This is an indictment of a government-run animal shelter, the product of Multnomah County Oregon’s government failure to recognize its public’s goals and its continued willful efforts to keep all doors closed to the public.
Decades of direct experience and study of records wrested from government control prove that Multnomah County’s agency (MCAS) is a disaster, a multi-million dollar abject failure to serve the needs and rights of our people and our animals.
Future postings will focus on specific failings – the unjust and prohibitively expensive enforcement practices, the ignorant restrictions and death sentences, a dedication to keeping its records away from public study, and a wildly exaggerated fear of being sued if the most Draconian punishments are not imposed.
We invite comments about individual experiences and thoughts. Even when we differ, we can all learn from the exchange of views. To this end, here is the 2016 audit of the agency and the response from two of the agency’s most senior managers.
To those who ask how a shelter with such poor audit findings has such a remarkably high ‘live release’ rate, the answer is simple. That release rate is dishonestly inflated.
The live release rate is a calculation reflecting the percentage of impounded stray companion cats and dogs leaving an agency alive i.e. as owner redeemed, adopted, or transferred to other rescue organizations, relative to total intake. In 2010, MCAS included a total of 933 animals that were either fostered to themselves, (278: a non permitted inclusion), or were in fact owned and in for spay neuter surgery (655), redeemed at the end of the day by their owners. The deceptions and offsetting factors for which MCAS bears no responsibility ( a high percentage of responsible owners who redeem) continue. Some can be easily identified, others are more difficult because public access to information is hard. In many cases numbers just do not add up and animals are missing (as well as euthanasia drugs).
Like politicians, animal control managers deny, lie, or rationalize problems to make them go away. The main witnesses, stray animals, cannot protest. This is the beginning of a voice for change.