Tucked inside the fine print of the California budget compromise is a little noticed language change that could mean certain death for thousands of stray animals.
The Hayden law says publicly run animal shelters can euthanize an animal after six days. If an animal picked up as a stray is not redeemed by its owner, then the animal will be euthanized. The state budget deal worked out over the summer allows that hold time to be reduced to three days!”
If your dog gets out of the backyard while you are away for a long weekend, and is picked up by animal control, conceivably, your pet could be dead by the time you have the chance to act.
Amy Cooper, the director of Sonoma County Animal Care and Control says with pet overpopulation what it is in California, “I do think there are shelters, however, that will take advantage of this mandate suspension. ”
But not Sonoma County says Cooper. “It is my interpretation that we could reduce that hold time from 96 hours to 72 hours. We currently have no plans to do that. The prime reason is we haven’t and we don’t intend to euthanize after the hold time has expired. A large part of our job here is to reunite lost pets with their owners. ”
Most dogs picked up as strays in Sonoma County stay in the shelter for 10 days until redeemed and for cats, it was an average stay of 12 days according to figures from Sonoma County.
While it would be easy to chastise shelter operators who do impose the three day stray hold, they are not really the bad guys in this. Once they clear out their shelters, more animals are dumped on them.
Get upset at a state that provides a way for the killing of animals but little support or funding for a mandatory spay and neuter program. That’s the real shame.
