When the pound kills for “space” while cages sit empty, they blame the public for failing to neuter their pets.
When the pound kills someone’s lost pet instead of sending him back home, they blame the owner saying the pet should have been microchipped.
When the pound kills someone’s lost pet despite him having a microchip, they blame the owner saying the pet should have been wearing an ID tag.
When the pound kills someone’s scared cat and erroneously calls him “feral”, they blame the owner for letting the cat outside.
When the pound kills someone’s lost pet despite the owner visiting the shelter to look for him, they show the owner only some of the pets in the facility then claim the owner failed to recognize their own family member.
When the pound allows healthy pets to get sick by failing to follow standard disease prevention cleaning practices and/or failing to vaccinate upon intake, they blame a lack of manpower and resources even as they refuse help from volunteers and fail to partner with the community to save lives.
When the pound conducts a mass killing in response to a disease outbreak instead of performing appropriate testing and quarantine, they blame the public for failing to vaccinate the pets in the community.
When the pound kills orphaned puppies and kittens instead of placing them with foster homes they should have lined up on a list, they blame the public for failing to neuter their pets.
When the pound kills Pitbulls instead of letting them go home with people who want to adopt but are unwilling to submit to special requirements such as home inspections, they blame the public, claiming that the only people who wouldn’t jump through all their hoops are dogfighters and thugs.
When the pound kills feral cats instead of implementing a TNR program, they blame mythical population explosion figures, and/or parasites and diseases that they falsely claim will endanger public health.
When the pound kills treatable pets instead of providing them with basic veterinary care, they blame the public for so-called pet overpopulation.
When the pound kills healthy cats instead of adopting them out because it’s Halloween, they blame the public, claiming that only animal sacrifice ritualists would adopt a cat near Halloween.
When the pound kills healthy pets instead of adopting them out because it’s Christmas, they blame the public, claiming that only irresponsible people who won’t take good care of a pet would adopt at Christmas.
I say: When the pound kills pets, the pound is responsible. It doesn’t matter what someone at the pound thinks someone in the community may or may not have done at some point in time. What matters is that once the pet hits the front door of the shelter, the staff need to do their jobs and quit looking for someone else to blame for their failures.
It’s time for those who kill pets to start taking responsibility for their actions. And for those who enable the killing to stop parroting the tired old excuses. There is an alternative – a set of programs proven to save pets’ lives. Any animal shelter failing to do its job has no one else to blame.