On January 23, 2918, Mike Fry from No Kill Learning debuted his new mini documentary series Boots on the Ground, in which he is touring the country to tell the stories of how successful No Kill communities achieved their No Kill status. The first episode is The Lake County, Florida No Kill Story.. It is inspiring, uplifting, heart-felt and something everyone interested in animal sheltering should watch, whether they are a volunteer, staff person or an elected official who ove

The Greater Birmingham Humane Society (GBHS) has reportedly sent a threatening cease and desist letter to a No Kill advocate in Alabama because she has complained about the very wealthy organization's declining save rate, among other things. So, we decided to look into it. The complaints include declining performance as well as misrepresentation of outcome statistics, a practice we have seen before. Our research included an analysis of animal shelter reports for 2016 and 201

There’s a phrase that goes something along the lines of, "if you want something done, go ask the busy person." The meaning is pretty simple. Busy people are doers. If you want to get something accomplished quickly and accurately, it’s better to go to that doer than it is to someone who is not busy and who may very well lack the commitment and focus to perform the task. The busy person will carve out time to help because that’s part of who they are. In animal welfare circles,

We rejoiced yesterday, Sunday, September 3, 2017 when Best Friends Animal Society posted an action alert on their blog titled "Demand Houston SPCA Save Hurricane Harvey Animals." In it, they rightly point out that HSPCA has a history of a lack of transparency (We still can't find any outcome reports on the HSPCA web site). They also state that the agency has questionable policies regarding pit bull type dogs (HSPCA reportedly kills all so-called "pit bulls"). Because of these

Pueblo City, Colorado Councilman Chris Nicoll has distributed a press release condemning the termination of a volunteer at Pueblo Animal Services (PAS). The volunteer's alleged offense? Writing a thoughtful, well-written and processional letter to the editor that was published in the Pueblo Chieftain, the City's local paper. The volunteer in question is Shanna Farmer and her termination by PAS raises several legal questions, and are likely a violation of federal law, because

We hear from a lot of advocates that their efforts to encourage shelter reform in their communities are viewed as “attacks,” as if the subject of animal shelter reform is personal and not about accountability. We realize that there are some communities in which a change in shelter leadership is likely the best way to reform a poorly performing shelter. We also realize that any form of constructive criticism, no matter how diplomatic, can be viewed as a personal attack. Fo

How many days should a homeless pet stay at an animal shelter before killing them? Earlier this year I was approached by a person who worked for a state lobbying organization and told (not even asked) “you would rather see a dog suffer in a kennel forever.” I replied by saying, killing and suffering in a kennel are not the only two choices for homeless pets in shelters. But I should have asked, “Which day is it OK to kill a homeless pet?” Which day is the day that killing a h

We recently wrote about Charlie, a dog that was killed at Pueblo Animal Services (PAS), in spite of offers by others to save him. Since then, a lot has happened, some of it leading people to begin questioning the neutrality of their local newspaper, The Pueblo Chieftain. One of the first things that happened was The Pueblo Chieftain came out very publicly supporting the shelter and the killing of Charlie. The paper wrote a heavy-handed and ill-informed editorial in which it s

Note: The muzzle on the puppy in the above photo was added digitally. We would never do that to a puppy. As No Kill efforts around the USA continue gaining momentum, the old, regressive establishment is sinking lower in their efforts to muzzle No Kill advocates. In some cases their actions are simply disturbing and arguably Un-American. In other cases, they are violations of federal law. Before we get into the details we will say that it is clear that some people are so afrai

A fight recently broke out on Facebook. It was, ironically, at least in part, a fight about fighting. It all started when keyboard advocate and blogger, Susan Houser, had posted a series of increasingly strange No Kill blogs that left many experienced No Kill advocates scratching their heads. More recently, she wrote a blog in which she criticized No Kill advocates who are critical of animal shelters that are still killing healthy and treatable pets, while not implementing pr

Nearly every No Kill advocate shares at least one common experience: the moment they discovered their "friendly community animal shelter" wasn't so friendly. It is a lesson most people react to in very similar ways, generally following, nearly to the letter, the five stages of grief: First comes Denial, then Anger, then Bargaining, then Depression and, finally, Acceptance. To be clear, when we say "acceptance" we do not mean to suggest that when shelters kill healthy or treat