posted January 05, 2015 11:22 PM            

On Tuesday, Dec. 30, Dallas Animal Services officers picked up four dogs. The owner gave the dogs to DAS in hopes of finding them a new home. They ranged in age from about one to eight-years old. The officers took the animals to the City shelter, where they were entered into the system as “owner surrenders.” Two days later, on Jan. 1, all four dogs were euthanized by DAS staff based on their health and behavior.

On Monday, Jan. 5, community members said potential homes had been found for the dogs. DAS is now conducting a complete investigation to determine if system failures and/or performance issues may have contributed to the incident. Once the investigation is complete, we will share our findings and potential next steps.

Now contrast that with what one of the two rescuers told me happened (and I must tell you that I watched some of the events summarized below unfold at the end of the year on Marina’s Facebook page):

Deborah Whittington, whom I spoke to several times today, was part of a rescue team seeking to find shelter for 27 dogs that Marina’s crew had found in southeast Dallas in small pens with no shelter. As bad weather set in after Christmas, Deborah enlisted DAS to help get the animals out of the cold. An animal cruelty investigator with the city promised the dogs would be put under a protective order at the DAS shelter while Deborah and her team looked for foster homes. He gave his word that the dogs wouldn’t be euthanized. Two days after the four dogs arrived at DAS, they were euthanized — without the animal cruelty investigator, Deborah or anyone else on the team being notified.

I can’t prove which side is right at this moment, but the city statement alleging that this was an “owner surrenders” case is about to make a bad situation much worse. Far better for DAS to have simply said they were looking into it IMHO. This release looks like they are accusing Deborah of making up her story — and that’s playing very, very poorly on social media.

ORIGINAL POST:

It’s a dark day for both the legion of dog rescuers in Dallas and Dallas Animal Services. If you follow Dallas resident Marina Tarashevska’s work on her Facebook page or became acquainted with her through this DMN editorial, you may be aware of her team’s efforts on behalf of four Aussie dogs that needed rescue in southeast Dallas. (If you keep up with her work and still have to ask, “which were the four Aussies?” that’s understandable — Marina and her supporters rescue so many stray and abandoned dogs on a daily basis that you need a score card to keep up.)

Long story short is that rescuers went to great lengths to rescue these four dogs, which were then taken to DAS with assurances that they would not be euthanized. Somehow, a dreadful mistake was made and Marina learned this morning that these four are now dead. DAS is investigating now — and I’ll post the official statement as soon as it is released.

This is a particular tragedy for so many reasons: First and foremost, the deaths of the dogs themselves, who — like all the stories of the stray and abandoned dogs on Marina’s Facebook page — had terribly sad lives and deserved second chances, not death.

Second, Marina’s group had increasingly come to trust DAS and work with the agency, and that partnership was, in turn, leading to more animals being helped. You don’t have to read far into the comments of Marina’s Facebook post about the four Aussies to see what these deaths have prompted in terms of the rescuers’ attitudes toward DAS.

Finally, a big reason for the developing trust between rescuers and DAS — as best I can tell — is that DAS head Jody Jones and her No. 2, Dr. Cate McManus, have done more than anyone ever before at DAS to work with rescuers and fosters to try to save as many dogs as possible. DAS was increasingly seen as a temporary safe haven for rescued animals as the volunteers looked for new homes for them.

I don’t have an official report yet, but I believe that these deaths will most likely be attributable to the pervasive lack of staffing — and lack of educated staff. If enough of us would pay a visit to DAS — as I have now done twice — and just witness what is going on in the intake area, my guess is that our council members would get an earful on the lack of personnel.

Here’s what it looks like: An overwhelming number of animals being surrendered all day every day. It’s hard to imagine this many people on a daily basis would be relinquishing animals. (Not to mention how many simply are dumped elsewhere.) And while the city increased some funding, it did not in the last budget increase money for staffing. There are simply not enough people in the field or in the shelter itself to manage the number of animals.

Now, let me be clear, a horrible mistake was made today. I’m not trying to skate over that. But rather than focus just on who needs to lose his or her job, I hope these dreadful deaths will cause the community to take notice.

As long as we have too few “dog catchers” and shelter personnel and as long as people willfully dump their animals all over town — particularly in the southeastern part of the city — we will have an overwhelmed Dallas Animal Services center. And that means, no matter how good folks’ intentions are, these accidental deaths will continue.

My heart goes out to everyone involved. I watched for days, on social media, as the volunteers worked to bring those Aussies safely out of harm’s way in southeast Dallas. They risked their lives — literally — over the holidays. Go back and read the details to see what I mean. This is a sorry way for those dogs’ lives to have ended. Now we have to find a constructive way forward.