For decades, the Kansas City, MO Animal Shelter resembled many public animals shelter facilities. It was old. Outdated. And had a very high kill rate.
As recently as 2007 the shelter killed nearly 7,000 dogs and cats. As recently as 2008, the shelter killed more than 60% of the dogs and cats that entered.
Everyone knew we could, and had, to do better.
In 2009, the city made the decision to privatize the operations of the animal shelter. While there were significant improvements made, not everything was going as well as everyone had hoped. In April, 2011, the city took over the operations from the private contractor while they searched for a new vendor.
In January, 2012, the Kansas City Pet Project began the operation of the city shelter after a lengthy search by the city for a new partner. KC Pet Project is an organization I'm very proud to be a part of.
It's been a wild ride -- but we have an amazing team with talented and compassionate staff and volunteers that have been working their butts off to create an amazing story for Kansas City. The shelter is still small. And outdated. And clearly not designed, in its location or layout, for lifesaving. But we're making it happen.
Honestly, there's a lot I could say about the changes, but I think the best story I can show is by showing the numbers over the past 7 years.
One quick note on the numbers: In 2009, 2010 and the first half of 2011 the operators of the shelter logged all rescue transfers to non-brick-and-mortar rescues as "adoptions" instead of "transfers" - so many of the "transfer" numbers for those years are much lower than they should be and "adoption" numbers are much higher.
For the year, we had a total 85.7% live release rate. It was 87.1% for dogs, 82.4% for cats. Since July 1, it's been better than that: 90% for dogs, 85% for cats -- for a total of 89% live release rate. The live release rate was calculated using the Asilomar Accords and Maddies Fund formula -- however, our euthanasia numbers include owner-requests for euthanasia (which most shelters don't include).
I've opted to include just information about dogs and cats -- but KCPP is an open admission facility and takes in everything from animal control -- so we have saved more than 250 chickens, goats, alligators (I'm not kidding), ferrets, pigs, owls, rats, and snakes over the past 12 months also.
We have a lot of work still ahead of us, but the progress is certainly there. I'm really proud of our team.
I also want to thank Susan at No Kill News for the kind words about our organization.
fantastic progress!
What accounts for the dramatic drop in "intake", do you know?
Posted by: EmilyS | January 09, 2013 at 08:12 PM
Impressive increase in transfers, congratulations. I assume you started courting the local rescues or some sort of outreach to rescues. I did notice a 1% point drop between 2011 and 2012 for percentage of transfers to rescue. That led me to wonder if there was a plan, involving rescues or not, going forward to sustain transfer rates?
Posted by: Rhett | January 09, 2013 at 08:46 PM
Most shelters are down from 2011 to 2012. His numbers are similar to the numbers I've seen where I am in 2 similar open admission, one larger and one smaller.
Posted by: Rhett | January 09, 2013 at 08:48 PM
I should say when I say most I mean most of the ones I know. I don't think any national statistics are out yet.
Posted by: Rhett | January 09, 2013 at 09:23 PM
Emily,
The decrease in intake would be largely two-fold:
1) We had a low cost spay/neuter organization that started up about 10 years ago, but really began solid growth about 6 years ago. They're doing things the right way, with targeted outread in the lower-income parts of the inner-city. They have certainly helped.
2) We have had a change in management of animal control. AC used to be run by a former police chief who used to confiscate animals for EVERYTHING -- over the limit, not licensed, etc. New management, while they still have a ways to go, the new management is evolving toward more humane animal control which is also helping.
It's impossible to know how much of the decrease is from each source, both, seem to be working well.
Posted by: Brent | January 09, 2013 at 11:11 PM
Rhett, please note the note right under the numbers. We actually have probably been less reliant on rescues this year than in the past -- but because of some record-keeping differences, it looks like we're overly-reliant on rescues. We definitely still work with them and need them, but we have not seen the increase that the numbers might suggest. Previous operators "adopted" animals to non brick-and-mortar rescues to circumvent a mis-interpretation of a local ordinance. We've fixed that now, but the numbers look a little off because of it...
Posted by: Brent | January 09, 2013 at 11:13 PM
Good job! If you are in DC anytime, let me know and I'll give you a tour of WARL.
Posted by: Dianne R | January 10, 2013 at 09:51 AM
I'd lvoe that Dianne.
Posted by: Brent | January 10, 2013 at 09:53 AM
I completely missed that whole paragraph. Thanks!
Posted by: Rhett | January 10, 2013 at 01:23 PM
Organization is key. Second is funding. Kudos to all of you who are making the difference and change.
Something to consider..
6,000 + taken in and 955 released back to owners.
Considering dogs are stolen / missing every day. Dogs are easily transported out of the local area... you have to wonder how many are euthanized/ adopted out that are family pets who are lost/stolen?
What we need is a nationwide clearinghouse. A centralized list/posting of pictures of missing and found dogs.
Stolen Horse International aka Netposse has such a setup for horses.
How many more could be returned to rightful owners if we had such a mechanism in place to help reconnect them?
Posted by: Cindy | January 10, 2013 at 02:48 PM
This is awesome! Hopefully by next year you can officially be a no-kill shelter!
Posted by: Ashley | January 10, 2013 at 04:39 PM
Very impressive numbers!
Other than a mention of barn cats on the KCPP website, I don't see any information about how "community cats" are handled by the KC shelter system. Am I missing something?
Peter J. Wolf
http://www.voxfelina.com
Posted by: Peter Wolf | June 17, 2013 at 08:01 PM
Peter. Under the city law in KCMO, releasing cats back into the community is technically illegal. So instead of doing this (as many communities do) we find barn homes for them where they can go live. It's our humane alternative while working within our legal confines.
Posted by: Brent | June 17, 2013 at 10:24 PM