Tri-City Animal Shelter kill rates rise
The number of animals euthanized at the Tri-City Animal Shelter in Fremont has risen each year between 2014 and 2016, and advocates are calling on the city to stop that trend.
The shelter, which is located in Fremont but also serves Newark, Union City and San Leandro, euthanized 678 of the 2,694 animals it housed in 2014.
In that same year, 618 were adopted and the rest were either returned to their owners or transferred to rescue or community organizations. In all, 74.7 percent of the animals left the shelter alive that year.
But the number of animals that made it out alive in 2015 dropped to 66.6 percent and last year to just above 59 percent. Of the 2,829 animals at the shelter last year, 1,151 were euthanized.
Alarmed by such data, a group of residents called Tri-City Animal Advocates recently began urging Fremont City Council members and the police department, which oversees the shelter, to stem the rising tide of euthanasia and make other improvements.
Natalia Lebedeva, one of the advocates, said Fremont’s shelter isn’t being asked to become a model for the Bay Area, only to perform as well as nearby ones and adopt some of their successful strategies.
San Jose’s shelter had a live release rate of 89 percent in fiscal year 201516, according to city documents, and Oakland’s had 81 percent.
Fremont police Capt. Kimberly Petersen, whose division includes animal services, said an increase in the number of feral cats being brought into the shelter is primarily responsible for the climbing euthanasia rate.
She said it’s important to note the shelter only euthanizes animals considered unhealthy or untreatable.
“People have this idea that we’re euthanizing these otherwise adoptable animals and that’s just not
the case,” she added.
But Lebedeva is skeptical.
“San Jose and Oakland municipal shelters’ live release rates are much, much higher than ours,” she said in an interview this week. “So it’s hard to say ‘OK, all the unhealthy animals come to our Tri-City shelter.’ No one would believe that, so there is probably inconsistent euthanasia policies.”
The advocates say the animal services division should be removed from the police department’s control and become a standalone unit under the city manager’s office. That happened in Oakland several years ago and led in part to significantly higher live release rates, they argue.
Lebedeva said the shelter also needs to have a fulltime volunteer coordinator
and a full-time veterinarian or vet technician, like other shelters in the Bay Area that take in even fewer animals. And it needs to lengthen open hours so working people can get to it more easily.
Fremont currently uses a a half-time vet technician, who comes in about three days a week. For medical treatment that the tech cannot provide, the city partners with local veterinarians, Petersen said.
Petersen said the animals are getting the care they need, and from conversations with shelter manager Sandra Stadler, the police department believes a fulltime vet wouldn’t lead to a higher live release rate.
And even though the shelter is meeting its goal of adopting or transferring as many animals as possible, Petersen said some changes
are being made with the goal of doing even better.
Before the advocates got involved, Petersen said an employee was promoted and tasked with managing the volunteers who come to help at the shelter.
She said the shelter’s annual reports about animal intake and euthanasia are “a little deceiving,” and a software vendor will be tapped to clarify how many unhealthy or untreatable animals are admitted each year.
And in response to advocates’ concerns, Petersen said the shelter’s Web page on the police department’s site will be brought “up to date.”
Animal shelter volunteers will also be required to more regularly update photos and animal descriptions on a third-party site the shelter uses called PetFinder. Meanwhile, discussions are underway about possibly setting up a dedicated social media channel for the shelter.
As for the shelter’s public hours, Petersen said the resources for increasing them don’t exist right now. The shelter is open from noon to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays, and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays; it is closed on Sundays and Mondays.
“We agree, we would love to be open for longer hours,” Petersen said, nothing that “we actually think that we could do it, it would take an add to the budget, but we would love to be open perhaps some longer hours on one of those weekdays and on Sundays.”