After-hours dumping of pets at shelter ‘unacceptable’

Published 6:08 pm Tuesday, August 29, 2017

Please take note, citizens of Butler County: the Greenville Animal Shelter is not intended as an after-hours dumping ground for unwanted animals. Recently the shelter officers discovered several dogs, cats and kittens left caged or tied and unattended on the hot concrete outside of the shelter’s Commerce St. location.

“We have had trouble with people dropping animals off here after hours on Friday nights . . . well, we are closed Saturday and Sunday and nobody is here again until Saturday evening to check on the animals,” said Christy D. Sexton, one of the city’s two animal control officers. “It’s not so bad when they do it during the week—I guess maybe it is better than just dumping the poor things in a ditch—but when you leave an animal in a cage or tied to a post and they are stuck there for almost 24 hours, that is bad, especially in the summer heat. And most of the time they don’t leave any water or food for the cats or dogs, either.”

Young puppies and kittens can be particularly sensitive to extremes in temperature, often suffering from exposure.

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Fellow animal control officer Kristi S. Sexton describes the weekend  after-hour drop-offs as “unacceptable.”

“These animals don’t deserve this,” she said.

The shelter, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Greenville Police Department, accepts stray and abandoned animals brought in by residents from throughout Butler County. Its hours of operation are 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Monday through Friday, excluding city holidays.

If some people are avoiding the shelter during the hours it is open because they think it will cost them something monetarily, they are wrong.

Unlike some facilities, the Greenville shelter does not charge anyone surrendering an animal a fee to do so. And the shelter’s animal control officers can and do go out on calls within the city limits to pick up animals.

Stray or abandoned animals in the city or town limits of Georgiana and McKenzie fall under their police department’s jurisdictions while all other homeless animals in the county are under the jurisdiction of the Butler County Sheriff’s Office.

If you can’t keep them, don’t dump them.

“Try to make some arrangements for a friend, family member or neighbor to bring in the animals for surrender during regular hours if you just can’t do it yourself. It’s the right thing to do,” said Christy Sexton.

And the shelter always welcomes those who are looking to adopt animals in need of a good home. The local supply of unwanted animals is greater than the demand for adoptable pets, which means the animal control officers work hard to find as many rescues in other states as possible that will take healthy, adoptable animals.

“We just want to find good homes for as many as we can,” said Christy Sexton.

The cost of adoption from the Greenville Animal Shelter is $100 for dogs and $85 for cats, and this not only includes spay/neuter surgery, but rabies and other basic shots, deworming, heartworm preventative (for dogs) and a wellness check.

For more information on adoption and/or surrender, contact the Greenville Animal Shelter at 382-7806.