Filthy and hot Surprise inspection finds protocols, standards not implemented

That spiffy county pet shelter that opened three years ago isn’t so spiffy these days.

That’s according to an out-ofstate expert sent in to do a surprise inspection of the $16.5 million shelter by Mark Bogen, mayor of Broward County.

“The conclusion … was that our shelter was filthy, dirty, poor ventilation in some of the rooms and certain protocols and standards need to be implemented,” Bogen said in an email to one animal activist.

Bogen said in an interview he plans to address the deficiencies at the next county commission meeting on Nov. 5.

He sent in the expert and a longtime volunteer from an out-ofstate shelter on Friday and Saturday after hearing months of complaints from animal activists.

The duo went on their own Friday, unbeknownst to shelter director Lauralei Combs and her staff. They returned Saturday with Bogen in tow.

“I say bravo,” said Roz Harris, president of Friends of Broward County Animals and one of several activists who’s been critical of conditions at the shelter, including overcrowding. “I am grateful he took the initiative to do his own due diligence. He didn’t just take their word for it that things were all right.”

On Sunday, Combs said in a text that she was addressing complaints about the dirty kennels but did not say how. She also said she was working on tackling other issues identified in the inspection.

“It is a delicate balance between lifesaving and crowding,” she wrote.

Combs, hired as shelter director in March 2018, previously managed a staff of 50 volunteers for the Austin Animal Center’s Volunteer Programs department, one of the nation’s largest no-kill city-owned shelters.

Broward’s shelter is still working toward a no-kill goal embraced by county commissioners seven years ago.

The shelter, at 2400 SW 42nd St., was built to replace a former Army barracks-turned-shelter near Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. That shelter was half the size and had open-air runs that turned hot in the summer and chilly in the winter.

But Bogen says the new shelter gets hot in certain kennel areas too.

“When I did walk in there, there were rooms that were uncomfortably warm,” he said. “Some rooms were nice and cool. And some rooms were a little warm. It was uncomfortable.”

Bogen says he wasn’t with what he found.

“I don’t know anything about how shelters should be run,” he said. “And that’s why I asked this woman to please inspect this for me. We didn’t tell anyone we were coming. The goal is to make the shelter the best one in the country.”

It has a long way to go, says Michele Lazarow, a Hallandale Beach commissioner and animal advocate who has criticized the shelter for what she calls the “unnecessary killing” of animals.

“If you surrender a dog to the shelter and it does not have the right physical activity or attention, they start to get stir crazy, they start to get frightened, they start to get aggressive,” she said. “And then they have to put the dog down because it’s not considered adoptable. It’s a recipe for failure.” happy