COMMENTARY: Hidalgo County should not open its own animal shelter

During the past 18 years, I’ve had a front-row seat to the horrors and the vast improvements in the treatment of the Valley’s stray animals. To watch Hidalgo County officials seriously investigate building and running their own large-intake facility means going back in time, back to some dark days and backward thinking when animal control officers were referred to as “dog catchers” and the “dog pound” was where animals went to die.

As a board member of what is now Palm Valley Animal Society, I remember clearly the days when very few of the animals coming through our gates had any chance of leaving alive. I remember the sounds of terrified animals being taken off the animal control trucks with catch poles around their necks and being shoved into kennels with other scared stray animals, some of them injured, sick and even dangerous. No one seemed to care what happened to them after that. I cared, but there were very few of us trying to change that dire situation and the complacent community mindset behind it.

I remember the day in 2018 when our board voted to pursue significantly higher live outcomes. Those lost, abandoned and unwanted animals deserved our best efforts, not just being killed to make space for the 100-plus animals arriving the next day. I also remember how many of our partner cities left us when our pursuit made their drop-offs more expensive.

Last month, the commissioners for our longtime partner, Hidalgo County, voted to pursue a full feasibility study for building their own intake pound. Based on the preliminary study guidelines, the option they are pursuing bears no resemblance to a shelter; rather it looks more like the Humane Society of the Upper Valley that I remember from 2005. The thousands of animals brought to this new county pound would have a five-day stray hold with limited chances for adoption, rescue or even owner reclaim. Five days.

The proposed county pound would have capacity for up to 15,500 animals per year, more than the approximately 13,000 PVAS takes in, with 20% of the staff.

County officials stress their goal is to find “the lowest cost for dealing with unattended animals,” yet the projected annual budget for this high-kill center would run substantially more than what they currently pay PVAS without the positive outcomes and the community services we routinely offer.

Our decades of facilitating “animal control” have proven that catch-and-kill is not and never has been an effective option. Statistics show that a large majority of animals picked up are within a half mile of their homes, and on average, only 12% of animals brought to a traditional government-run pound ever make it out. PVAS was the first intake center in the Valley to realize there had to be a better way.

I realize that for the Valley to get to a better place, it’s going to take vision and action from our elected leaders and better communication with their constituents about the changes needed. The recent reinvention in attitude and direction by the city of McAllen gives us a glimpse of what that vision and action could look like. McAllen is taking the lead, and more entities need to follow.

We need to get microchips into tens of thousands of pets to help them get back to their homes when they get lost. We need more low-cost spay/neuter clinics and the vets to staff them. We need to work directly with people who need help keeping the animals they love, especially those who don’t have the resources necessary for feeding and taking care of their pets.

What we don’t need is another dog pound, especially one with 154 dog kennels and 62 cat kennels that would be full within days, one where ending the lives of even healthy, adoptable animals would be a necessary daily factor.

Hidalgo County doesn’t want to be in the dog and cat business. They seem to know that and yet have approved the certificates of obligation that will keep this ill-conceived notion moving forward.

PVAS already has the property, the infrastructure, the experienced leadership and staff, the vast national connections with outside organizations that can help with spay/neuter and move unwanted animals out of the Valley into communities that want them. PVAS already provides tens of thousands of vaccinations and the quarantine facilities that keep the public safe. We’ve been at this for almost 50 years. The county needs to concentrate on the other things it does well and continue to let PVAS do the heavy lifting of their animal welfare.

Back in 2005, when I first joined the PVAS board, we were desperately trying to find ways to improve a seemingly hopeless situation. Back then, saving even one animal felt like a huge victory. I’m reminded of something Maya Angelou once said: “I did then what I knew how to do. Now that I know better, I do better.” PVAS can never go back to the dark days when animals didn’t stand a chance. I hope the county won’t go back there either.

Barbara Guerra is board president of Palm Valley Animal Society.

RELATED READING:

Hidalgo County mulls severing ties with PVAS, building its own animal shelter

Palm Valley Animal Society ‘blindsided’ by Hidalgo County feasibility study