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Why Can't Animal Shelters Save Every Animal? · The Animal Advocate

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People ask me some version of this question all the time:
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Why can't shelters save every animal?
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Usually, I hear it after they've seen a post online about an
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animal who didn't make it out. And almost immediately,
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someone in the comments says something like, well, that shelter likes
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to kill animals, or, the people who work there just don't
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care enough. But in my experience,
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that's almost never the real reason animals die in shelters.
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The real reason has much more to do with the job we've asked
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open-intake shelters to do, the animals they have to
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take, and the resources available to them.
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And once you understand that answer, you'll see both the
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problem and the possibilities much differently.
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Welcome to The Animal Advocate,
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where we arm animal lovers with the information and inspiration
1:02
you need to become effective advocates. I'm your host,
1:05
Penny Ellison, and I've taught animal law and advocacy at the University of
1:09
Pennsylvania since 2006. If you've
1:13
ever thought, someone should do something about that, I'm
1:17
here to guide you on your journey to being that someone.
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You can find us on the web at
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animaladvocacyacademy.com, and that's where you'll
1:27
find show notes and resources, and you can And send us your comments on
1:31
episodes and ideas for topics you'd like to hear on future shows.
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So, on to today's topic.
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So let's start with the core question: why can't an
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open-intake shelter save every animal who comes in?
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Let's start with what open intake means. These are usually
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shelters operated directly by a city or county Or private
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organizations like nonprofit shelters hired by the government
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to provide animal control and sheltering services.
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Either way, they have a public responsibility or a contractual
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responsibility to accept animals from their community.
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And that means every stray dog picked up by animal
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control, every cat found injured on the side of the road,
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and every pet whose owner arrives saying they have nowhere else to turn.
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Not when there's room, not only when the animal is healthy and easy
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to place, every single one. Now, a
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private, limited-admission shelter can say, we're full today,
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call again next week. An open-intake shelter
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usually can't. So the shelter doesn't control how
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many animals arrive. They come whether or not there's a kennel
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open that morning. And that space is fixed.
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A building has the kennels it has. When every kennel
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is full and the animal control truck pulls in with 6 more dogs,
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no amount of concern adds another kennel. Now, some
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shelters start doubling up dogs or cats or putting up temporary
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crates because they're trying to make more space.
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But that creates its own problems: more
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stress, More disease transmission, and worse living
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conditions for the animals. At that point, more
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animals are coming in than the building can safely hold.
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And limited space is only part of the problem. Open-intake shelters
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also get many of the animals who are the hardest to save.
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When you're the shelter that can't refuse animals, you take
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cases that other organizations may decline.
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Animals who arrive critically ill, badly injured,
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or with behavior that may present a danger to the community.
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Some can get better, recover with treatment or skilled handling,
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but some can't. The point isn't that those animals
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don't deserve help. It's that an open-intake shelter doesn't
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get to select only the animals most likely to have good
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outcomes. The shelter didn't create the condition that
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the animal's in, but it became responsible for dealing
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with circumstances no one else had to accept.
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And that's very different from not caring. Let's make these ideas
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concrete with one real example.
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ACT Philly is Philadelphia's open-intake animal shelter.
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They have a contract with the city. They're required to accept strays and owner
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surrenders from city residents. In 2025, it
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took in nearly 19,000 dogs and cats. According
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to ACT Philly's published figures, approximately 87%
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of those animals left alive. That number, the
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live release rate, it matters, but it doesn't tell the whole
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story by itself. It doesn't tell you how sick the
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animals were when they arrived, how many had serious behavioral
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concerns, how crowded the building became, or what
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resources were available to help them. And there's another
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number to notice that shows how much sheltering depends on an entire
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network. More animals left ACT Philly through
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rescue transfers than through direct public adoptions.
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Those transfers are part of the shelter doing its job well.
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ACT takes the animal because it can't say no, then a rescue
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with the right space and expertise takes over. Foster
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homes, transport volunteers, veterinarians, and community
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organizations all become part of that animal's pathway out.
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Take those partners away, and the shelter has far fewer choices.
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And yet, that same shelter is regularly
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accused online of liking to kill animals. An
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open-intake shelter like ACT Philly can get the vast majority of its
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animals out alive, And still be judged by some
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almost entirely by the ones it couldn't save.
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So, if shaming the shelter doesn't save more animals, it
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actually turns people away from the shelters, what helps?
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Well, there isn't one solution or one program that suddenly fixes
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everything. Shelters save more animals
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when they build a real relationship with the community around them.
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They have to welcome volunteers, work with rescue groups,
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communicate with the public, and ask clearly for the help that they
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need. And then the community has to
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respond. That means you! You
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can think of a shelter's live release rate as a fraction. On the
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bottom are the animals coming in. On the top are the
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animals getting out alive. And there are lots of ways to
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change both numbers. You can prevent animals from
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entering the shelter through affordable veterinary care, spay and
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neuter services, pet-inclusive housing,
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pet food assistance, and temporary help for families in
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crisis. And you can create more ways out
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through adoption, fostering, Rescue transfer,
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and reunification of families with lost pets. But
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none of those things happens just because the shelter knows they're needed.
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A shelter can create a foster program, but it still needs people
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willing to bring animals into their homes. It can schedule an
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adoption event, but it needs volunteers to transport
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animals, hold leashes, answer questions, and help
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potential adopters meet them. It can post a lost
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dog, but it needs people to share the post, check
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neighborhood groups for missing dogs, and help find the family.
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It can ask for rescue placement, but it needs rescue groups
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willing to answer, drivers willing to transport, and again,
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foster homes waiting at the other end.
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It can create a volunteer program, but people still have to show
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up. To walk dogs, socialize cats, take
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photographs, write adoption profiles, wash
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blankets, stuff Kongs, and help
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animals get noticed. Each action may
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look small by itself, but one lost dog
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gets reunited with his family. One litter is
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prevented through an affordable spay appointment.
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One foster home Opens a kennel. One
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volunteer gets a dog out of the kennel and in front of an adopter.
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Then another, and another, and another.
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That's how the numbers change. The shelters
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that improve don't rely on one organization
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doing everything. They become the center of a network of
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people who share responsibility for the animals in their community.
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That network only exists when the shelter invites people
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in and the community says yes.
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And you don't need a big city budget to make that
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kind of change. This next story comes from Cara
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Achterberg, who some of you may remember from an earlier
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episode on managed intake and community sheltering.
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Cara runs an organization called Who Will Let the Dogs Out, And
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she's spent years visiting shelters across the rural South
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and writing about what she finds. I'll put a link to our earlier
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conversation in the show notes because she explains this work in much greater
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depth, including what many rural shelters are up against that may
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be foreign to a lot of the rest of us. So one of
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the shelters she's written about is the City of Quitman Animal Shelter in
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rural South Georgia. A few years ago, A local
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rescuer named Elena walked into a place that
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was still operating more like an old-fashioned pound than a modern
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animal shelter. Animals routinely died there.
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The conditions were bleak, and there wasn't a big budget coming to fix them.
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Like a lot of places, South Georgia doesn't have enough
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veterinarians. Spay and neuter still isn't the norm in many
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communities. Now, the city pays for the building,
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the animal control truck, and one salary. Almost
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everything else has to come from donations and volunteers.
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So Elena and a former veterinary technician named Anna
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started changing what they could. They moved dogs
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into local homes, more than 500 of them, and relied
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heavily on weekly adoption events in nearby Valdosta.
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They began coordinating with other small municipal shelters, so when
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one shelter filled up and another had a little room,
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dogs could move instead of being killed simply because there was
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nowhere to put them. They also started working on the
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reasons animals kept arriving, including spaying and neutering the
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animals that they could reach. It's still hard, make no
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mistake. The shelter still relies on donations,
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community service volunteers, and nowhere near enough money.
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But the place where dogs once had almost no chance
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is now a shelter where they have blankets, toys,
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playgroups, and most of the time, somewhere to go.
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What changed was that a few determined people began creating
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options. They found adopters. They coordinated with
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other shelters. They brought in volunteers. They got
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donations. Then more of
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the community started showing up. People became aware of the
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shelter and began to see it as something that they could be part of.
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Instead of staying a sad place that people avoided,
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it began to become a center of community activity
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built around a shared commitment to animals.
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More people volunteered, more people donated, more people
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attended events, Adopted animals, and helped spread the
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word. And every new person created another
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possibility for an animal who might not have had one before.
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That's what improved sheltering looks like. It's not usually
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one dramatic fix. It's the shelter and the community solving
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one problem and then another until the shelter has
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choices it didn't have before.
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And now we get to our Be the Change segment, and as usual,
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that means you. Because when I say the community,
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I don't mean some vague group of other people.
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I mean you. Yep. You. You don't have
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to run a rescue. You don't have to foster 20 dogs. You don't
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have to reorganize your entire life. Start with one
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useful thing That's social, manageable, and
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finite. Volunteer at one adoption event.
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That's my first ask. Most shelters hold them, and
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many are short on help. Call your local shelter and ask whether it
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needs volunteers for an upcoming event. Complete whatever training it
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requires, grab a friend, and give the shelter one
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weekend afternoon. You might help transport the dogs,
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Answer questions, hold a leash and make sure an animal gets seen.
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You'll spend a few hours with dogs who are thrilled to be
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anywhere other than their kennels. You'll meet families who may have stopped
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by for something else and leave having met their next best friend.
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Then you and your friend can go get a drink and feel good about how
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you spent the day. And I can't stress this enough,
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shelter staff cannot do this work alone. When
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I first started volunteering inside shelters years ago, that was
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my biggest takeaway. The shelter hopefully
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has enough paid staff to handle intake and adoptions
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and clean the kennels and provide medical care. But
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all the extra attention you're hoping the animals get— the
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walks, the playtime, the socialization, the
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photographs, the adoption events— And the help getting seen
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by potential adopters. Much of that has to
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come from the community, and the community is us.
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But an adoption event may not be the right fit for you. Maybe
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you're antisocial. You can foster. You can drive an
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animal to a rescue. You can help reunite a lost pet with a family.
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You can take photos, organize a food donation drive
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to keep pets in homes, Or help a
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neighbor solve a temporary problem before it leads to
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surrender. You don't have to do all of it. Pick the part
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you can do. But you do have to stop
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thinking of the shelter as a place where other people are
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supposed to solve the community's animal problems.
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They can't. Not without us.
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So, why can't shelters save every animal? An
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open-intake shelter can't control how many animals arrive.
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It can't choose only the easiest ones to save. And
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it can't create unlimited space inside the walls of a fixed
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building. It also can't do this work alone.
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Every foster placement, adoption, rescue transfer,
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reunion, And prevented surrender depends on someone in the
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community stepping forward. The people
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inside the shelter may care as much as anyone possibly can,
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but concern alone doesn't create a foster home or
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reunite a lost cat with her family. People do that.
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Communities do that. You do that.
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So pick one way to help. Give it one afternoon, One
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ride, one spare room, or one phone call.
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It may seem small to you. To the animal who gets the kennel,
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the foster home, or the ride out, it isn't
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small at all.
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That's it for today. The Animal Advocate podcast is brought
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to you by the Animal Advocacy Academy. You can find
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episodes and show notes at animaladvocacyacademy.com,
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along with a link to our Facebook and LinkedIn pages, where we discuss our
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If you have any questions on this or any other topic related to animal law,
17:04
Email them to podcast@animaladvocacyacademy.com,
17:09
and we'll make sure to get them answered. We'll either email you
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back or feature them in a future episode, or both.
17:16
And remember, compassion is great, but compassionate
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action is infinitely better. Until next week,
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live with compassion.