Position Statement on Responsibilities of Animal Shelters

Introduction
Goal 1: Animals in shelters routinely receive necessary and appropriate care.
Goal 2: Animal sheltering is increasingly transparent, ensuring accountability and public trust.
Goal 3: Intake policies ensure appropriate services for the animals most in need.
Goal 4: Owned animals are quickly and reliably returned to their owners.
Goal 5: Adoption and positive outcome opportunities are expanded and emphasized.
Goal 6: Euthanasia occurs only when shelters deem it the most humane and responsible option. Shelters retain discretion to make these critical decisions.
Conclusion

Introduction

This position statement expresses the ASPCA’s views concerning the responsibilities of shelters^[1] — which include all animal welfare organizations that house and care for stray, homeless, owner-surrendered, abandoned, and/or impounded animals. This means both municipal and private brick-and-mortar shelters as well as nonprofit rescue organizations. While this document deals primarily with dogs and cats because they are the most common species served by shelters and the focus of the Association of Shelter Veterinarians (ASV)^[2], many of the tenets expressed here apply to other animals served by shelters, including equines.

The number of cats and dogs euthanized in shelters has declined considerably over the past five decades, from around 15 million annually in the 1970s to fewer than 1 million^[3] today. This drop is attributable to several factors, including broader access to and acceptance of spay/neuter programs, progressive shelter policies, increased community outreach and pet owner support services, and robust adoption efforts, as well as increased funding and public support for these vital services. Despite this progress, many shelters and rescue groups continue to face challenges that impede their ability to meet high, or even baseline, standards of animal welfare and prevent them from effectively protecting the animals and the people they serve — both within the shelter and in the community at large. These obstacles include ongoing capacity challenges, long-term staffing and veterinary care shortages, and an increasing number of animals requiring specialized care. A community’s animal welfare needs change over time, requiring adjustments to programs, services, and the allocation of resources.

This document is meant to provide guidance for organizations to help them ensure they are meeting the needs of animals and effectively navigating the myriad challenges inherent in animal sheltering work.

Lack of adequate resources is the most often-cited challenge faced by shelters. Whether nonprofit or municipal, shelters that perform any government functions (for example, taking in strays pursuant to municipal contract) should negotiate for adequate and realistic funding so that they are not compelled to cut corners on animal care or other services. State government can also provide funding for local animal welfare services. Shelters can reach out to their representatives’ district offices to inquire about available resources and to advocate for expanded funding.^[4]

Outlined here are six goals that are essential for shelters to achieve to effectively safeguard and champion animal welfare in their communities:

1. Animal welfare: Animals in shelters routinely receive necessary and appropriate care.
2. Operational transparency: Animal sheltering is increasingly transparent, ensuring accountability and public trust.
3. Animal intake: Intake policies ensure appropriate services for animals most in need.
4. Owner reclaims: Owned animals are quickly and reliably returned to their owners.
5. Adoption and transfer: Adoption and positive outcome opportunities are expanded and emphasized.
6. Euthanasia: Euthanasia occurs only when shelters deem it the most humane and responsible^[5] option. Shelters retain discretion to make these critical decisions.

These goals are intended to support organizations in fulfilling the substantial responsibilities that go along with the job of sheltering animals.

Goal 1: Animals in shelters routinely receive necessary and appropriate care.

A. Standards for facilities, sanitation, and medical and behavioral protocols should be required by law.

State and local regulation of animal shelters lacks uniformity, and there are still many places in the country where there is little, if any, meaningful regulation or oversight. To consistently and reliably protect the physical and psychological health of animals in shelters, minimum operational standards^[6] should be established by law. These standards include operation within a shelter’s “capacity for care” (where a shelter’s resources meet the physical and behavioral needs of all animals in its care) as well as baseline requirements for primary animal enclosures and behavioral enrichment. Meeting these standards can help ensure that shelters are places where medical and behavioral problems are not exacerbated, but, rather, appropriately managed and addressed. Animals can experience stress in a shelter environment, and many shelters struggle with facility designs that can add to that stress. Still, shelters should do all they can to ensure that animals do not become less likely to be adopted because of the sheltering experience. Animals should be given the best opportunity possible for adoption or transfer to another shelter or rescue organization.

Shelters should strive to achieve good welfare for all animals in their care, not to merely reduce physical pain and psychological distress. To that end, shelter culture and protocols should ensure that medical, animal behavior, and sheltering teams work together, in partnership and with equal voices, to promote optimal outcomes.

Shelters, policy makers, and communities can find more information about improving shelter care standards in the Association of Shelter Veterinarians’ “The Guidelines for Standards of Care in Animal Shelters, Second Edition.”^[7]

B. Shelters should be authorized and encouraged to establish foster programs within the bounds of their capacity for care.

Engaging community members to provide temporary care for shelter animals in their homes can be enormously beneficial for everyone involved. Foster programs can:

• Provide a home environment for animals who need longer-term care before they are old enough for adoption (in the case of puppies and kittens) or well enough for adoption (in the case of animals with treatable medical and behavioral conditions)
• Provide insight into an animal’s behavior in a home environment
• Expand the capacity of the shelter to help more animals in need, even when there are on-site staffing challenges
• Provide access to a larger pool of prospective adopters, as foster families can tap into their own social networks to find homes, thereby averting the need for animals to return to the shelter
• Increase community knowledge and support of animal welfare work

As much as foster programs can expand a shelter’s capacity, these programs require proper oversight to effectively serve their purpose. Shelters retain responsibility for the care and well-being of animals in foster homes and must ensure that they move in a timely manner to adoption, transfer to another organization, or another appropriate outcome. Therefore, it is critical that shelters develop foster care programs that they have the resources to properly oversee.

Goal 2: Animal sheltering is increasingly transparent, ensuring accountability and public trust.

A. All shelters and rescue organizations should make descriptions of key processes and information readily available for public inspection.

Transparency fosters public trust, and forthright dissemination of information concerning a shelter’s key policies and procedures can help satisfy the general public’s need to know. The ASPCA recommends that public and private shelters and rescue groups voluntarily provide descriptions of both their public-facing processes, such as intake and transfer to other shelters, as well as certain internal processes, such as medical and behavioral care, enrichment, and euthanasia decisions, regardless of whether there are legal requirements in place, as discussed in section B., below. Doing so gives shelters and rescues control over how the information is presented to their communities and demonstrates their commitment to transparency and community engagement.

B. Records and data concerning key processes (including protocols for responding to disasters, animal cruelty, and other crisis situations), intakes, outcomes, and community-based services should be maintained by all public and private shelters and rescues and should be made publicly available.

Public and private shelters and rescue groups should maintain and routinely report key records and data to a central national reporting organization.^[8] While much of this information, at least for public shelters, may already be considered public record under applicable state law, standardizing and centralizing it and extending these requirements to private shelters is an effective way to gain a fuller picture of animals at risk in communities, regionally and nationally. When the only information available on shelter intake and outcomes is provided by public shelters via the media or through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, the public gets an incomplete and likely distorted impression of both the operations of individual facilities and, perhaps, the evolving landscape of animal sheltering more broadly.

In addition to animal count (intake and outcome) data, shelters should use all the data they collect to both inform their policies and programs and support funding requests to their local and state governments, donors, and grantors. Accurate data can also help shelters explain to government funders that funding must match expected service provision. Shelters should not be in the untenable position of being expected to serve as a catch-all for animal needs in the community when the funding allocated to them does not cover all services.

Goal 3: Intake policies ensure appropriate services for the animals most in need.

A. Shelters should retain autonomy in determining when and how animals are admitted to the facility.

The concept of “managed admissions” or “managed intake” recognizes that shelter admission is not always what is best for an individual animal’s welfare. Moreover, limited resources make it hard to stay within a shelter’s capacity for care if the shelter has no leeway to “manage” its admissions. While shelters may have little discretion with respect to the intake of certain categories of animals (for example, dangerous dogs and cruelty seizures when governed by law or contract), they can better serve the community and more effectively use their resources if they employ managed admissions for owner surrenders as well as for any other category of animal they intake, when permissible by law.

Animals in genuine need of sheltering services must have a safe place to go; managed admissions should not be used to thwart that goal and may be especially challenging in communities with very modest sheltering resources. The aim is to employ managed admissions to better serve animals in need while adjusting for the circumstances of the particular community.

Fundamentals of managed admissions include:

• Providing a “conversation-based intake” process in which shelter staff ask open-ended questions in a nonjudgmental way to obtain as much information as possible about the animal’s history, home environment, and the reason the animal is being brought to the shelter; forms completed by animal owners may provide an incomplete picture that can hamper the shelter’s ability to assist the animal in the most appropriate way
• Prioritizing the intake of animals with the most urgent needs, such as those who are victims of cruelty or natural disasters, as well as those whose owners have no viable alternatives to surrender reasonably available to them; in these situations, shelters should be authorized and encouraged to reduce or waive owner-surrender fees
• Not housing more animals than the shelter can care for; crisis situations, such as large-scale cruelty seizures and natural disasters, may compel intake beyond a shelter’s capacity for care; in these instances, the emphasis should be on allocating additional resources to ensure proper care for animals in a temporary situation and returning to normal capacity as soon as possible
• Offering support and resources to animal owners and Good Samaritans to facilitate proper care for animals outside the shelter system
• Considering alternative placement opportunities that avert the need for some animals to come into the shelter

Alternatives to shelter intake can include:

• Encouraging owners to use self-rehoming resources
• Scheduling intake for owner-surrendered animals to keep the shelter population within its capacity for care
• Returning stray animals in the field directly to owners instead of taking them to the shelter
• Facilitating access to veterinary and behavioral care or other resources (e.g., pet food)
• Referring owners to other resources better equipped to help particular animals (e.g., breed or senior animal rescues, community cat organizations) or animals in particular circumstances (e.g., organizations that provide temporary foster care for victims of domestic violence or for owners undergoing medical treatment)
• Leaving animals in place when shelter intervention is unnecessary, including the provision of trap-neuter-return-monitor (TNRM) services for community cats who are healthy and thriving^[9]

Managed admissions must be properly planned and resourced and should never be used to merely turn away animals in need and improve shelter “numbers.”

Successful diversion of animals from shelter intake requires a variety of resources and services, often provided by a number of organizations. Therefore, coordination among agencies is critical, as is ensuring continuity of care so that animals’ needs are not ignored while they await admission to the shelter or receive alternative-to-intake services.

Providing effective alternatives to intake requires:

• Services and materials offered in the language and terminology most used in the community served
• Access to resources and services in person, via phone (e.g., designated information line), and via the internet
• Services provided both passively and actively (e.g., an online form to request assistance as well as in-person or phone options through representatives working at the shelter and in the community)

Managed admissions done without the criteria and the considerations delineated here may result in the perception of better metrics for the shelter but poorer outcomes and welfare for the animals themselves. Turning animals away from the shelter or giving owners/finders a list of resources does not constitute managed admission but, rather, inappropriately places responsibility for animal welfare entirely on the community and Good Samaritans.

Goal 4: Owned animals are quickly and reliably returned to their owners.

A. Shelters should check potentially lost animals for ID, including microchips, tattoos, etc., at the time of intake.

Shelters should be required by law to check all animals for identification at the time of intake. The administrative and financial burdens of this requirement are minimal compared to the benefits of quickly reuniting animals with their owners, including improved animal welfare, increased shelter capacity for new admissions, and the cost savings associated with shorter hold times. This requirement should extend to owner-surrendered animals, as microchip information can confirm current ownership, shed light on the possibility that other owners exist, and, in any event, must be updated if there is a subsequent adoption. Rescue groups who take owner-surrendered animals should also be required to check for ID. Prompt reunification is stymied when microchips and licenses are not kept up to date, and lengthier stays in the shelter can cause needless stress for both pets and owners. Outreach or PSAs to help owners understand their role in making sure their lost pet finds their way home can help ensure that pet identification serves its intended purpose.

Members of the public or rescue groups who find animals they believe to be lost should follow the law in their jurisdiction regarding reporting the incident, checking for ID, bringing the animal to the designated shelter or other holding facility, and, where legally allowed, holding the animal temporarily in their homes pending return-to-owner or other disposition. Shelters should clearly and proactively communicate with their communities regarding protocols for the above. If a shelter must pause intake because it is at or over capacity for care and in circumstances where people who find animals are willing to temporarily care for them, shelters should provide finders with as much support as possible to maximize the chance of animals being returned to owners or rehomed. Reinforcing the efforts of Good Samaritans to help animals in their communities encourages their continued support. Owners looking for lost animals need to know where to find them. All protocols for dealing with stray animals, wherever they are housed, must keep this priority front and center.

B. Returning animals to their owners directly from the field should be expressly authorized.

The ability to return animals with identification to their owners directly from the field, without animals ever entering the shelter, should be legally authorized. This practice spares animals a stressful stay at the shelter while quickly and reliably reuniting them with their families, incentivizes owners to keep up-to-date identification on their animals, and reduces the resource drain on shelters.

C. Shelters must notify identified owners of stray animals, and hold times must account for mail delivery.

Many people still rely on the US Postal Service to receive communications from local government, utility companies, financial institutions, and the courts. Therefore, while alternate means of contacting owners are strongly encouraged (e.g., text, email, phone, social media), shelters should be required to serve notice to identified owners by mail and to make all attempts to send that mail on the animal’s first day to decrease the length of stay for strays — even when alternate methods of communication are also attempted. To give owners a meaningful chance to reclaim animals, stray hold times should be long enough to account for the additional time that notice by mail requires.

D. Shelters must provide accessible and appropriate public notice of stray animals entering the shelter.

Shelters have an obligation to do everything possible to reunite animals with their owners — even when those animals don’t have ID. Owners may not know where to look for a lost animal, or they may not be able to visit the shelter during its regular business hours. Connecting with the community to help find owners of lost animals, therefore, becomes even more critical. While online postings on a shelter’s website or other electronic means have become commonplace, this may not be feasible for all shelters or accessible to all community members. It is critical to use the method or methods most likely to reach the largest segment of the relevant community, whether that means online posts, flyers in the neighborhood where an animal was found, or a combination of different methods.

E. Shelters must provide clear notice to the public concerning their location, hours of operation, fees, and return-to-owner process and seek to minimize barriers to public access.

Information about a shelter’s hours of operation and fees should be easily accessible to the public on the shelter’s website and/or any social media presence as well as in written form at the shelter itself.

Because not everyone is able to take time during the workday to go to the shelter, it is important for shelters to have reasonable hours during which owners can relinquish or reclaim animals, adopt animals, or receive other services. These hours should include some daytime, evening, and weekend hours, though the nature of the community (urban, suburban, rural) and the resources of the shelter will determine what is “reasonable.”

F. Shelters should have a reasonable process for matching stray animals who are either admitted to the shelter or held by a member of the public in lieu of admission with reports of lost animals received by the shelter.

Shelters should be required to establish and publicize a reasonable process for helping stray animals return to their owners. The most effective approaches include monitoring lost-animal reports for possible matches with stray animals admitted to the shelter as well as collaboration with local lost-animal organizations.

Shelters should also create clear pathways for returning stray animals to their owners in circumstances where a member of the public has notified the shelter that an animal has been found and it has been agreed that the individual will keep the animal during the hold period. While Good Samaritans can play a helpful role for shelters and for animals who are spared a stay at the shelter, there should be processes in place to ensure that owners can find lost pets and that “finders” comply with all directives regarding lost pets.

In addition, because animals’ appearances can change significantly while they are lost and information in lost-animal reports may be incomplete or inaccurate, shelters should make clear to owners searching for animals that there is no substitute for visiting the shelter in person.

G. Shelters should be authorized and encouraged to reduce or waive redemption fees.

For the reasons discussed regarding adoption and placement, the ASPCA supports authorizing shelters to reduce or waive fees for owners seeking to reclaim animals and encourages shelters to regularly and consistently use this tool to reunite more animals with their families.

H. All dogs and cats who venture outside should have up-to-date identification: a collar with ID tag and/or microchip.

Using collars and ID tags with current telephone numbers helps ensure animals’ prompt return to their owners, both when an animal is lost and in times of emergency or disaster. Shelters should consider sending collars and tags home with adopted animals and with owned community animals they serve in other ways (e.g., spay/neuter), preferably with the animals wearing collars and tags when they leave the facility. Microchips are also helpful as long as the information is kept up to date. Finding ways to defray or remove the cost of microchipping can make this tool more accessible to everyone in the community.

Unowned community cats should be ear tipped as standard procedure during spay/neuter. Ear tipping should also be discussed with owners of cats who live or venture outdoors to indicate their sterilized status.

Goal 5: Adoption and positive outcome opportunities are expanded and emphasized.

A. Shelters should have broad discretion in adoption and placement decisions, provided that adoption policies and decisions do not discriminate against or disparately impact people in underserved populations or those who fall into protected status categories.

An adoption approach where shelters retain broad discretion is best for both expanding adoption opportunities and for protecting animals from situations that might put them at risk. This same approach makes sense for policies governing the transfer of animals to partner shelters and rescue groups, a tool that should be leveraged to maximize positive outcomes. To help ensure that biases (recognized or not) do not affect adoption decisions, shelters should be required to implement nondiscriminatory adoption policies that forbid denying members of the public adoption opportunities because of race, religion, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, age, disability, or other protected categories recognized under federal, state, or local law. Shelters should also scrutinize policies and practices that appear objective and neutral to ensure that they do not disparately impact adoptions to these protected classes or to underserved populations.

Shelter adoption programs across the country vary widely, from no screening (any animal is available to anyone) to the use of rigid guidelines to screen potential adopters. An approach known as “conversation-based adoptions” falls somewhere in between these two extremes, matching adopters with companion animals through dialogue, in a climate of trust and understanding.

Adoption programs should also be just that — transferring ownership to adopters and ensuring that proof of ownership (licenses, microchips) is transferred to the new owners.

B. Shelters should be required by law and resourced to develop robust adoption and other placement programs to ensure prompt, humane outcomes for all animals in their care.

Along with ensuring that the medical and behavioral needs of animals are met (Goal 1, above), shelters have a responsibility to make every effort to find homes or other placement options for animals in their care. Shelters should be required to take all necessary steps to place as many animals entering their facilities as possible, whether they arrive as strays, as owner-surrenders or through other means. In practice, this means that adoption and other placement programs, including transfer to other rescue organizations or other shelters if it improves the chance for adoption and/or the shelter’s capacity for care, must be vigorous and robust.

Animals with certain physical health or behavioral conditions may nonetheless be suitable for adoption, either during or after treatment. Once animals are available for adoption or transfer, every effort must be made to move them as quickly as possible into new homes or into a transfer program. Transferring animals locally (within the community or in neighboring areas) should be considered before bringing animals in from long distances. Transporting animals is not without risks, and these programs should be operated in accordance with appropriate standards.^[10]

Shelters should be legally authorized to reduce or waive adoption and placement fees^[11] to move the most adoptable animals as possible into new homes as expeditiously as possible. Where such fees are strictly mandated by law, they can serve as a disincentive for both individual adopters and for rescues seeking to “pull” animals from the shelter for placement. While these fees may provide some funding to shelters, rigid adherence to them can also cost shelters money by unnecessarily extending the time that animals must remain — and receive care — at the shelter.

In addition, fee waivers associated with adoption promotions or campaigns or used to facilitate the adoption of certain categories of animals (such as those with longer lengths of stay) allow shelters to tailor adoption opportunities to adapt to shifting community and economic dynamics. Shelters should use their discretion to reduce or waive fees to save more lives whenever possible.

Getting involved with your state or local legislative process can yield other creative ways to incentivize adoptions, such as allowing adoption fees to be tax deductible. Shelters can suggest such measures by reaching out to elected officials in their communities.

Spay/neuter before adoption is an important element of adoption programs unless it prevents animals from leaving the shelter in a timely manner. Where spay/neuter services are limited and where the law allows, shelters should provide alternative solutions — such as foster-to-adopt or spay/neuter deposits — that allow animals to leave the shelter while ensuring that they are sterilized within a reasonable timeframe. As nonsurgical sterilization becomes a reality, that will be a potential alternative for shelters as well.

Shelters should not be required or permitted to use arbitrary criteria for immediate euthanasia, such as the expiration of applicable stray hold periods, relinquishment status (owned vs. stray), or breed identification. Proactive “pathway planning,” in which shelters anticipate services and care required to achieve appropriate outcomes, should also include prompt and appropriate decisions regarding euthanasia.

Of course, providing appropriate services to animals in need takes resources — and the responsibility for ensuring that shelters have what they need to perform this vital public function rests not solely with them, but also with government bodies who allocate funds and with the communities who support their efforts.

C. Except in instances where euthanasia is most humane and responsible outcome, shelters should be encouraged but not required to seek placement for animals being considered for euthanasia with partner shelters and rescues.

By partnering with other agencies that may have resources they do not — such as greater overall capacity for care or more extensive behavioral expertise and resources — shelters can expand adoption opportunities for their animals. Animals who are deemed not adoptable due to health or behavioral problems should not be transferred to other facilities that cannot effectively treat them. The decision as to when transfer is appropriate should rest with the shelter and not be mandated by law.

D. Shelters should retain discretion to humanely euthanize animals with medical or behavioral problems.

Shelters should retain discretion in adoption and placement decisions in general and specifically with regard to animals with medical issues or behavioral concerns. Factors to be considered should include the ability and willingness of potential adopters to provide care and appropriately manage these conditions, the animal’s quality of life, and the safety of the public. Shelters have a responsibility to avoid placing animals who pose a threat to public safety, and they should be supported in making these difficult but critical decisions.

Where there are concerns regarding behavior, the shelter should rely on multiple sources of information in making outcome decisions. Owners surrendering animals do not always disclose all relevant information, and the information they do provide may lack important context. Therefore, owner surrender forms should be one piece of information, supplemented by objective observations made by shelter staff, volunteers, and foster care providers during a variety of interactions. Standardized behavior evaluations are another potential source of information; however, research suggests that their predictive value is limited when it comes to future aggressive behavior.^[12]

Behavioral and medical assessment should include documentation of an animal’s overall quality of life/welfare. Euthanasia decisions based on poor quality of life are often not straightforward, and discretion in these matters properly rests with the shelter. Where available and practical, standardized, science-based tools to assess holistic (physical and psychological) quality of life are preferable to informal documentation.

Shelters should support owner-requested euthanasia. Euthanasia and disposal can be cost prohibitive for the owner of any animal (with costs and logistics often magnified for equines), and the ability to access these services can prevent unnecessary suffering and shelter intake.

E. Owner-surrendered animals who are deemed suitable for placement should not be subject to hold times and should be eligible for adoption as promptly as possible.

The ASPCA supports the elimination of hold times for owner-surrendered animals when they unnecessarily block a shelter’s efforts to adopt out or transfer such animals. The elimination of hold times for owner-surrendered animals should never, by itself, serve as justification for immediate euthanasia, but should rather be treated as an opportunity to make animals more quickly available for adoption or transfer, pending appropriate medical and behavioral evaluation.

F. Kittens reasonably thought to be unowned should be immediately eligible for adoption or transfer to shelter or rescue partners.

Making unowned kittens (those determined to be under four months old) immediately available for adoption or transfer decreases their chances of exposure to contagious disease and stress in the shelter, reduces foster time for kittens on hold until readiness for adoption, and generally improves the flow of animals through the shelter.

Goal 6: Euthanasia occurs only when shelters deem it the most humane and responsible option. Shelters retain discretion to make these critical decisions.

By operating in alignment with the requirements and guidelines outlined here, shelters can reduce the likelihood that euthanasia will be necessary. They do so by:

• Safeguarding animal health and well-being and preserving adoptability
• Supporting prompt, reliable return-to-owner
• Removing financial barriers to reclaiming owned animals
• Removing barriers to and encouraging adoption and transfer to other animal welfare organizations that also comply with these guidelines
• Being transparent about animal data, policies, and processes to foster public trust and to inform other strategies that can reduce the need to euthanize
• Providing services like spay/neuter, assistance securing pet-friendly housing, affordable vet care, and grooming services to keep pets out of the shelter and help facilities operate within their capacity for care

Euthanasia should never be a substitute for concerted efforts to keep animals healthy and find placement for them. However, when animals aren’t good candidates for adoption due to medical or behavioral problems and their treatment prognosis is poor, they don’t respond well to treatment, or treatment isn’t feasible, euthanasia is the most appropriate outcome. Allowing animals who cannot be treated, transferred for treatment, or placed in the community to linger in the shelter is neither humane nor responsible.

The ASPCA does not support legislative efforts to remove discretion from shelters to make appropriate euthanasia decisions.

Conclusion

Shelters play a vital role in communities across the country: they are charged with caring for some of the most vulnerable among us. We rely on them to meet high standards — tending to lost, hurt, and sick animals, helping animals return to their owners or find new homes, and doing all they can to keep animals in loving homes whenever possible. Ensuring that shelters have the public and private support and resources they need to perform this vital function improves welfare for animals in need as well as the health and safety of the community as a whole.

[1] Throughout this document, the term “animal shelters” refers to facilities and foster-based rescue organizations that house and care for stray, homeless, impounded, surrendered, and/or abandoned animals. “Government animal services” (or “public animal shelters”) refers to entities operated by cities or counties that provide animal control and housing services (e.g., animal control agencies, municipal animal shelters). The terms “private” or “nonprofit agencies” refer to facilities or organizations that are operated by duly incorporated humane societies, societies for the prevention of cruelty to animals, or other nonprofit organizations devoted to the welfare, protection, rehabilitation, and/or humane treatment of animals. Animal shelters and foster-based rescues may also have contracts with government entities for animal control and/or housing.

[2] “The Guidelines for Standards of Care in Animal Shelters, Second Edition,” a publication of the Association of Shelter Veterinarians, is currently the primary industry reference for specific standards of care.

[3] See ASPCA Pet Statistics: https://www.aspca.org/helping-people-pets/shelter-intake-and-surrender/pet-statistics.

[4] State support for animal shelters is not widespread as most are funded by their municipalities. Examples of state funding include New York’s Companion Animal Capital Fund and California’s Animal Shelter Assistance Program. An example of locally advocating for shelter funding is the City of Los Angeles’s local Proposition F in 2000, which provided $154.1 million to build, repair, expand, renovate, or replace eight shelters within the city. Shelters may need to advocate for funding from both municipal and state government to ensure they have the resources needed to properly perform their duties.

[5] Determining what is “humane and responsible” for an individual animal requires consideration of the factors enumerated in this statement: the animal’s medical and behavioral status, the facility’s capacity to effectively address those needs, the likelihood of placement, and the safety of the public.

[6] See the Association of Shelter Veterinarians’ “The Guidelines for Standards of Care in Animal Shelters, Second Edition”: https://www.sheltervet.org/guidelines-for-standards-of-care-in-animal-shelters.

[7] https://www.sheltervet.org/guidelines-for-standards-of-care-in-animal-shelters

[8] Shelters can bring transparency to their data by routinely sharing it with a centralized registry, like Shelter Animals Count (SAC).

[9] See the ASPCA Position Statement on Community Cats: https://www.aspca.org/about-us/aspca-policy-and-position-statements/position-statement-on-community-cats.

[10] American Veterinary Medical Association/Association of Shelter Veterinarians (2020). Non-emergency relocation of dogs and cats for adoption within the United States: Best practices. https://www.avma.org/sites/default/files/2020-03/AWF-TransportAdoptionBestPractices.pdf

[11] ASPCA study on fee-waived adoptions: Weiss, E., & Gramann, S. (2009). A comparison of attachment levels of adopters of cats: Fee-based adoptions versus free adoptions. Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science, 12(4), 360-370. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888700903163674

[12] See the ASPCA Position Statement on Shelter Dog Behavior Assessments: https://www.aspca.org/about-us/aspca-policy-and-position-statements/position-statement-shelter-dog-behavior-assessments.