 A POUND OF COMPLAINTS has landed on Mike Oswald, director for Multnomah County Animal Services.
IMAGE: cameronbrownephoto.com |
Portlanders are dog people. They take their dogs to coffee. They push for leash-free parks. Last year, Dog Fancy magazine named Portland the best "all-around city for dogs." So why, in such a canine-loving city, has the local animal shelter increased its dog-euthanization rate by 10 percent?
In 2006, 1,259 of the 4,600 dogs processed by Multnomah County Animal Services were euthanized. That's 27 percent compared with three years ago, when only 17 percent—or 754 dogs out of 4,346—were euthanized. Dog adoptions dropped by 35 percent during the same period.
Local shelter-reform activist Gail O'Connell-Babcock blames Animal Services Director Mike Oswald for shifting away from more humane treatment recommended by a 2000 citizens task force and toward protecting the public from pit bulls and other breeds perceived as vicious. Oswald says the numbers just reflect reality for most public shelters.
"For 2006, about 33 percent of the dogs entering our shelter were pit bull-type dogs," says Oswald, who notes it was only 20 percent five years ago. "The average owner is not looking for aggressive dogs. Last week we had 400 people come to the shelter wanting a family pet, not something difficult to handle."
Oswald stresses the shelter shares the same problems as shelters nationwide: more people with pets, more pets abandoned and more of those abandoned pets coming from unpopular breeds.
Some critics don't think it can be so easily explained. Nathan Winograd, a national advocate for "no kill" shelters, blames the county for inappropriate use of temperament tests to assess dogs. At O'Connell-Babcock's request, he reviewed 115 shelter euthanasia cases from 2005. He found "much to be apprehensive about in the use of temperament testing at MCAS to justify the killing of dogs under the guise of public safety, scientific legitimacy and objective 'adoptability.'"
Temperament testing involves engaging the dog to detect aggression, including touching, removing food or putting the dog in contact with other dogs. An assessment officer judges whether the dog is too aggressive for rehabilitation. Winograd believes the records he reviewed showed misuse of the testing. He says dogs were tested before they acclimated to the shelter environment, and that testing was performed on injured dogs, nursing mothers with unweaned pups, even a dog under treatment for poisoning. Winograd says behavior stemming from pain, protectiveness and illness was assessed as aggressiveness and the dogs destroyed. He says the temperament testing was "setting the dog up for failure."
Oswald disagrees, emphasizing Winograd hasn't even been to the shelter. He points out that testing doesn't take place until three to six days after the dog arrives at the shelter. His assessment team was trained by leaders in temperament training, and the shelter is one of only five in the nation recognized for meeting the highest standards of the American Animal Hospital Association.
The real problem may, as one local animal-rescue activist noted, go beyond shelters and animal activists.
"The problem is bigger than the shelter," says Claudia Wood, a co-founder of Indigo Rescue. "The problem is people don't spay or neuter their pets, don't keep identification on them, or support the taxes necessary for these services to do their job."
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He also advocates placing aggressive dogs.
Winograd and O'Connell-Babcock need to stop blaming shelter staff who must care about both the dogs and public safety.
The problem is lack of spaying and neutering, and a huge growth in dog fighting and breeding.
Until these issues are dealt with, it is beyond irresponsible to be maligning hard-working shelter staff.
Why MCAS death statistics are increasing for all species
To distract from the fact of MCAS dismal performance Michael Oswald offers a series of sorry excuses.
The agency statistics: Hiding in plain view on the agency’s website for all to see are MCAS’ own statistics for the duration of his tenure beginning March 2003. While animal intake remains about the same, deaths are significantly up and adoptions down for all species, cats and dogs alike. The death rate for dogs increased by 50% from a “save” rate of 18% in 2000 to 27% at present. The “save” rate, a calculation that allows the agency to take credit for owner redeemed animals, has little to do with the agency’s effectiveness and a great deal to do with the community. It would be like FEMA taking credit for all who stumbled to the New Orleans Astrodome on their own after Hurricane Katrina.
The unfortunate but easily documented facts are that, under Michael Oswald’s watch (a) fewer dogs and cats are being adopted and (b) more dogs and cats are being killed. Of every 10 dogs not redeemed by their owners and left to MCAS’s tender mercies in FY 2006, 5 were killed, 3 were redeemed by their owners and 2 were transferred to other facilities to an unknown fate.
The reported increase in pit bull and alleged pit bull mixes intake alleged to be up from 20% to 30% by MCAS cannot possibly account for an overall increase of 50% in the death rate for dogs. And this rate is inflated by the suspect nature of breed reclassification. What is disturbing is that once MCAS has reclassified a dog for example from Lab mix to pit bull mix his death is virtually assured. All pit bulls and suspected mixes are killed with testing scores that allow every other breed and mix to go to adoptions.
The real role of temperament testing “irregularities”: Temperament testing “irregularities” serve the purpose of allowing MCAS to sanitize killing while keeping the numbers low. Hence they need not trouble themselves about finding resources. Killing the inventory however also throws out viable income: adoption and licensing fees are tossed into the incinerator.
The covert pit bull ban: This has all the characteristics of overt breed racism. Killing healthy adoptable pit bulls as “unadoptable” allows Michael Oswald to translate his unwarranted personal subjective breed prejudice into unapproved public policy. It is deceptive and intentionally so. It condones the slaughter of a breed rather than engaging in creative humane solutions such as litter registration taxes. The latter, however, would be rejected by MCAS because so many staff are breeders who would oppose such an action.
The irresponsible public: the spay neuter excuse: Spaying and neutering has gone up significantly. That isn’t why so many are dying at MCAS. Many factors contribute to an excess of homeless animals, not just excessive propagation. There are few block parties for dog singles in the city. Idle breeding in the city is made far more difficult by leash and containment laws. Fertility and accidental breeding are far more significant factors with cats both rural and urban. But an attitude of disposability is the most destructive of all and lack of owner education about animal behavior, just not knowing how to correct an unwanted behavior, contributes significantly.
The public doesn’t pay its taxes and fees so animal control suffers: The public doesn’t like to pay taxes to kill animals but will contribute gladly out of pocket to humane organizations. MCAS squanders monies on its outdated ineffective adversarial enforcement system and kills adoptable animals who represent revenue.
The awards and fancy training programs waiver: The lessons weren’t learned; the statistics keep getting worse. Clearly what was learned by MCAS staff did not translate into practice nor does it guarantee ethical behavior. The hospital cleanliness award is a housekeeping award only and does not speak to agency practices and policies. “Clean for a day” (the day of the visit) is not a free pass from all further inspection and certainly provides no “cover” for policies and practices focused upon culling and killing. MCAS has a nasty habit of hijacking then hiding behind the deserved reputations of others much as a pirate ships once flew the Union Jack. So much for the awards.
All this and more does not excuse MCAS from accountability, standards of performance and transparency. The animals aren’t failing, the county is. It has for decades because Multnomah County government officials lack the political will to change.
Gail O’Connell-Babcock
Citizens for Humane Animal Legislation/Watchdog
www.mcasstopthekilling