"On the Southeast and Southwest sides of Austin, I cannot even explain how common it is to see loose dogs strolling along the sidewalk. ![]() In the last three years, Amy Rae Dadamo has picked up around 10 dogs off the streets. So how did the system get here? Where is communication breaking down? And can they dig themselves out of this hole and reclaim the no-kill gold standard? No Room at the Intake Council, employees, stakeholders, and volunteers are all uniformly disappointed with the state of animal rescue in Austin. At AAC, dogs are at 145% of capacity and cats are at 171% as of July 28. As Austin rebounds from the pandemic, policy changes and staffing challenges at both AAC and APA!, along with the worsening of the city's housing crisis for humans who'd take care of animals, have left the sanctuaries with emergency levels of overcrowding and infighting. ![]() To achieve that level of performance, the partnership at the system's core – between the city-owned and -run Austin Animal Center and its nonprofit partner Austin Pets Alive! – needs to operate seamlessly and without friction, as it sustains the work of hundreds of volunteers and makes connections with scores of community partners. That came to an end in 2021 when Los Angeles joined the club, but the animal services system in Austin still prides itself at its save rate of over 95%. ![]() A dog waits to be adopted at Austin Animal Center on July 29 (Photo by Jana Birchum)įor more than a decade, Austin was the largest city to designate itself a no-kill sanctuary for animals.
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