{"id":15243,"date":"2009-07-19T13:47:34","date_gmt":"2009-07-19T19:47:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=15243"},"modified":"2009-07-19T13:47:42","modified_gmt":"2009-07-19T19:47:42","slug":"the-last-shelter","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/07\/19\/the-last-shelter.html","title":{"rendered":"The Last Shelter"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

A lot of animals are brought through the Denver Dumb Friends League<\/a>‘s door. In their 2008 annual report<\/a>, the DFL shows that 12,000 cats, 14,000 dogs, and 2,000 other animals were received.<\/p>\n

Of that 28,000 animals, about 16,500 were adopted. Another 3,000 (mostly dogs) were reunited with their owners, who had lost them. Another 600 or so get transferred to “placement partners and other sheltering organizations.”<\/p>\n

The rest are put down. Euthanized. Killed.<\/p>\n

Those are hard, cold facts. And they are something that make some folks very uncomfortable, and others very angry at the DFL. Why would you support (or send an animal to) a shelter where it might be killed?<\/p>\n

The DFL says:<\/p>\n

\n

The Dumb Friends League welcomes every animal in need. We turn no animals away. We are defined as an \u201copen admission\u201d shelter.<\/p>\n

There are other organizations that call themselves \u201cno kill\u201d shelters, but we find the term misleading. These organizations are more accurately defined as \u201climited admission\u201d shelters, because, generally speaking, they have to restrict the number of animals they take in. They may turn away those that aren\u2019t healthy or behaviorally sound. To operate successfully, they have to limit their intake to animals that can be adopted quickly.<\/p>\n

As an open-admission shelter, we take in ill and injured animals and those that are not immediate candidates for adoption. We receive pets that are no longer wanted, pets from people who can no longer care for them, as well as stray animals.<\/p>\n

We work hard to give second chances to every healthy or rehabilitatable animal, and we do a very good job.<\/p>\n

There is no set time limit for how long an animal can remain in our Adoptions<\/a> program. As long as an animal maintains general good health, a sound temperament and we have space, we’ll keep a pet for weeks, sometimes months. We may put a healthy but overlooked animal in temporary foster care<\/a> and return it to the Adoptions program at a later time. We move sick animals into foster care or into our TLC Center for treatment, where they remain available for adoption. And we work with our placement partners (breed groups and other organizations), who find homes for some harder-to-place animals. We do everything we can to avoid euthanasia of healthy or rehabilitatable animals.<\/p>\n

But more keep coming\u2014an average of about 83 every day\u2014and the reality is that there is not enough space and money to accommodate all of them. We humanely euthanize those animals\u2014primarily cats\u2014that are not chosen by new families. We also euthanize aggressive animals\u2014primarily dogs\u2014that are determined to be a potential threat to the community and those sick or injured animals that are unrehabilitatable given our resource limitations.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The bottom line is that not all animals abandoned, lost, given away, or rescued can be placed. Nor can they be housed indefinitely and still have room for the endless line of animals — 83 every day <\/em>— that need help.<\/p>\n

In their annual report, the DFL notes:<\/p>\n

\n

Of the pets euthanized, 57 percent had behavior issues, such as aggression or extreme fear; 38 percent had serious medical issues. The remaining 5% included pets (primarily cats, rabbits, and other small mammals) for which no homes could be found and pets, such as wolf hybrids and wildlife, that were not taken by sanctuaries or rehabilitators.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

It’s a hard set of facts. I’ve known people who had to give up their pets for one reason or another. It must be an awful, gut-wrenching thing to do, not knowing what will happen to them.<\/p>\n

But my experiences with the DFL has always been very positive. The facilities are clean. The employees appear caring. The animals seem to be under appropriate care. 98% of healthy pets get paced; 80% of treatable \/ rehabilitatable pets do as well. Their overall live release rate (per the Asilomar Accords<\/a> protocols) is 71%.<\/p>\n

\"blogathon2009-mdm\"<\/div>\n

I don’t have any hesitation about blogging in support of them for the Blogathon<\/a>. DFL brought in about $14MM.year in 2008 in various sources — 80% from contributions, like the $400+ that folks have pledged so far here for the Blogathon. Of their expenses, 76% are for animal care services, education, and outreach; 16% goes to further fund raising. Only 8% go for accounting, admin, planning, and program development.<\/p>\n

If you’ve not pledged for my blog during the Blogathon, please do so<\/a>. The benefit isn’t to me — it’s to the animals that will be saved by the Denver Dumb Friends League. Animals that we, as humans, have a responsibility for. It’s a cause I’m proud to stand behind.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A lot of animals are brought through the Denver Dumb Friends League‘s door. In their 2008 annual report, the DFL shows that 12,000 cats, 14,000 dogs, and 2,000 other animals were received. Of that 28,000 animals, about 16,500 were adopted. Another 3,000 (mostly dogs) were reunited with their owners, who had lost them. Another 600 or … Continue reading “The Last Shelter”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13,34],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blogathon","category-pets"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":15155,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/07\/09\/blogathon-2009-blogging-for-the-denver-dumb-friends-league.html","url_meta":{"origin":15243,"position":0},"title":"Blogathon 2009 – Blogging for the Denver Dumb Friends League","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 9-Jul-09 6:45am","format":false,"excerpt":"The Denver Dumb Friends League was founded in 1910, and is the largest animal shelter and animal welfare organization in Denver and the Rocky Mountain region. 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In our real world, \"animal rescue\" means saving animals from neglect, abandonment, and mistreatment. 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