Loving Homes Wanted
Benton Animal Shelter expands efforts to give pets furever homes
The Benton Animal Shelter/ Animal Control is expanding its efforts to find loving homes for the many dogs and cats that come through its doors.
Benton Animal Control is a municipal animal control facility located in the heart of the city. As a high-intake shelter, it is expanding its efforts by developing social media campaigns and reaching out to The Saline Courier to help get the word out about the animals who need love and care.
“We provide animal services to all citizens inside the city limits of Benton,” said Lea Canady, Director of Marketing and Special Events for the city. “Benton Animal Control has continued to grow. In the year 2020, even though we were dealing with a pandemic, we had a very positive year compared to 2019.”
According to Canady, the city’s recent partnership with Petsmart has been very successful.
“We met our goal of a minimum of 100 cats being adopted,” Canady said. “Petsmart awarded the city of Benton a $1,000
check for reaching our goal. The adoption percentages were up a total of 10 percent for dog and cat adoptions. The industry standards state that if you have an adoption rate of 90 percent or better you are considered a no-kill shelter. We are within striking distance of this goal.”
Canady added that the mission of Benton Animal Control is to promote and insure public health and safety; facilitate responsible pet ownership; humanely and responsibly care for the animals in its care; provide prompt and courteous service to our citizens; and provide education and positive enforcement efforts.
“We strive to prevent the expenses and suffering caused to both human and pet animals, due directly and indirectly, to animal bites and neglect of proper basic pet ownership responsibilities,” Canady said. “Our goal is to ensure public health, safety, and animal welfare in the city of Benton.”
Another goal is the shelter’s desire to to find lifelong homes for adopted pets at the shelter.
“We are a high-intake shelter, so if you see a pet on our social media that you would love to adopt, please give us a call or come by,” Canady said. “We get so many nice animals, from purebred Labs and German Shepherds to the loving and sweet mixed breed dogs. All of them deserve a loving home and we want to help them find their forever home.”
The shelter works with local vets to do low cost spay/neutering on pets being adopted out through the shelter. The fees for animal adoption go toward those procedures along with rabies vaccinations.
“In the past several months we have extended our social media by posting pictures of the dogs and cats that are looking for a loving home and the outcome has been amazing from the community,” Canady said. “People from the community are reaching out to us about adopting animals and helping us find the owners of some of the dogs and cats we found in town. One dog was posted on Facebook on a Monday morning with a picture and brief description of the type of dog and their personality. By Wednesday morning the dog had been adopted.”
The Saline Courier has also aided in the effort by featuring a special Valentine’s Day section sharing a number of photos and descriptions of adoptable dogs at the shelter. Many of the dogs have already found loving homes.
“We would like to thank everyone who has shared our Facebook post and helped get the word out,” Canady said. Benton Animal Control is our Facebook page make sure you like and follow us.”
The shelter is located less than a mile from the Saline County Courthouse in Downtown Benton at 606 Willow St. From the Courthouse/royal Theater, follow South Market down the hill and over the railroad tracks.
“Look for our big sign on your right,” Canady said. “We have new operating hours from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.”
The shelter can be reached at 501-776-5972 or animalcontrol@bentonar. org.