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Palo Alto reaffirmed on Monday its commitment to stick with Pets In Need as the city’s animal service provider even as some City Council members urged a broad reevaluation of the rocky partnership.
The council voted 6-1, with council member Greg Tanaka dissenting, to approve a term sheet with Pets In Need for a new five-year deal, an outcome that was all but predetermined by its vote in June.
But in a surprising twist that caught both city staff and Pets In Need executives off guard, three council members proposed Monday that the city reevaluate whether the Palo Alto shelter really needs to provide adoption services.
The idea was championed by council member Vicki Veenker, who earlier in the day toured the Milpitas facility of Humane Society Silicon Valley with council member Pat Burt. Both said they came away impressed — so much so that they began to question whether Palo Alto would be better off outsourcing adoption services to another organization.
Palo Alto launched a partnership with Pets In Need, a Redwood City-based nonprofit with a reputation as a “no-kill” shelter, in 2019. But that relationship turned sour two years later, as Pets In Need accused the city of reneging on its commitment to improve the shelter and found itself on the defensive after seven puppies died inside a Pets In Need van while being transported from Central Valley.
It hit rock bottom November 2021, when the nonprofit invoked a clause in the agreement allowing it to terminate its partnership within a year.
The divorce never materialized. The Pets In Needs’ executive director resigned and new leadership vowed to work with Palo Alto on a fresh deal. The two sides have since signed several short-term extensions. Meanwhile, Pets In Need has been dealing with conflicts between its Palo Alto and Redwood City staff and fending off allegations of increase euthanasia at the shelter — claims that its leaders have vehemently denied.
Under the terms the council approved Monday, the city’s annual payment to Pets In Need would go up from $773,580 to $1.37 million and the city would commit to at least $2.5 million in capital improvements to the shelter.
While Veenker supported the new contract, she also proposed that the city concurrently begin evaluating what types of services the local animal shelter should be offering.
“What should we duplicate and what should we not? It depends on dollars, it depends on our responsibility to our residents and it depends on our residents’ preferences. All of that I think should be looked at,” Veenker said.
Burt agreed and suggested that residents can fairly easily go to another nearby shelter — such as Pets In Need’s adoption facility in Redwood City or the Humane Society Silicon Valley — for adoption services.
“Should we be doing adoptive services? Are we best at that?” Burt asked.
The tenor of the discussion appeared to surprise both City Manager Ed Shikada and Pets In Need’s Chief Executive Officer Laura Toller Gardner, who earlier in the evening said that the nonprofit is enthusiastic about moving ahead with the deal and charting a positive course forward.
But her enthusiasm appeared to wane after both Veenker and Burt suggest that adoption may not be part of the shelter’s long-term future.
Toller Gardner called the existing system a “great hybrid” because it allows Pets In Need to move animals back and forth between its two shelters to meet the needs of the communities and the animals.
“Not being able to do that would be a significant hinderance honestly and it would need to be something we’d need to look at very seriously to understand the impacts of that — not only to Palo Alto but to our 60-year legacy in Redwood City and all our donors, volunteers and supporters there,” Toller Gardner said.
Removing adoption services from the Palo Alto shelter would make it run counter to shelter best practices, she said. It also might discourage some Palo Alto residents from adopting.
“The travel, the inability to do that in their community actually might be a barrier to adoption,” she said.
Shikada and Kristen O’Kane, director of the Community Services Department, both observed that the idea of reevaluating adoption services would run counter to the direction that the council had previously given.
“I do think we’re potentially changing the scope in ways that make it no longer attractive for them to be a partner,” Shikada said of Pets In Need. “I’d caution against doing that at this point, in entering into a multi-year agreement.”
One thing that the council had little appetite for revisiting is the idea of allowing Pets In Need to implement a “trap/neuter/return” (TNR) policy for feral cats. Much like in past meetings, council members heard from a crowd of animal advocates arguing that such a policy is the most effective and humane way of controlling the feral cat population.
They also heard from conservationists and members of the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society who strongly oppose TNR and claim that released cats pose a danger to birds and other sensitive wildlife.
Wendy Eilers, who took part in a campaign by Stanford University to reduce the feral cat population on campus, was among the proponents of TNR, which she called “the only proven humane cat to reduce the population of homeless cats in our communities.”
The council’s decision to ban TNR will only result in “more breeding cats, more kittens for whom there are no homes and more suffering,” she said.
“You cannot have a policy that’s humane and reflective of best animal control practices that does not permit the return to colony of feral cats,” Eilers said. “A ban on return-to-colony means the killing of animals at the shelter.”
Rani Fischer, a volunteer at the Audubon Society, argued against TNR and claimed that feral cats hunt birds and other species.
“TNR is especially harmful to wildlife that live and breed on the ground,” she said. “They are preyed upon by feral cats, from baby rabbits to ducklings, to burrowing owls and endangered species, including the salt-marsh harvest mouse and the Ridgway rail.”
Much like in the past, the council sided with the Audubon Society and agreed to maintain the current ban on TNR. However, its term sheet includes language calling for Pets In Need and the city to “work together to develop a transparent and humane feral cat program reflective of municipal best practices and the impact on public health and wildlife, and that maintains the current practice where PIN does not release feral cats or cause them to be released.”
Toller Gardner said Pets In Need hopes that it can work with the city and community advocates to “come up with something that is positive for birds, for wildlife and for community cats,”
“Because we all ultimately want the same thing. We want there to be many fewer community cats,” Toller Gardner said.
While most of the public comments pertained to TNR, Animal Control Officer Jeannette Washington focused on the broader issue of whether Pets In Need is a good fit for the city and whether the new contract is a good deal.
She suggested that Pets In Need, as a rescue organization, isn’t well-suited to handling all the functions of a municipal shelter and lamented that the city did not further explore the idea of bringing back an in-house model for animal services.
“The currently proposed contract asks for more money and less services,” Washington said.
Tanaka also wasn’t thrilled about the new deal and cited the growing cost of the Pets In Need contract. He also indicated that he’d be willing to consider eliminating some local services, including adoption, and outsourcing them. Palo Alto can, for example, do what Mountain View did and explore a partnership with Silicon Valley Animal Control Authority, which has a shelter in Santa Clara. Local residents would be willing to make that trip for adoption, he said.
“It’s not like they have to go to Timbuktu or all the way to San Francisco,” Tanaka said.
The council’s vote to approve the term sheet Monday sets the stage for staff to draft a new five-year contract, which will return to the council for formal approval later this year.
The Council displayed a total lack of understanding of the issues around and reason for a municipal shelter, as well as a shocking sense of entitlement for rich Palo Alto. One visit to Silicon Valley Humane Society’s state-of-the-art facility in Milpitas seemed to lead to the pie-in-the-sky idea that Palo Alto could “outsource” adoptions to other organizations, and the wishful-thinking idea that other organizations would be happy to take on Palo Alto’s surrendered pets. Here is a dose of reality: there are no underutilized shelters in the Bay Area; all are in full or over-full capacity. No shelters are looking for more animals, they are all currently doing everything they can to avoid taking animals from their own jurisdictions. And the cities that these shelters serve would not be happy to have their shelters subsidizing Palo Alto, one of the richest cities in the US.
Poor little Palo Alto can’t afford a municipal animal shelter program, so somehow Sunnyvale, Milpitas, and San Jose should subsidize Palo Alto? I suppose anything is available at a price, but the Council members brainstorming (wasting time) seemed to think this would be a bargain. It would not be a bargain and probably wouldn’t be available at all. If anything, these shelters would set a high price to take each animal from Palo Alto, and then pick and choose the most adoptable animals only. Palo Alto would be left with those that require more care and more time to find homes. Or perhaps Palo Alto would just euthanize these pesky leftovers?
The city of Palo Alto cannot figure out the best way to run an animal shelter. We are good! The animals deserve to be treated humanely and place them in a position to be adopted by families here so they have forever homes.
Is there a budget shortfall? Then review and cut the various wasted projects the city has spent money and those joining with the County where both were not financial responsible. Has the retirement age changed to 65 and over regardless of time in? Have they transitioned it to a 401k style program or still fully funded by the government. The city seems to have many staff at specific levels, perhaps too many for a city this size.
I attended the Council meeting last night and spoke in favor of Trap-Neuter-Return and of expanding low cost spay/neuter services. We seemed to be nearing some consensus when the Approval of the Term Sheet with Pets In Need seemed to be threatened by a statement from Pat Burke that perhaps Palo Alto needs to reduce expenses by outsourcing adoption. Vicki Veeneker and Greg Tanaka seemed to agree. This would change the negotiations that the City has been working on for a year and a half, and would seem to require a different Term Sheet.
More importantly, adoption of animals is the very aim, heart and desire of all shelters. This would make the shelter a totally different organization.
There was talk of outsourcing animals to be adopted, but those of us who trap feral cats and kittens know that perfectly adoptable, adorable animals are being turned away at all shelters because they are not only over capacity, but in the case of San Jose Animal Care Center, are at twice capacity.
There seemed to be a general lack of understanding of shelter duties and responsibilities among the City Council. In fact one member, Greg Tanaka, stated that he didn’t know why we even need an animal shelter, and why don’t we just ship them off to Mountain View?
The answer is: Amimals are part of our community and share this
Wonderful World with us. Even if you don’t have a pet cat or dog, you enjoy the birds and squirrels who share Palo Alto with us.
It is common decency and humanity that we care for these lovely beings.
Furthermore, there is nowhere in Mountain View to ship them. Mountain View is under the care of the Silicon Valley Animal Control center. All local shelters have certain cities that they cover.
And in the Bay Area they don’t have room for our animals.
Palo Alto, Los Altos and Los Altos Hills are areas of great wealth. Surely we can scrape up enough money to cover this basic need.
This was my 1st time attending a PACC meeting & I left feeling very disturbed about the outcome of this shelter contract for both PA & Los Altos. Despite providing council with a wealth of information regarding, not only the benefits & success of TNR (trap-neuter-return), but the abysmal results & failure of what happens without it.
I was a volunteer, board member & board president of Stanford Cat Network (now http://felinefriendsnetwork.org/ ) for many years. When it began in 1989, there were ~1,500 cats on campus. When I retired in 2016 there were <100. Today, <35. TNR is a nationally recognized model for successful management of homeless & feral cats & is further recognized as a safe program by the CDC.
Virtually every shelter in the Bay Area & throughout CA offers TNR services and it continues to be more widespread throughout the country. Yet, Palo Alto, continues to ignore these facts.
The city of Sunnyvale, where I reside, has a contract with the HSSV that offers an amazing level of services for homeless & feral cats & is supportive of all the work that rescuers do. This allows us to round up large numbers of cats, identify those adoptable, treat or euthanize very ill cats, as appropriate, & spay/neuter/vaccinate the remainder to go to a managed colony or a barn placement.
If Palo Alto cannot effectively manage their own program, we certainly don’t need them over-impacting a successfully run program at HSSV. They’ve seen the model, they can replicated it.
I further found it concerning when Toller Gardner stated they only had 22 feral cats brought to the PA shelter & placed the majority in barn placements. She made it sound as though what they did was so unique. That’s what shelters do; that’s what rescuers do. But that 22 number does not represent lack of need, it represents the lack of providing the TNR services! A complete disconnect.
I thank the Sunnyvale City Council for what they are doing.
I am ashamed of what PA & LA are doing.
Some observations on the TNR issue:
– Managing the population of community (unowned stray & unsocialized “feral”) cats mostly falls to volunteer rescuers, both organized groups and individuals.
– Animal Control agencies are not typically funded or staffed to respond to situations which aren’t critical in some way. Palo Alto is fortunate to have several officers who routinely go above and beyond to help citizens when there are cats in need.
– At best, cities support rescuers by underwriting low-cost spay/neuter clinics. Spay/Neuter clinics other than PiN in Santa Clara County have become prohibitively expensive for non-residents since the pandemic ($55/$85 now $200). There is a dearth of available appointments everywhere.
– The lack of affordable spay/neuter services will only increase the population of community cats. We’re struggling to catch up after the pandemic shuttered those services for an extended period.
– Most rescue organizations require in their adoption contract that adopted cats remain indoors at all times.
– Much of the debate between TNR and the environmental lobby is actually one between practical common sense & ideology, between years of accumulated experience & sometimes questionable statistical extrapolations.
– Ask TNR opponents what should be done with community cats? They have no viable response beyond arguing cats shouldn’t be around to threaten birds, so where should unsocialized cats go?
– Euthanasia is an act to relieve irremediable suffering. Rounding up community cats and killing them is not euthanasia, it’s just killing. It also doesn’t solve the problem!
– Cats are both territorial and opportunistic feeders. A minority who are adequately fed will still hunt. The most prolific hunters seem to be pet cats who have been allowed outside and can afford to “play.” Unfed community cats will conserve their energy to hunt for food and most are not skilled bird hunters.
– It’s rarely effective to legislate against compassionate human nature.
Viewing the PACC meeting on this topic it seemed consumed by people with the TNR topic. I thought this meeting was suppose to be about the management of the animal control center on East Bayshore and how the animals are treated while there. I am glad that the “termination clause” was called out for the resulting contract.
Meanwhile I think that we should be talking to the Humane Society in Milpitas to get an overview of what services they perform – what works and what does not work – so we can implement more succesful outcomes for our animals.