Dr. K  🇺🇲

8. People turn over pets because they lost their jobs, their marriages exploded, or for other reasons they had to move to some place that won't allow pets. People die, their pets come to us. In spring we are always *deluged* with unwanted puppies and kittens. Mixed blessing.

9. Spring puppies and kittens are such a workload that they almost kill our tiny volunteer staff, but they don't cost us much - shots, neutering, a little food - and PetSmart gets them homes for us, pretty much 100%. We get the money. They're a lot of work but pay their own way.

10. PetSmart even makes donations to us based on the numbers of pets we place through them. We get *more than* 100% of the adoption fees. Without exception, volunteers give, as well as their time, money directly to the project. We buy stuff and don't put in for reimbursement.

11. I can't begin to imagine how a shelter in a major population area could avoid the question of killing long term unwanted animals. It is the grim truth that a big, ill-mannered, unhousebroken, mixed breed mutt is damn hard to find a home for. And we get lots of them.

12. The less well an animal is socialized, schooled, and civilized, the more likely that animal is to wind up in a shelter by the age of two, and the less likely to be quickly adopted out. And every day we have one, the more money they cost us.

13. Puppies, kittens, and little dogs often go through so quickly that we don't lose money on them, but they are never able to fully cover the cost of the long term residents, the big dogs, sick dogs, shy and sick cats. Without generous donations we'd be gone.

14. If any one of these three women dies or quits we'll be gone. Two of them are Trump voters. We don't talk about it. One of these women has a full-time job. One has a full-time and a part-time job. G is 70 and retired. All work over 40 hours a week at the shelter apiece.

15. It's easy to blame the kill shelters, but they are living with a hard decision: give more animals at least some opportunity for adoption, or give fewer animals longer opportunity, more chance. There is no hating person volunteering at a shelter, I don't believe.