For The Herald Bulletin
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I want to thank all of you who responded with donations and support for Animal Care & Control in response to the column about the number of animals pouring into the facility and the July 16 newspaper article concerning Animal Care & Control.
Your response has been overwhelming, and your kindness has touched our battered hearts.
On the other hand, some of the online bloggers’ comments (or so I’m told, I don’t read them) seem to believe that the reason 488 animals came into our shelter in the last 3 1/2 weeks is not due to the irresponsible behavior of pet owners in this community who do not have their animals spayed/neutered or who let them roam and reproduce or who don’t take the care of the their animals seriously. No, it is because our adoption fees are too high.
Too high? You’ve got to be kidding me. It is $100 for a dog and $85 for a cat. This is essentially a service fee. It is now protocol that all animals adopted from Animal Care and Control are spayed/neutered.
This fee includes: spaying/neutering, vaccinations, rabies, deworming, heartworm test for dogs and combo feline tests for cats. Yes, this is higher than the $5 and $10 adoption fees of the past, but a contract was also signed agreeing to do all the services listed above.
How many adhered to that, I do not know, but it is certain that the cost was well over $5 and $10 if you took the animals to a veterinarian.
Unless a pet owner is willing to drive to downtown Indianapolis to the FACE clinic, he isn’t going to get a much better deal.
The veterinary costs for these same services — if the owner walks in off the street with his animal — vary from $120 to $350, depending on the veterinarian.
The bloggers stated that they as well as many of their friends would happily take one of these shelter animals into their homes for free. I wonder how many of these people planned on getting these animals spayed/neutered, flea medication, monthly heartworm preventative, de-wormed?
I’m sorry the bottom line is, if you cannot afford these adoption fees which provide these services and help to stop pet overpopulation and animal abuse, then chances are you cannot afford to provide food and medical services as needed for pets.
Many believe that how a community or society treats its animals is a barometer of its humanity, its compassion. It is also a belief of many that how we treat animals speaks to who we are morally and ethically. It is an indicator of how we treat our children, the disabled, the elderly and the weaker members of our society.
Many can argue and say they are just animals and how they are treated doesn’t matter, that it has no reflection on us as human beings. I will argue, how can it not?
We need a spay/neuter ordinance in this community so that animals do not suffer needlessly because there are simply too many to receive care. Animals are dumped and left to fend for themselves all too often in our community. Those, often we never see; they simply suffer in silence and fear.
Please help. Support a spay/neuter ordinance and adopt a shelter animal.
Save a life. Change a life.
Maleah Stringer, director of Anderson Animal Care and Control, is also president of the Animal Protection League. She can be reached at maleahstringer@aol.com.
