ESSENTIAL DESTINATIONS

How ANIMAL PEOPLE evaluates shelters

June 2004

ANIMAL PEOPLE graded the 16 dog holding facilities that we visited in Romania, Poland, and Slovakia during May 2004 using a 14-item, 100-point scoring system meant to evaluate the quality of care, regardless of the size of the facility, whether it is funded by donations or by tax money, and independent of philosophical issues such as whether it is “open admission ” or “no kill.”

Our scoring system provides a quick index of success at fulfilling the most generally agreed upon basic functions of an animal shelter. It does not attempt to assess whole organizations––just the sheltering aspects.

We have developed the scoring system gradually over more than 10 years as a part of our own note-taking about shelters we visit, but have only recently begun to feel that it is finally clear enough and simple enough to share with others, for general use.

The scoring system can be used in either of two ways.

The most basic way is to award a shelter seven points apiece for meeting each of the 14 criteria. This can be done very quickly, if necessary, since the yes/no aspects can mostly be determined at a glance. A shelter is either fulfilling a basic function well enough that the effort is obvious, getting seven points for it, or it is not, getting zero.

A more sophisticated approach awards from zero to seven points for the extent to which the basic functions are fulfilled. This takes longer to determine, involves more subjective judgement, and produces many scores in between zero and seven, but the cumulative outcome tends to be much the same.

The first part of the score is based on the extent to which a shelter meets the “Five Freedoms” articulated in 1967 by the Farm Animal Welfare Advisory Committee, formed by the British government in response to Animal Machines, by Ruth Harrison (1964), the first major expose of factory farming.

The Farm Animal Welfare Advisory Committee became the present Farm Animal Welfare Council in 1979. It outlined the “Five Freedoms” in present form in 1993:

1. Freedom from thirst, hunger and malnutrition by ready access to fresh, clean water and adequate, nutritious food to maintain full health and vigor.

2. Freedom from discomfort by providing an environment suitable to their species, including adequate shelter and a comfortable resting area.

3. Freedom from pain, injury and disease by prevention, rapid diagnosis, and treatment.
4. Freedom to express normal behaviour by providing sufficient space, proper facilities and company of the animal’s own kind.

5. Freedom from fear and distress by ensuring living conditions which avoid mental suffering.
Meeting each of these criteria is worth up to seven points.

Items #3 and #5 may be applied to evaluation of euthanasia criteria and performance. If a shelter fails to euthanize animals who are incurably suffering, or kills animals in a painful manner, such as by decompression or unfiltered and uncooled gassing using automobile exhaust, it receives no points for #3. If the shelter kills animals in a manner that causes other animals to witness and anticipate their own demise, it receives no points for #5. An animal control facility that shoots or bludgeons animals, as some still do, would receive no points for either #3 or #5.

ANIMAL PEOPLE also awards up to seven points each if a shelter:

• Is open to public visitation and easily located.

• Is clean and attractive to visitors.

• Has an active sterilization program, meaning that at minimum all animals who are adopted out and all animals who are kept at the shelter for long enough to potentially reproduce are sterilized.

• Has an effective adoption program, meaning that the animals must be actively offered for rehoming, either by the shelter itself or by an allied organization or auxiliary, at the end of the reclaiming and/or quarantine period for newly arrived animals.

• Has an active humane education program. At minimum, the shelter must teach basic health care to adoptors, teach the importance of sterilizing pets, and advise people with pet behavior problems about possible solutions, to help keep the pets in their home.

• Has effective odor control. A shelter that stinks is not accepted as a community asset, no matter what else it does.

• Has effective noise control. Few shelters get points for this, but not controlling noise is the leading reason, worldwide, for shelters being obliged to move or close, and for community opposition to opening shelters. Tolerating excessive barking also tends to make dogs less adoptable, drives cats insane, and harms the health of staff and volunteers. At least a dozen shelters worldwide have now demonstrated that proper construction and management can keep a shelter library-quiet.

• Has effective community-based fundraising, sufficient to support basic operations plus improvements. If a community supports a place of worship, it will support humane work––but only if the citizens are asked in an appropriate manner to help.

• Is actively striving to realize potential. If a shelter is trying to improve, the effort is obvious. If effort is not seen, whatever is seen will almost certainly deteriorate.

In addition to the seven possible points for the 14 items, totaling 98, ANIMAL PEOPLE may award two “bonus points” for innovative performance.

Because ANIMAL PEOPLE usually seeks out shelters which by reputation may provide examples of good practice, those we visited on recent visits to China and South Africa all scored at or above the average range.

In Romania, Poland, and Slovakia we visited a random selection, as opportunity permitted. Most scored poorly, as a random selection of U.S. shelters would have about 20 years ago, and still would in many regions:

79 Fundatia Daisy Hope (Bucharest)
79 ROLDA (Galatzi)
71 Asociatia Natura (Bucharest)
64 Animed Arad
57 Project Campina (Campina)
57 Adapost Caini Comunitari (Bucov)
36 Asociatia Pas-Cu-Pas (Bucharest)
36 Sloboda Zvierat (Bratislava)
22 Asociatia Anima (Arad)
14 Adapostul Christi (Bucharest)
14 First Galatzi Municipal Pound
14 Second Galatzi Municipal Pound
2 Spoleczne Schronisko DLA (Warsaw)
0 Bucharest District #2
0 Fundatia Speranta (Bucharest)
0 Arca Lui Noe (Bucharest)

Animed Arad scored well on management criteria despite lacking actual kennel facilities. Project Campina, the Adapost Caini Communitari, and the Asociatia Anima in Arad each could have scored above 70 if their management quality matched their facilities.

The Asociatia Pas-Cu-Pas, starting with facilities substantially similar to the Bucharest District #2 pound and Noah’s Ark, scored much higher than the other two because the management is clearly trying to improve.