'I would rather see them dead' 

The Controversy Over Saving Lives

In 2004, a series of articles in the Philadelphia Daily News depicted the Philadelphia Animal Care & Control Association (PACCA) as a “mismanaged house of horrors.” At the time, almost 9 out of 10 animals who entered the shelter were killed, arguably one of the worst lifesaving records in the United States. Animal lovers and rescue groups clamored for change, publicly attacking PACCA for its failure to save lives.

In 2005, the City of Philadelphia asked No Kill Solutions to do a complete assessment of shelter operations and make recommendations to improve program and service delivery with a goal of creating a No Kill Philadelphia. By implementing the recommendations of No Kill Solutions and by thoroughly integrating principles of accountability into shelter operations, in less than one year, there have been tremendous lifesaving gains. But no other change was more important—and would prove so key to saving lives—than our recommendation for the hiring of two new leaders: Tara Derby, who would become the new Chief Executive Officer, and Susan Cosby, the agency's Operations Director.

Nathan Winograd, the President of No Kill Solutions, explains:
 

I was immediately impressed when I interviewed Tara and Susan. They did not bring to the table the same old tired clichés and approaches with its over-reliance on killing. In fact, Tara had no sheltering experience. But what both had was what I often find missing from most animal control directors: a passion for saving lives, a commitment to get the job done, a focus on the bottom line, and an abhorrence for killing.

And time and time again, when the going got tough, that passion and dedication have saved the day, as Tara and Susan turned to the community for help: to the rescue groups, to the veterinarians, to the media, to local business, to anyone and everyone with the potential to help in the lifesaving enterprise. Tara explains:
 

Despite relentless outreach to rescue groups and other shelters, we simply cannot keep up with the number of intakes we are receiving. We decided to enlist the support of the media and ask for their help. They responded and newspapers and television stations filmed live from the shelter and told the public about our dire situation. The response from the community has been tremendous. The road is long, and sometime difficult, but it is well worth the effort. Particularly when it results—as it did this past weekend—in so many animals going home alive.

Believing in the Community
With kitten season in full swing, and the shelter filled to capacity, Tara and Susan have once again called on the community for their help and support—trusting that the people of Philadelphia will respond to the homeless animals of their city as they have repeatedly done when given the opportunity—with open hearts and open homes.

With the support of newspapers and local television news stations, the headlines rang out throughout the city of brotherly love: PACCA is looking for 1,000 good homes to avoid killing kittens and cats. The Philadelphia Daily News said it best: “Don't let these kittens die. If you've ever felt like saving a kitty's life, now is the time.”

And once again, the good people of Philadelphia have come through, heeding the call to help save the lives of kittens and cats during a weekend Adoptathon that saw adoptions discounted to $1 to defray the costs association with bringing a new animal home— including veterinary bills, pet deposits to landlords, litter boxes and other supplies.

With volunteers and staff screening applicants and providing needed counseling, in one weekend alone, PACCA officials saw 1,000 people come through their doors, and hundreds of felines going home with them. More kittens were adopted out in three days compared to all the animals adopted out in the same month one year ago—despite an increase in adoption screening, counseling and higher adoption standards (including the requirement that all kittens be spayed/neutered before going home).

The end result: lots of empty cages and no dead kittens—proving once again that saving lives starts with believing in the community and trusting in the power of compassion.

Susan Cosby describes the scene:
 

People literally waited up to five hours to go through the process of adoption. That speaks volumes about the level of commitment they had to a cat who had captured their heart and the level of service provided by our adoption counselors and volunteers. It was so successful that we actually ran out of kittens. But that didn’t stop people from helping us save lives. One woman surrendered an old cat that she had found. A man in the lobby asked to see the cat. His face lit up when he saw this rare beauty – an orange tabby female – despite the fact that the woman surrendering the cat explained that the cat was very old. He ended up adopting the cat the very next day—after she was spayed, vaccinated, treated for fleas, and microchipped. This is a cat who was older in years and had very few teeth. I was lucky enough to be there the following day when he picked her up. He was beyond grateful, felt very proud to have saved her and best of all, she left alive!

‘I would rather see them dead.’
But not everyone was pleased. Some organizations and individuals, even those involved in animal rescue, were outraged. They claimed that by reducing the adoption fee, people would feed them to snakes (despite no evidence to support such a ludicrous assertion) or worse. But more disturbing than that, they stated that they would rather see the kittens killed. Unfortunately, they were not alone. Another critic said that he “forwarded the news article to my contact at the Humane Society of the United States. The response from the HSUS was quick and clear. The HSUS does not support this...”

Susan explains:
 

One year ago, PACCA was criticized for killing too many animals by the public and they were absolutely right to do so. But now we are saving them, and we get attacked—not by the public which supports us—but by people who are supposed to be our allies! I can’t believe there are groups and people still in this movement who believe that animals should be killed.

To these defeatists, killing is legitimate. Killing is morally acceptable. But worse than that, killing is the preferred method of choice. And so these naysayers, directly or indirectly, appear to be calling for PACCA officials to execute the kittens today, because some of them may suffer later—an ethical contradiction that can never be ethically defended, or logically reconciled. And an absurdity which the animal protection movement has reserved exclusively for dogs and cats. According to opponents, to increase the quantity of adoptions, you have to reduce the quality. And rather than do that, the kittens should be killed. Where did this disturbing viewpoint come from?

The Quantity vs. Quality Myth
The notion that one needs to reduce quality of homes in order to increase quantity is one of the anachronisms of old-guard, reactionary shelters (and their national allies) who needed a way to justify a paradigm of high impounds, high kill rates and low adoptions. By contrast, some of the most successful industries in the United States have excelled in a consumer market demanding high volume coupled with increasing consumer awareness, information and requirement for quality. These agencies are able to meet demand for both quality and quantity. Quality and quantity are not, should not be perceived, and have never been, mutually exclusive.

It has long been a cliché that a community cannot adopt its way out of killing. Like so much conventional wisdom, this viewpoint is also wrong. The problem is that people get their pets from shelters only 15% of the time because shelters have historically done a poor job of getting good homes to adopt animals. An animal lover explained it best:
 

I tried to adopt from my local shelter, but they weren’t open on the weekend, it was almost impossible to reach them on the telephone and when I did, I was treated rudely. Nonetheless, I raced down there one day after work, and the place was so dirty. It made me cry to look into the faces of all those animals I knew would be killed. But I found this scared, skinny cat hiding in the back of his cage and I filled out an application. I was turned down because I didn’t turn in the paperwork on time, which meant a half hour before closing, but I couldn’t get there from work in time to do that. I tried to leave work early the next day, but I called and found out they had already killed the poor cat. I will never go back.

The bottom line is that there are plenty of homes out there, and it is up to shelters to effectively promote their pets so that they find their way into those homes—from offsite adoptions and other community venues, effective use of the internet, increasing partnerships with the media, enlisting the support of volunteers and foster parents, and making shelters more inviting.  And, when necessary, turning to the community with a marketing incentive and a call to arms to help an agency save lives. Adopting an animal means a shelter does not kill that animal. Not only can a shelter adopt its way out of killing, it should.

During the early 1990s, North Shore Animal League (“NSAL”) was adopting out over 20,000 animals each and every year—with no adoption fee of any kind. But there was plenty to protect the animals besides the “missing” adoption fee. According to NSAL:
 

The best adoption programs are designed to ensure that each animal is placed with a responsible person, one prepared to make a lifelong commitment, and to avoid the kinds of problems that may have caused the animal to be brought to the shelter. An important part of the process is to match the lifestyle and needs of the adopter with the individual dog or cat. After selecting a pet, each potential adopter is thoroughly screened.

A Preference for Saving Lives
Three cheers for PACCA—its leadership in Tara and Susan, and a staff that saw the sun rise rather than set when the going got tough and the cages got full. But most of all, three cheers for the kittens who found in PACCA a new beginning, instead of what they would have found in so many other shelters and if the apologists for the status quo in Philadelphia had had their way—the end of the line.

Because of them, their staff, the volunteers, and the scores of people who turned out to do the right thing, hundreds of kittens are alive today.

Reprinted courtesy of The No Kill Advocacy Center