New animal control contract could allow cities a reprieve

By Jeff Kearns

The South Bay cities scrambling to come up with an alternative animal sheltering agreement by July 1 may get a one-year reprieve, thanks to an Assembly bill introduced Feb. 26.

Assemblymember Elaine Alquist (D-Santa Clara) agreed to sponsor the bill after the Santa Clara County Cities Association and the city of San Jose started asking area representatives to do something to delay the starting date of the new law. Co-author is Assemblyman Jim Cunneen.

"We've been pushing to get this," Town Manager David Knapp said. "It gives us a little breathing room, but it doesn't solve the problem."

The best chance for a solution, Knapp says, is if San Jose builds the shelter and the smaller cities contract for service.

Los Gatos, Monte Sereno, and six other cities in the county, and the county itself, have been trying to figure out how to take over sheltering duties from the Humane Society of Santa Clara Valley, which announced in December that it would drop its animal sheltering contract with nine cities and the county at the end of June--effectively forcing the cities into the animal sheltering business.

The so-called "no-kill bill," authored by state Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Los Angeles), extended the amount of time animals must stay in shelters before they can be euthanized.

"It's not a bad bill, but we need more time to comply," Humane Society Executive Director Chris Arnold said. "This is not something that can be done quickly.

"The cities have had several meetings, but they're still trying to agree on how they'll work together. And once a decision is made, we'll start working with that group."

The cities and the county began their series of meetings in January, but haven't decided anything except that they should find a common solution. Where the new shelter would be built, what kind of joint agreement it would operate under, and how it would be funded are still up in the air.

With less than four months to go, it appears unlikely that a solution will be ready by the deadline. But if the cities aren't ready to start taking in animals, the Humane Society says it will continue to care for animals as long as it needs to.

The Humane Society says it will still take strays, but it is trying to do more adoptions and to stop euthanizing animals. Additionally, the organization will focus on spay and neuter education, community outreach and cruelty investigation.

To comply with the new law, Arnold says the Humane Society would have to euthanize adoptable dogs or build a bigger facility, which it doesn't have the money to do.

Arnold says the Humane Society can't do much more than wait to see what the cities decide and if the bill passes. "There's a lot of support statewide for this [no-kill bill], and it makes sense from a community standpoint as well."

In a January letter to San Jose, Arnold says the only options available to the organization if there's no new shelter by the deadline are to euthanize 70 percent of adoptable animals until a new shelter is built, refuse to comply with the law, or refuse strays, which would have no place to go. "None of these options is acceptable," the letter said.

The changes affect Campbell, Cupertino, Los Gatos, Milpitas, Monte Sereno, San Jose, Santa Clara, Saratoga, Sunnyvale and unincorporated areas of Santa Clara county.

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