Why Houston’s BARC kills so many animals
Overrun shelter
Regarding “As euthanasia climbs, overworked Houston shelter workers try to manage influx of stray dogs and cats,” (July 3): I can only imagine how extraordinarily painful it must be for the dedicated employees at BARC to be part of a process that killed 386 animals in April alone. While the Chronicle is right to call attention to this crisis, euthanizing adoptable or savable animals at BARC is not new.
For years, animal advocates, rescue groups, volunteers and concerned citizens have tried in so many ways, with limited success, to get the shelter to make life-saving improvements. The Chronicle could do this city a big service by doing a true in-depth investigation of BARC and the challenges faced by the animal advocacy community. And it is time for the city to hire a third party to do a new audit of BARC operations.
For years, BARC has been grossly underfunded on a per capita basis compared to every major city in Texas. Here is the actual data of per capita funding for fiscal year 2021:
Houston: $5.79
San Antonio: $10.43
Dallas: $11.95
Austin: $16.58
El Paso: $12.81
I understand the city's budget issues and the many competing demands, but other cities face those problems and still have managed to step up with decent funding for animal care and control. Although it's estimated that our per capita funding for the new fiscal year may be as high as $6.75, the gap between us and other cities is vast. We are spending nearly 50 percent less than the lowest city on the list. Indefensible.
So long as we remain such a serious outlier in our financial commitment, dogs and cats will die needlessly in our shelter. The animals turned away by BARC because we do not have enough cage/staff capacity will continue to suffer, reproduce and die on the streets.
Surely we can do better.
Jane Schmitt, Houston
How sad to hear that Texas is No. 1 in the nation for animals killed in shelters, with 68,945 euthanized in 2022. The brains at Houston-area shelters decided the answer to this problem was to close their intake so they won't see “lines of cars weaving through the parking lot coming to surrender animals.”
Instead, these same people who were dumping their pets at shelters are likely now dumping them onto the streets, where they will suffer the horrors of starvation, a heat-related death, or death by car crash. Do the powers that be really think this is a good tradeoff ?
Kathy Bernhardt, Spring
While visiting Houston, I was pleasantly surprised to see the state's animal shelter crisis was featured on the Chronicle front page. Things are no better in San Antonio, but I have never seen our paper address the issue, so I have sent copies of your excellent coverage to our editors.
And I send you wholehearted thanks. This entire state has to change its attitude towards animals. It seems to have the attitude that, if it bothers you, kill it. This even pertains to pets. Instead of sufficient spay and neuter and adoption programs, they just pick them up and kill them.
John Bachman, Pipe Creek