Dozens of volunteers met with county staff on Feb. 4 to discuss improving the animal shelter and turning its high euthanasia rate around.

About 30 members of the public and some county staff members attended the meeting, according to volunteer Becky Dill.

Dill passed around a sign-up sheet during the meeting, asking those in attendance to list their name and contact information in an effort to better organize potential volunteers.

Ben Kane, director of environmental health, is over the animal shelter and led the meeting.

Kane said the shelter is overwhelmed by a lack of staff members and volunteers, with only one full-time and two part-time employees regularly at the shelter, plus two animal control officers who are often out responding to calls and picking up animals. He pointed to shelter director Becky Wilson.

“Becky is the director of the animal shelter, Becky is the receptionist, Becky is the dispatcher, Becky is the vet tech, Becky is the cleaner, and she is also supposed to be the one that answers the phone and the doors all the time,” Kane said. “So Becky has a lot of hats down there, and when you have that many hats, you don’t get any of your jobs done great, and that’s another reason we need volunteers.”

Some at the meeting volunteer regularly at the shelter; one has put more than 100 hours in just since Christmas. Some complained that volunteers have been turned away.

Kane said he has heard about volunteers being turned away before he took over the shelter, but that if it happens again, he asked volunteers to call him. He has only been over the animal shelter for three or four months, he said.

On any given day, the shelter needs six volunteers. Kane said that ideally, there would be two volunteers cleaning, two helping in the front office, one working with rescue groups and one to answer the phone. Those volunteers would not be able to work with aggressive or rabid animals.

In order to let volunteers come in the evenings or weekends, when many are off work and available to go, Kane said that the shelter has to have a paid staff member present and that he currently doesn’t have the staff available to come in even on staggered shifts. A new part-time employee the county just hired will have only limited hours on weekends.

Kane and Dr. Fred Thompson approached the county commissioners during their Feb. 2 meeting and asked for more staff members, but the board did not immediately make a decision.

“Until Hannah (the new employee) gets comfortable, what I’d like to see is volunteers come in, clean up, help do the things that need to be done, then have two that have been trained, or three, who can do adoptions on Saturdays,” Kane said. “Saturday is the best and biggest day to adopt animals out. I can’t get Becky to go there on Saturdays because she works five days a week already. But we’ve got to wait for Hannah, it will probably take a month or so to get her trained, so we can do it. Now, if we don’t get volunteers to help clean, we won’t be able to do the adoptions, because the shelter being cleaned is the main job on weekends. I’d like to see shelter and adoptions as the main job on weekends, and that’s what we’re going to work toward.”

Kane said he wants the shelter to begin holding adoption fairs on Saturdays at Tractor Supply and other locations.

The shelter’s euthanasia rate also came up, with some at the meeting complaining that they’d been misled with promises of no or low euthanasia rates when the shelter first opened nearly two years ago.

“OK, you all want to make it a no-kill shelter?” Kane said. “I’m going to need $100 a dog per month to take care of it.”

A lack of funding and space for the animals make it a difficult situation. The shelter can only house 100 animals, and if more come in before those in the shelter can be taken by a rescue organization or adopted, some animals have to be euthanized in order to make space, Wilson said.

Kane said he was not working for the county at the time the shelter opened and couldn’t address what volunteers may have heard originally.

Kane said that as of the time the meeting was held, no animal has been euthanized since Dec. 12.

Volunteer Lindsey Erin Capell said she would begin coordinating volunteer efforts, using an online sign-up sheet to allow volunteers to sign up for specific tasks and time slots. Kane said county employee Jacqueline Rubio will also work on calling volunteers.

Kane also said the shelter is working on having animals fostered to reduce cost and space strains on the shelter.

The current main needs of the shelter are volunteers to help give human contact to the animals, including exercising and bathing them, help with adoptions and other paperwork, work with rescue groups, update social media accounts and the shelter website, organize storage rooms, volunteer at adoption fairs and clean kennels. It also needs donations of bleach, paper towels, Dawn dish soap and laundry detergent.

The shelter is currently open from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, and adoption hours are from 1-5 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Reach reporter Imari Scarbrough at 704-994-5471 and follow her on Twitter @ImariScarbrough.

Imari Scarbrough | Anson Record Ben Kane, standing, spoke to a group of animal shelter volunteers to work on a solution to improve the animal shelter.
https://ansonrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/web1_Animal-shelter-volunteer-meeting-2-4-16-2-fz.jpgImari Scarbrough | Anson Record Ben Kane, standing, spoke to a group of animal shelter volunteers to work on a solution to improve the animal shelter.

Imari Scarbrough | Anson Record Ben Kane, standing, said the animal shelter needs more volunteers and employees in order to reduce strain on staff, help with animal adoptions and care for the animals.
https://ansonrecord.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/web1_Animal-shelter-volunteer-meeting-2-4-16-fz.jpgImari Scarbrough | Anson Record Ben Kane, standing, said the animal shelter needs more volunteers and employees in order to reduce strain on staff, help with animal adoptions and care for the animals.

By Imari Scarbrough

iscarbrough@civitasmedia.com