end the killing of any adoptable pet within five years, a look inside the shelter system reveals the difficulties they face.
The key, shelter leaders say, is to keep hammering home the point that all pets must by spayed and neutered to avoid the overcrowding that leads to euthanasia.
“Right now, in this economy, everybody’s full up,” Honor Sanctuary board president Cindy Morton said. “It’s really sad.”
“It’s very upsetting,” animal services Director Kris Weiskopf said of the county’s pet euthanasia rate, which was 47 percent across all shelters in 2008. “We can’t do it alone. We can’t do it without the community out there helping us.”
According to a Humane Society assessment released last month, 6,727, or 74 percent, of the 9,117 dogs and cats that entered the shelter system in 2008 started at Manatee County Animal Services as a result of an impoundment, a nuisance or abuse complaint, or an unwilling owner. About three-quarters of those animals were either stray, feral or living at large.
Once a cat or dog reaches animal services, it must be held for seven days if it does not have identification, 10 days if it has ID. Following the holding period, the animal services department either places healthy animals into its adoption process, offers them to other shelters or euthanizes them if there is no alternative.
The animal services shelter has room for about 40 dogs and 35 cats at a time. According to the Humane Society assessment figures, animal services accepted an average of more than 500 animals per month in 2008.
Weiskopf said his agency is the victim of an unfair public perception as a death trap because of its legal intake requirements. Animal services euthanized 46 percent of the 3,220 dogs it took in last year and 75 percent of the 2,625 cats.
“We can’t turn anything away,” Weiskopf said. “If we get a call, we go and pick up the animal. We can’t say no.
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