CORPUS CHRISTI (Kiii News) -
The City of Corpus Christi is looking to decrease the number of animals they euthanize by increasing the number of animals they place for adoption.
Animal advocates say the reality is that the facility on Holly ends up being a kill shelter when the animals do not get adopted, and city officials say the number of animals that get euthanized is way too high.
For the past couple of years, more than 11-thousand animals per year have come through the shelter, and close to 70-percent of those animals end up getting euthanized. The City is looking to change all of that.
How? By redesigning both the process of adoption and the layout of the shelter.
The City used to keep animals for 10 days before they made them available for adoption. That was done just to be extra cautious, but the City said they've since learned that wasn't really necessary. So now, they will be shortening that pre-adoption quarantine period to three days.
Animal advocate Cheryl Martinez, of People Assisting Animal Control, is happy about the direction the City is moving in, saying more animals will be saved, and you can play a role.
"We're going to depend on the community to help us with this so we can get more animals out of this facility, and come adopt," Martinez said. "If they cannot adopt and they want to sponsor an animal, please let us know. They can sponsor throughout PAAC, and that will cover the animal's adoption fee, and that it'll get it out sooner."
Because of the change in the adoption process, the shelter will be using more kennels as adoption kennels. The shelter has recently built a small fence that will make the adoption kennels more accessible to the public. Soon, people will be allowed to come out to the facility, unescorted, to tour the adoption kennels.
That fence was just finished on Saturday, so the City is hoping to fill those kennels up as soon as possible and get people out there to view them. They are hoping by the end of the week, folks will be able to come out and view the adoption kennels unescorted.
