Broward shelter needs to do more to save dogs

Animal lovers in Broward County have been trying to create a no-kill community since 2012, when the County Commission passed resolution 2012-271. It is December 2018, and they are still killing healthy, treatable and trainable dogs at the County shelter.

Several months ago, longtime residents of the dog kennels at the animal shelter would suddenly disappear. Without a notice or a plea to rescue partners, dogs would be killed.

The shelter has created a new notification system to alert rescues of what they called “at risk or deteriorating” dogs. The 72-hour Pathway Notification was born. The 72-hour system is not designed to help move the dog out of the shelter alive, it is simply a way for the shelter to say, “we notified you.” In colloquial parlance that is a CYA memo.

The information in these pathway notifications is full of inexperienced staff member assessments of dog behavior. The County has created a system to notify the public of its intent to kill an otherwise healthy adoptable and trainable dog based on these untrained judgments.

It is disappointing that the shelter is unwilling to work with the rescue community when it is essential to the achievement of its no-kill mandate.

Broward County needs to change its way of thinking and operating and work with the community to save every possible treatable and trainable animal.

Wendy Schugar-Martin,

Fort Lauderdale