Uniting Human & Animal Welfare
[embedded content] The Hays County Resource Center is trailblazing a new animal welfare model that will provide programs focused on public safety, animal safety and lifesaving, increased public access to important resources for pet owners, and community education to provide safe and humane care for pets–and it all began with community engagement. Panelists Lee Ann Shenefiel, Hays County Pet Resource Center Executive Advisor, Alex Villalobos, Hays County Chief of Staff, and Sari M. Vatske, President & CEO of Central Texas Food Bank...
An Animal Control Officer’s Lesson in Empathy
The call was fairly routine, as animal neglect complaints go. The dog in question, a loyal companion to an elderly woman living alone, was in pretty rough shape. Rough enough that it was a pretty clear-cut case of neglect. The woman, who obviously loved her pet, seemed to be facing multiple struggles. She may never have intended to cause harm, yet her circumstances had led to a situation that, legally, could not be ignored. In my early career as a cruelty investigator for the City of Dallas, I was driven by a sense of duty to protect the...
HASS Launches First Ever Shelter Budget Calculator to Combat Underfunding
Supported by PetSmart Charities, the HASS Budget Calculator aims to arm animal welfare organizations with the data necessary to advocate for increased operational budgets (AUSTIN, TX) April 9, 2024–Human Animal Support Services (HASS), an international project revolutionizing the animal welfare industry by uniting human and animal welfare, announced today the launch of the HASS Budget Calculator. An initiative supported by PetSmart Charities®, the free-to-use tool is a new way for animal welfare organizations to more accurately...
Exploring the HASS Playbook
[embedded content] The HASS Playbook is a comprehensive collection of FREE how-to guides, programming, resources and research built rise above existing sheltering system challenges and increase the support animal welfare organizations can provide for pets AND people. Each HASS Playbook section is accompanied by an optional, self-paced questionnaire that, upon completion, produces instantaneous customized recommendations for your shelter to create new or enhance existing initiatives. Think of this option as on-demand animal welfare consulting...
Breaking Barriers: Insights into the Competitive Pet Placement Project
[embedded content] Over the last several months, HASS collaborated with a selection of HASS pilot shelters to identify any lingering shelter operation barriers to positive adoption outcomes as part of a formal Competitive Pet Placement (CPP) project. CPP is an initiative supported by PetSmart Charities that aims to make sure animal shelters are not making it harder for people to adopt and foster than it should be—and to make it easier for pets to get into homes. Watch Kate McHugh-Westfall, HASS Embedded Data and Implementation...
Support Access to Free and Low-Cost Vet Care
Spend a day at an open-intake animal shelter in the U.S., and it probably won’t be long before a call comes in or a person and their pet walk in the door, desperate for low-cost or free veterinary care. And not just for spay or neuter services, which often (and for good reason!) gets the most attention in the animal welfare community. HASS conducted Community Values Surveys (CVS) in eight cities in the U.S. and in every city lack of access to preventative, sick, and emergency veterinary care is among the top 4 resources pet owners have...
Beyond the Save Rate: Integrating People into the Sheltering Equation
[embedded content] Having a 90% or higher save rate has become the gold standard for measuring the success or failure of an animal shelter or rescue, and it will continue to be an important metric. The problem is that the save rate focuses only on a singular point in a complex societal issue. The more the animal welfare industry learns about people and pets, the more we realize that the trouble is less about the pets in the shelter and more about the “people problems” that put them there to begin with. In this webinar, Dr. Ellen...
Data Insight on Reducing Returns: Help Adopters Let Dogs be Dogs and Cats be Cats
Highlights Behavior is a leading cause of returns, second only to owner/household preferences. Nuisance behavior is the most common type of behavior-related returns. The median time out of shelter for animals returned due to nuisance behavior is only 3 days. Data on returns suggests an opportunity to provide more behavior and training education and support for adopters. Recommendations are provided on how to support behavior needs in pet adoption journeys. What’s Happening Why are adopted pets returned? HASS pilot shelter data...
Building Bridges: The Intersection of Black Activism and Animal Welfare with HASS
Do Black people like animals? Hell yes, they do! I’ve been thinking a lot this Black History Month. I did a Google search using the first part of this article’s title. What I found ranged anywhere from the offensive to the absurd. Opinions are all over the place regarding whether an entire group of people have a connection with animals, and the worst opinions are usually propagated by non-black people, who lack no understanding of black people or black culture. I don’t speak for all black people, so the best I can do is tell...
How Supporting Self-Rehoming Helps Your Community and Your Shelter
Owner surrendered pets make up the second largest category for shelter intake, contributing over a quarter of intake cases annually in national data, and over 14% in HASS pilot shelters. They are an important population to address if shelters are to alleviate the overcrowding many have seen since the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic began to fade. The data on owner surrenders also shows a pattern that likely contributes to the extra strain on resources and space that shelters typically see in the summer months. Both in Shelter Animals Count...
