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RE: A Dog Named Ruger--The Rest of the Story
Mountain Mafia at its finest... Ridiculous how these people can get away with this and make you the villain. Is Tazewell County Animal Shelter still a kill shelter?
Yes, it is. However, recently they do seem to be working with some of the other local rescues, including one that, like us, they had also refused to work with for years. It defies logic why a kill shelter would insist on holding any dogs back rather than tossing them at rescues as quickly as they come in. Their kill rate has come way down over the last couple of reporting cycles, though, something I have been really gratified to see.
Laws are changing that allow shelters to blacklist proven and reputable rescues. Laws are changing about the priority they must place on adoption over euthanasia, too. In theory, I could probably fight their blacklist of my rescue, but I've learned to pick my battles. We're actually catching a lot of dogs before they even enter the shelter system, quarantining them for fourteen days (which our municipal shelter isn't set up to do,) getting at least two rounds of vaccines and deworming into them before they're spayed/neutered and transported to a low-kill region. So I think it would be counterproductive to overextend ourselves with shelter dogs right now anyway, particularly since other rescues are able to get those dogs out before their kill dates. There's been more scrutiny on the shelter lately, too. Hopefully things are slowly changing in that regard. Now if we could just get some of these local poopheads to stop breeding them and dumping them hand over fist. . . .
I’m sorry for all of that. I remember some abuse that happened at the Russell County shelter before it was declared no-kill. I used to volunteer there and on euthanasia day, they just euthanized every animal in the shelter that wasn’t a coon hunting dog. It really was despicable. They didn’t work with a rescue until they became no-kill. This area.. I swear. 😤
This might interest you, then. Russell County has a sordid past indeed.
https://steemit.com/animals/@rhondak/atrocities-at-a-public-animal-shelter