{"id":1257,"date":"2015-08-17T18:06:09","date_gmt":"2015-08-17T18:06:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/?p=1257"},"modified":"2015-08-17T18:09:31","modified_gmt":"2015-08-17T18:09:31","slug":"naia-perspective-on-no-kill-philosophy-in-the-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/shelter-rescue\/naia-perspective-on-no-kill-philosophy-in-the-news\/","title":{"rendered":"NAIA Perspective on No-Kill Philosophy in the News"},"content":{"rendered":"

In a Garden Island<\/i> article<\/a>\u00a0on euthanasia and the no-kill philosophy\u00a0last weekend, NAIA president Patti Strand weighed in on the consequences of focusing on numbers over real solutions:<\/p>\n

\n

If\u00a0[the\u00a0Kauai Humane Society]\u00a0were pressured to “have better numbers,\u201d Strand said it would be impossible to do so without ample funding and effort to fix the symptoms. And that\u2019s something she said can\u2019t be done overnight.<\/em><\/p>\n

“What happens is the value of saving the life of the dog is valued more highly than the value of protecting an adoptive family from a dangerous dog,” Strand said. “It\u2019s this idea that, \u2018’Gee whiz, I\u2019d like to save this dog and he\u2019s only nipped someone once,’ that can have real consequences.”<\/em><\/p>\n

One of the best examples comes out of New Mexico, where the Albuquerque Animal Welfare Department last year permitted more than 100 dangerous dogs to be adopted by families or returned to them after they failed nationally recognized behavioral tests.<\/em><\/p>\n

The result was tragic: Dozens of these dogs killed or injured other pets, bit children, attacked their owners or displayed otherwise aggressive behavior.<\/em>
\n“All across the country, dangerous dogs that should not be adopted out to the public today and wouldn\u2019t have been adopted out 10 years ago are being adopted out,\u201d Strand said. “The reason is this idea that there are numbers every shelter should be hitting, and it\u2019s not that black and white. Not every community is ready to be no-kill. It\u2019s not a switch that can just be flipped.<\/em><\/p>\n

“I\u2019m absolutely in favor of the wholesome goal that\u2019s attached to the no-kill label, but you have to look below the surface to see how it\u2019s being applied.”<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

As always, the focus should be striving for the best possible standards of care — in home and in shelters — on cooperation, public education, and outreach; improvements in “the numbers” will flow naturally from those goals and improvements.<\/p>\n

\"\"

There are now many communities in the United States with open-admission shelters that do not kill for lack of space — this was considered “impossible” 40 years ago, and speaks to the tireless efforts of education and outreach, changing culture, and improved standards of care<\/center><\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In a Garden Island article\u00a0on euthanasia and the no-kill philosophy\u00a0last weekend, NAIA president Patti Strand weighed in on the consequences of focusing on numbers over real solutions: If\u00a0[the\u00a0Kauai Humane Society]\u00a0were pressured to “have better numbers,\u201d Strand said it would be impossible to do so without ample funding and effort to fix the symptoms. And that\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[6],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1257"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1260,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1257\/revisions\/1260"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naiaonline.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}