Is Council waking up to the Austin Pets Alive! scam?
Even the mayor seems troubled.
At Council's first budget work session today, finance staff went through the budget for each city department alphabetically. First up was our beleaguered Animal Services Dept.
The city animal center remains well over capacity, forcing the shelter to close intake and to house dogs in crates. The shelter has also begun to offer rescue groups $500 to shelter a large dog and $250 per small dog or cat.
On its face, this is a tragic misallocation of resources that comes at the expense of human services that I think the vast majority of taxpayers would agree are more important.
But what makes the situation even more absurd is that it is largely caused by City Council doing the bidding of a fringe animal advocacy group: Austin Pets Alive!
