MOAS responds to Oglethorpe Commissioners’ statements regarding the use of MOAS as an impound facility for Oglethorpe County
The Madison-Oglethorpe Animal Shelter (MOAS) Board of Directors (Board) has been following the developments in Oglethorpe County closely as the Oglethorpe County Board of Commissioners (BOC) has worked to create and implement local ordinances regarding the control of animals. While the Board applauds the BOC’s efforts towards improving the significant animal control and welfare issues that Oglethorpe County is facing, the Board has repeatedly made it clear to the BOC that MOAS cannot impound animals directly from county code enforcement personnel (serve as an impound facility) and that it is not legally obligated to do so. MOAS does not have the legal authority nor space or resources to act in this capacity.
The Board understands that the legal nuances of this matter can be a source of confusion; but to be clear, MOAS has operated for almost twenty years under a contract to accept unwanted and abandoned animals from Madison and Oglethorpe residents. MOAS has traditionally also accepted stray animals from Madison and Oglethorpe residents as a courtesy given that many residents do not have the resources to hold a stray animal themselves or to locate its owner. However, during this entire time, MOAS has never served as an impound facility for either county.[1]
Unlike a private animal shelter such as MOAS, an impound facility is designed, first and foremost, to provide a safe and secure place to hold found or seized animals for the mandatory legal stray hold period while government staff attempt to locate an owner based on what they know about the animal, which can include tag and/or microchip information, or attempts to contact residents near where the animal was found. Impound facilities that are not part of a larger animal shelter are typically designed to provide temporary housing for an animal until its owner can be found, and they provide a centralized government location for residents to contact and/or visit to try to recover their lost pet.
Both Madison and Oglethorpe counties have a 72-hour stray hold period established by ordinance. Until an animal has been held for that mandatory 72-hour period, the government does not have any legal ownership of the animal; they are merely its temporary caretakers. They are restricted in how they may handle the animal and the care they can legally provide to it. After that 72-hour period has passed, legal ownership then passes to the county, and the animal can be disposed of by any lawful means, which typically means that the animal can be adopted out or transferred to a shelter or rescue. For example, if an animal is not reclaimed from Madison County Animal Control (MCAC) within that 72-hour window, MCAC transfers the animal to MOAS where it can then immediately be adopted out, placed in a foster home, or transferred to a rescue group. The Board would be happy for MOAS to provide this same service to Oglethorpe County, provided that Oglethorpe County establish its own impound facility for the initial 72-hour stray hold of animals seized by its code enforcement officer, but to date, the BOC has rejected this approach.
When comparing the actions of a citizen bringing in a stray animal to the work of a code enforcement officer tasked with enforcing animal control ordinances, the BOC fails to appreciate that a citizen may bring in an animal once every few years, while a code enforcement officer has the potential to overwhelm the shelter’s already limited capacity by bringing in multiple animals every single day. What’s more problematic is that those animals would all have to be held by the shelter for the 72-hour stray hold, meaning that if the code enforcement officer brings in ten animals, none of those animals can leave the shelter or even receive significant medical treatment (including spay/neuter) during this time because the shelter would not legally own those animals. Put another way, that means that ten kennels cannot be used for any other animals for at least three days. In comparison, if ten citizens surrender ten animals to MOAS that they legally own, those animals can immediately be adopted out, sent to foster homes, transferred to a rescue group, or sent on a transport to a northern shelter. While it may or may not happen, those ten animals brought in by private citizens could conceivably leave the shelter the next day freeing up valuable kennel space for the next ten to come in. While ten kennels may not seem like a lot, during the busy summer months having ten kennels (approximately 10% of our kennel space) that cannot be used for any other purpose for at least three days could mean the difference between life and death for the next ten animals that are brought in by citizens.
This is one of the reasons that MOAS’ relationship with MCAC is so valuable. MCAC serves that vital initial impound role for Madison County and provides an opportunity for owners to reclaim their pets without affecting MOAS’ capacity. Many animals that are picked up by MCAC will never set foot in the shelter. It is only after the animal has completed its stray hold and is available for adoption that MCAC transfers the animal to MOAS. MOAS is also grateful that MCAC is sensitive to the space limitations at the shelter and often works with shelter staff to coordinate when animal control officers will transfer animals to help MOAS avoid going over its capacity. The fact that MCAC is often able to hold an animal for an extra day while staff work with foster parents and local rescues to make space is critical to the shelter’s life-saving mission.
Furthermore, being responsible for animals that are being held for a legal stray hold without being involved in the attempts to reunify pets with their presumptive owners and without having any direct knowledge as to what efforts are (or are not) being made to reunify said animals could expose MOAS to significant legal liability that could jeopardize the shelter’s future.
Perhaps most importantly, impound facilities serve a critical role in providing safe and secure quarantine holding areas that are designed to ensure that an aggressive and/or potentially rabid animal can be secured in a space where the public does not have access to the animal and where staff can safely manage the animal without risk of injury to themselves or others. When an animal has bitten another animal or a person, been bitten by another animal, or is otherwise suspected of having been exposed to rabies, the animal must undergo a 10-day quarantine to see if it develops symptoms of rabies. Unfortunately, MOAS does not have the infrastructure necessary to safely hold rabies quarantine animals as all of the shelter’s runs are open to the public and were not designed for this purpose.
While MOAS is incapable of serving as Oglethorpe County’s impound facility for all of the reasons detailed above, the Board certainly hopes to be a resource for Oglethorpe County as it moves forward with its efforts to address its animal welfare challenges. We look forward to continuing to be a valuable resource for Oglethorpe County citizens, and we welcome the opportunity to assist the BOC should it choose to construct an impound facility similar to MCAC.
—————————
[1] Madison County Animal Control has always served that function in Madison County, and Oglethorpe has only just created a position responsible for enforcing animal ordinances.