Friday, April 16, 2004 | 4:18 a.m.
WEEKEND EDITION
April 17 - 18, 2004
The battle to end the killing of healthy homeless animals is being won, experts say, but it is a long war that has many struggles ahead, where many more lives of unwanted cats and dogs will be lost.
"Since 1987 the number of dogs and cats to be killed in shelters nationwide has been reduced from 17 million per year to between 4 and 5 million," Michael Mountain, president of Best Friends Animal Society of Kanab, Utah, said.
"The bottom lines that have reduced those numbers are that more people are having their pets spayed and neutered and more people are getting their spayed and neutered pets from shelters and not from pet stores or puppy mills."
But getting the numbers killed down to the six figures will take about another 10 years of concentrated, cooperative community efforts by animal rights organizations nationwide, Mountain said.
To that end, 400 leading animal welfare advocates from across the country will gather at the Alexis Park Resort starting Friday for a three-day conference aimed at boosting the No More Homeless Pets Movement.
Speakers will address issues such as the advancement of low-cost spay and neutering techniques that include establishing mobile clinics to rural areas and improvement of adoption techniques that include promotions outside shelters, such as outdoor pet festivals.
Mountain said his organization was part of one such Los Angeles event last month that was attended by 10,000 people and resulted in 400 pet adoptions.
"Some people are cynical and say we will never achieve ending euthanisia in shelters, but we see countries in Europe where that has happened -- where it is illegal to kill a healthy animal," Mountain said, noting that his group does not oppose the humane killing of ailing, injured or dangerous animals.
"We do these conferences twice a year in cities with significant population bases to urge animal welfare groups in communities to work together and for each to concentrate on the areas that they do best."
In Las Vegas over the past four decades -- and perhaps longer -- animal welfare groups have been fragmented and often have fought like cats and dogs.
The Animal Foundation of Nevada, which has long run the Las Vegas animal shelter and has won the contract to operate Clark County's services, makes no bones about the fact that such a situation has been counterproductive here.
"This has long been an area where there has been a lot of fighting among groups," Animal Foundation spokesman Mark Fierro said. "But it has gotten better. We have been working with more and more rescue organizations."
Fierro agrees with Mountain that the two areas that have best reduced the numbers of unwanted pets are the agency's longstanding low-cost spay and neuter program and aggressive efforts at encouraging shelter adoptions.
"We have urged pet owners that spaying or neutering their pet is the responsible thing to do," he said. "It eliminates so much suffering and is better for their pets. Spayed and neutered pets tend to live longer and tend to be less aggressive."
Fierro said unsterilized females have litters averaging about seven offspring. Left to reproduce unchecked, a single female, her offspring and their future generations will produce thousands of animals.
Since the Animal Foundation's low-cost spay-neuter program began in 1989, 168,000 animals have been sterilized, eliminating the potential for millions of unwanted animals, Fierro said.
Last year the Animal Foundation's Lied Shelter on North Mohave Road returned 2,000 lost animals to their homes and adopted 7,800 to new homes.
Also, the foundation's shelter euthanized 8,431 animals that either were put down by their owner's request, were determined to be vicious, had been held in quarantine for rabies or legal reasons, or were ill or were otherwise classified as in need of mercy.
But foundation officials said no healthy or treatable animals were euthanized because of shelter space needs or because they had been in the facility for too long.
Among the experts speaking at this week's conference will be Mike Arms, president of the Helen Woodward Animal Center in Rancho Santa Fe., Calif. Mountain says Arms is considered a leader in the field of animal adoptions.
Another will be Don Jordan, executive director of Seattle Animal Control, who Mountain said "got the ball rolling" in that community to support the "no-kill" philosophy.
The cost for three days of seminars, discussions and workshops is $225. For registration information, call Best Friends Animal Society at (435) 644-2001 or register online at bestfriends.org.
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