Animal shelters across the country have been in a capacity crisis for the past two years due to rising intakes and adoptions that are simply not keeping pace with the number of animals coming in.

At the 2023 Best Friends National Conference, speakers Tori Fugate and Misty Valenta told the audience during their session that by reframing the perspective to “never let a good crisis go to waste,” they allowed themselves the opportunity to try new and creative marketing that they never thought possible - and they say you can do it too.

This week, we’re sharing a session from this year’s conference titled “Capacity Crisis Marketing.” You’ll hear how Tori at KC Pet Project and Misty at the Williamson County Regional Animal Shelter publicized their shelter capacity to their communities while still promoting their pets, programs, and services. You’ll hear unique ways to use different mediums to effectively communicate the current capacity of your shelter and engage your community to get involved. Through effective messaging on social media, email, text programs, and more, you’ll continue to see support from your community, obtain media coverage, and ultimately save lives.

• To watch the video or to check out the slides for this presentation, visit the website for The Best Friends Podcast: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-149

After a hiatus, we’re excited for the return of the Best Friends Podcast! 

To catch up on what’s been happening around the country since our last episode, we contacted the Chief Program Officer for Best Friends, Marc Peralta. We discussed what’s happening regarding intake and outcomes in animal shelters and dug into the details around some less-than-helpful news articles that came out over the last few weeks. 

Marc also shares how, when times are tough, he leans on his experiences from the past 17 years in animal welfare.

To access resources from this episode, check out the website: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-148

The period to submit proposals to speak at the 2023 Best Friends National Conference is now open! Check out this link for more information on the requirements, timeline, and how to submit: https://bfas.io/NiEM

To get us started for 2023, we take a moment to think about the year ahead. What has happened over the last few weeks and months that can help us plan for what’s coming next?

Do we expect intake to continue rising at the pace it did through 2022? Will adoptions pick up and at least keep pace with intake? What about the impact of other factors within animal welfare and beyond, such as the economy?

The senior director of lifesaving programs for Best Friends, Brent Toellner, looked at the data and trends and shared what he thinks the year ahead may look like in this week’s episode.

For more resources related to this episode, check out the website for The Best Friends Podcast: bestfriends.org/podcast

If we’re going to meet the 2025 goal of ending the killing of pets in animal shelters, we need to redefine the relationship the community has with animal shelters. What is the best way to keep people and pets together and keep animals out of shelters unless they truly need to be there? 

The community supported sheltering model invites community members to play a more prominent role in saving lives. That allows the shelter to focus on the animals who need the most help - those with urgent medical needs or behavioral challenges. For people who think they need to surrender their pet, this new model does away with the “no questions asked” surrender process. People can often keep their pets if we start a conversation and work with them to solve the problems that led to the shelter in the first place. American Pets Alive! is working with organizations across the country to pilot a community-supported sheltering model they call Human Animal Support Services. 

This week we spoke with Kristen Hassen, the Maddie’s® American Pets Alive! Director, who has been part of the team working hard to see this vision of a better future in animal sheltering become a reality.

Strategic planning is a phrase that can strike boredom in the hearts of, well, a lot of us! 

But over the last year, from the ongoing pandemic to the political division and civil unrest, we’ve seen how critical it is for us to react and do what is necessary to continue saving lives. A strategic plan can help you do just that.

This week we look at how one organization has used strategic planning to set clear direction and align everyone in the organization behind the goals and what needs to happen to achieve them. 

It’s hard to imagine animal welfare and sheltering without Maddie’s Fund. From the support of individual shelters and rescue organizations to national campaigns and the vast amount of resources and programs, online courses, and conferences, Maddie's fundamentally changed what we do and how we do it. Mary Ippoliti-Smith has been there since there very beginning and has been directly responsible for much of that impact.

Today, as a member of the Executive Leadership Team, she is responsible for the family foundation’s strategic direction.

We talked to Mary about her storied career and what she sees ahead for the no-kill movement.

As we say goodbye to 2020, we are taking a moment to pause and reflect. While many are saying good riddance to 2020 (justified!), we are also trying to focus on the positive things that have come out of what is possibly the most stressful and challenging year in more than a generation.

When the pandemic took hold, all of us were trying to figure out the best way to navigate through it personally and professionally. At Best Friends, we believed - and we still do - that sharing our experiences and knowledge provides support and inspiration to help us save more lives. We hold that belief now more than ever. We do this through The Best Friends Network - a coalition of thousands of shelters and rescue organizations across the country.

We hoped a podcast would be a positive and useful addition to the already full slate of resources offered through the Network. And the tens of thousands of downloads since we launched 273 days ago has helped us realize that it is.

So here’s to a better 2021, and hopefully, many more episodes to come.

Thank you for being part of this journey with us.

Spoiler Alert!

We want to make sure we don’t ruin Amazon Prime’s new reality show The Pack for you, so if you are planning to watch the series wait to listen to this episode until you’ve seen them all!

Mark LeBlanc and his dog Ace were one of twelve teams competing to win the around the world race that challenged the contestants - both two and four-legged - through a series of different tasks designed to test their skills. The top prize was $500,000, but the contestants also chose a charity that would receive $250,000 if they won. We won’t say who wins, but Mark’s charity was Best Friends!

We talked to Mark about his experience on the show, about his life with Ace, and learned more about his photography and the new podcast he hopes will inspire people to live their best lives.

As the COVID-19 pandemic took hold of our lives, it meant overcoming obstacles to every aspect of our work - including fundraising. The cancelation of in-person events, for example, required quick thinking to ensure the projected revenue from those annual events wasn’t lost.

It’s also been a good reminder of how we must take advantage of every opportunity, and this year’s GivingTuesday is a perfect example. Since its inception in 2012, GivingTuesday has become a worldwide phenomenon inspiring billions of dollars of charitable giving each year on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. With our communities in lockdown, effective online engagement and digital fundraising efforts are more important than ever before.

What was the outcome of GivingTuesday this year and amid the economic crisis, are donors stepping up when we need them now more than ever?

Guests:

Amy Starnes, Senior Director of Digital Fundraising, Best Friends Animal Society

Sarah Cano, Community Engagement Coordinator, Humane Society of Harlingen

In 2010 a judge put an injunction in place that prevented the city shelters in Los Angeles from not only performing any trap, neuter, return (TNR) but also barred them from talking about it with the public. The injunction was a result of a lawsuit filed by a group of people who were concerned about the impact community cats were having on wildlife.

Since TNR is the only humane method of effectively reducing community cat populations, the injunction only served to worsen the problem it sought to address. But this week, in a unanimous vote, the L.A. City Council approved a 716-page report that is a big step towards making TNR an official policy of Los Angeles Animal Services.

A lot of work lies ahead, but we should take a moment and celebrate the opportunity that now exists for both the cats - and wildlife - of the City of Los Angeles.

Animal service officers historically have been trained to function as code enforcement officers, and in many communities that is still the case. While this training is integral, it is not always a holistic representation or acknowledgment of all the tools officers have to do their work.

Continuing the discussion on moving from punishment to support, we look at changing the culture one officer at a time. Helping us all understand the systemic needs in our community and the full range of resources at our fingertips.

Before he was known as the Cat Daddy, Jackson was a shelter employee, working for the Humane Society of Boulder Valley in Colorado. He worked in several roles, including the front desk supervisor, interfacing with the public who came in to surrender their pets. It was during that time that his knack for working with cats became clear and set him on the path that would make him a household name and help millions better understand their cats through his Animal Planet TV show, My Cat from Hell.

Jackson talks about his life as one of the most recognizable figures in the world of animals, what life has been like for him and his family during the pandemic, and what he says is the most effective way to help cats who are waiting for their forever home.

A far cry from the days of being seen as the “dogcatchers,” today’s highly skilled animal care and control officers are on the front lines in our communities, helping animals in need. In the last few years, as sheltering has seen progress towards connecting lifesaving to public safety, there’s a need to restructure the role animal services has in helping the pets and pet owners in their communities.

An animal services officer is often the largest touch-point to the community for a shelter and their work is so much more than impounding pets and writing citations. They know that an owned pet in need usually means there's also a person who needs help.

How can municipal agencies rethink their approach and implement new strategies that are support-based to improve the lives of animals and humans alike?

This is the final episode of the year! And what a year it has been.

Across the country, shelters struggled to manage increases in intake, and while adoptions also increased, the boost in positive outcomes couldn’t keep pace. That resulted in many folks in our industry being more overwhelmed than usual (which is saying something). We want to thank you for everything you do to help pets and those who love them.

It’s important always to show gratitude and celebrate wins. However, it’s even more important when times are tough. So as we say farewell to 2022, we’re celebrating the success our Best Friends Network Partners achieved during the four Best Friends National Adoption Weekend events we held in 2022, during which more than 35,000 pets found homes.

We asked our partners to share their experiences with us, and we’re sharing them with you. 

See you in 2023!

Want to be a guest on The Best Friends Podcast? Send us an email: podcast@bestfriends.org

Check out the website for more information about the guests you heard this week: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-138

You see an outdoor cat. What do you do? There’s a good chance your instinct is to save the cat. An outdoor cat is a cat in need. Right?

What if that isn't the case? Many cats will spend their entire lives outdoors. They often have people who care for them by providing food or outdoor shelter. Others prefer to fly solo, not looking to us for help. Regardless, healthy outdoor cats are just that, healthy and living outdoors. Bringing those cats into a shelter can be a solution to something that was never a problem, to begin with, and could lead to that cat losing its life.

This week we hear from leaders across the country who have reexamined their approach to managing community cats. You’ll hear how they’ve implemented new programs and they share how they worked with stakeholders both inside and outside of their organizations to ensure their efforts are successful.

Podcasting is more popular today than ever before, giving listeners their choice of more than 1.5 million podcasts. While there are plenty of shows to feed your true crime habit, there aren’t too many podcasts that focus on saving the lives of shelter pets. One of the best and longest-running is The Community Cats Podcast, hosted by Stacy LeBaron.

Much more than a podcast, the mission is “to provide education, information, and dialogue that will create a supportive environment, empowering people to help cats in their community.” She hosts several virtual conferences, and the podcast helps fund a grant and mentoring program that has helped more than 50 organizations spay/neuter community cats.

This week we talked to Stacy to learn how she’s using the podcast as a way to cat lovers and arm them with the information they need to effectively manage the community cat population in their neighborhoods.

Thirteen years ago, dogs seized from dogfighting busts were considered by most organizations to be too dangerous, too damaged, too traumatized to be rehabilitated. So it was no surprise that the effort to save the dogs from the Michael Vick dogfighting case was controversial. Some in our line of work called it reckless, and others believe it to be a waste of resources.

But it is the stories of those 47 dogs that have helped millions of people understand that all dogs are individuals. They have proven that breed discrimination laws are ineffective and costly. And these misguided bans may force people to have to give up their family members. Pets who have done nothing wrong; their only crime is their appearance.

How far have we come on these issues? What is the status of the legislative efforts to ensure no dog faces discrimination for the way they look? And how successful have we been at changing the public’s perception?

A priority for Best Friends is building a nationwide, grassroots movement of advocates who are willing to work together, all driven by the belief that people and their pets deserve compassion. We need to connect with others who share the common goal of ending the killing of cats and dogs in our nation's shelters by the year 2025 - even when that means going beyond our comfort zones.

As a teacher in inner-city Boston, Kenny Lamberti realized the power that animals hold. His dog, a 90-pound pit bull named Hank, helped break down some of the barriers that prevented the kids he worked with from fully opening up. Hank's ability to get the kids more engaged, regardless of their race or socioeconomic status was what Kenny calls his watershed moment and sent him down the path towards where he is today as the Director of Grassroots Advocacy for Best Friends.

Kenny uses his background, starting with his upbringing, to drive a strategy that has mobilized more than 16,000 advocates across the country. This coalition of like-minded and diverse individuals is proving that when we work together, we can create positive and sustainable change for pets and the people who love them in every community in America.

Animal care and control services are redefining the community and embracing principles that promote safe, humane communities for people and pets. Keeping families together should be a primary goal of today’s field services operations. To do that, it is critical to understand the difference between cases of true cruelty, and when it is a case of neglect brought on by a lack of resources, knowledge, or both.

In this episode, we hear the first-hand experiences of four seasoned field services professionals. Whether you are a field services officer or not, their insights can help all of us understand not just when animals need help, but what kind of help we should offer.

In 2018, Abilene Animal Services (AAS) had a 55% save rate. That put them at 27th on the list of shelters nationwide most in need of help. The community wanted the shelter to succeed and the city’s elected officials took action.

In May of this year, Abilene’s City Council passed a resolution that approved Best Friends to take on the role of Animal Services Director. The City of Abilene officially became the latest community to join the Shelter Embed Program. This unique approach to public-private partnerships has already proven successful in other communities, including Edinburg, Texas, where Palm Valley Animal Society’s save rate increased from 34% to almost 90% in two years.

This week we chatted with AAS Supervisor, Jacqueline Hernández, National Embed Program Specialist for Best Friends, Jen Adkins, who is helping AAS save cats through a community cats program, and Mike Bricker, the Director of Embed Operations for Best Friends who has taken on the role as the new director at AAS.

Pets need food, water, veterinary care, adequate shelter, and love. But what happens when an owner can provide endless amounts of love but struggles to deliver the rest?

The lack of access to care is a major contributor to pet owners surrendering their animals to shelters. There is so much more we, as animal welfare professionals, can do for our communities. We don’t have to be their last resort. We must be a real resource for pet owners, and we should work with them to keep families together.

This week we talk to Shannon Glenn from My Pit Bull is Family. They recently launched the North Minneapolis Pet Resource Center to provide the resources, supplies, and referrals to the health and human services people need to keep pets where they belong: with their families. 

Right now we are getting hit with some of the worst wildfires and hurricanes in recorded history. There’s civil unrest nationwide, the economy is on the brink, and of course, the pandemic has turned our lives upside down.

We must be prepared to respond to emergencies - meteorological or otherwise - so that we can help pets and the people who love them.

Louisiana has been battered by storms over the last few weeks. To learn more about the situation we check in with Acadiana Animal Aid, an organization playing its usual leadership role in the Gulf Coast region. And Sharon Hawa, the Senior Manager of Emergency Response for Best Friends, gives some perspective on the state of the world along with some tips on how you can be prepared for whatever comes your way.

In previous episodes of the podcast, we’ve covered the lack of diversity in our industry and how that has affected our ability to save lives. We discussed ways that we can work on breaking down our unconscious biases and how we can focus on meaningful approaches to diversity, equality, and inclusion. But we’ve barely scratched the surface when it comes to understanding what we need to do to continue moving forward on this issue. That’s why we must keep the conversation going.

This week we share the audio from a recent Town Hall hosted by Best Friends featuring James Evans, President of CARE (Companion Animals for Reform and Equity), the Senior Director of Culture and Talent for Best Friends, José Ocaño, and Julie Castle, the CEO of Best Friends.

What do you get when you take 18 of the best and brightest lifesaving innovators, pair them up, put them on a Zoom call and hit record? You get magic!

The Best Friends Professional Development Symposium is happening next week. The two-day, online event features short, fast-paced presentations designed to keep attendees engaged and excited. But every single presenter has so much more to share. That left us with a dilemma. How do we capture more from these amazing people to share with Symposium attendees?

These videos, which we’re calling the “Innovator Series,” bring nine hours of informative, thought-provoking discussions between these leaders in our field. This week we’re bringing you a sneak peek of these conversations, and announcing a newly added bonus guest to the symposium. If you’re part of Oprah’s Book Club, then you will know who this powerhouse is!

It’s that time, once again, when we take a moment to reflect on the year (and podcast), that was. 2022 was challenging in many ways, and the 42 episodes from this year reflect that. 

Topics ranged from staffing and pay inequity to marketing during a crisis. We talked about working with elected officials - with who better than actual elected officials! We welcomed 62 guests who represented various organizations and companies, in and out of animal welfare. And to top it all off, we passed the 100,000 download milestone in the fall!  

But as we’ve said before and will no doubt say again, this podcast is nothing without you. So on behalf of all of us at the Best Friends Network, thank you for everything you do each day to save the lives of pets, and we can’t wait to see what you do in 2023.

• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 100 - Reducing pay inequality w/ Julie Castle: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-100
• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 104 - Lifesaving success favors the bold: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-104
• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 108 - Saving lives in rural America w/ Cole Wakefield: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-108
• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 112 - Marketing during a crisis w/ KC Pet Project's Tori Fugate: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-112
• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 124 - Scott Stratten: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-124
• The Best Friends Podcast Ep. 133 - A radical transformation at the York County SPCA: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-133

COVID-19 has turned the world upside down. In our lives, both professionally and personally, we’ve had to make big changes. From working at home to wearing masks to the operational changes we've had to make, life is a whole lot different than it was 6 months ago. And the restrictions on travel and gatherings meant animal welfare's "conference season" was over before it even started.

The Best Friends Professional Development Symposium is not a replacement for the Best Friends National Conference, but this dynamic, two-day, online event features many of the leading lifesaving experts from across the country. This is part of a new initiative from Best Friends, presented in partnership with Southern Utah University.

This week we learn more about the symposium from Tawny Hammond, the National Director of Learning Advancement for Best Friends.

Georgia’s efforts to save pets have come a long way in the last few years. The 2019 lifesaving progress dataset showed that statewide, Georgia increased lifesaving by more than 30-percent over the previous year. Metro Atlanta is a sprawling area consisting of 29 counties and two of them, Fulton and Dekalb, have undergone a radical transformation over the last 7 years.  

Rebecca Guinn founded Lifeline Animal Project in 2003. The organization has saved thousands of animals through its shelter and fixed more than 125,000 pets of owners at low or no cost.

In 2013, Lifeline Animal Project took on the Herculean task of running the sheltering operations in both Fulton and Dekalb Counties - the two counties that comprise the City of Atlanta. Taking on both of those contracts within 6-months presented many obstacles (and a lot of people thought she was crazy!). But Rebecca and the entire Lifeline Animal Project team's drive to take Atlanta to No-Kill has paid off, making Atlanta a model for the entire nation. 

Idaho may not be the first place that comes to mind when you think of animal welfare, but it should! Two years ago, a coalition was formed in an attempt to unite the shelters and organizations spread out over this vast, mostly rural state.

The Idaho Shelter Coalition helped drive a 49.4% reduction in shelter killing in 2019, a result that has earned them the 2020 Best Friends Network Collective Impact Award! 

It's another perfect example of what can happen when we work together, communicate our needs, and provide peer-to-peer support - all using the power of data as the foundation.

This week's guests are Nadia Novik, COO of the Idaho Humane Society and President of the Idaho Shelter Coalition, and Brittany Sundell, the Development and Education Coordinator at the West Valley Humane Society.

Fewer pets in shelters. More resources for people with pets. More animal-friendly communities. Healthier, happier animals with safe places to call home. These are our shared goals. But are we all doing as much as we can to achieve them?

For example, what does your pet adoption process look like? Is it welcoming, conversation-based, and solution-oriented? Or is it full of roadblocks such as home visits, income questions, or multipage applications?

Now more than ever, being a part of the sheltering and rescue community means actively looking for ways to keep pets in the places they call home and inviting more animal-loving folks to the lifesaving party.

Guests this week:

Rich Anderson, Executive Director/CEO, Peggy Adams Animal Rescue League

Kimberly Elman, Manager of National Outreach Volunteer Programs, Best Friends Animal Society

Spay and neuter is the only way! We shouldn’t spend time or money doing anything else!

Well, that’s not true at all, but there are still too many people who think that is the case. Widely available low-cost spay and neuter services are a critical part of the lifesaving program mix, but it is just one part of the recipe. 

So how much of your available resources should go to spay and neuter services versus other critical lifesaving programs? Given the challenges that lie ahead with an uncertain economy, we need to make sure every dollar goes as far as it can. We talked with Brittany Pace from Spay Memphis, and Alexis Pugh from Memphis Animal Services to learn about how their partnership ensures they are able to balance the needs of both getting animals out of the shelter, and keep them from coming in.

In 2016, 2.3-million Americans lived in a home that was served an eviction notice. During the foreclosure crisis in 2008, 10-million Americans lost their home. Experts believe that by the end of this year, 28-million Americans will face eviction due to the economic downturn related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Every community in every state will be affected, and by our rough estimate, more than 40-million pets are facing eviction - and that’s on the low end. As eviction moratoriums across the country are beginning to expire, there are very legitimate fears about what this will mean for the number of pets and pet parents who will need help.

Programs such as temporary foster care ensure the human-animal bond is respected and keep pets with their families, but there simply aren’t enough diversion programs to meet the expected flood of requests. What can we do to prepare for what may be the biggest challenge we've faced in the modern era of animal sheltering?

We’re gotten pretty good at saving dogs in shelters, but that’s not the case for cats. 69% of all animals killed last year were feline. That two-to-one ratio of cats killed to dogs has not improved year over year, and it’s clear that what we’ve been doing isn't effective. So what is working when it comes to saving cats?

Launched in 2014, the Million Cat Challenge smashed its goal of saving one million cats in five years. The campaign encouraged shelters to save more cats by implementing five key initiatives; alternatives to intake, managed admission, capacity for care, removing barriers to adoption, and return to field. These approaches are intended to create a structure around which shelters can make the best lifesaving decision for each individual cat.

We spoke with a cofounder of the Million Cat Challenge, Dr. Kate Hurley, to learn more about her, the challenge, and talk about what we need to do going forward to save every cat that can be saved.

Starting in the 1970s, the animal sheltering movement slowly began to reject the practice of automatically euthanizing animals surrendered by the public at the owner's behest. This service, known as owner requested euthanasia (ORE), is still offered in many communities but only after consultation with the owner and the shelter staff and veterinarians. If the animal is determined to have an adequate quality of life, then other alternatives to save the life are considered.

Making end of life decisions for our own dogs and cats is difficult and emotional, and it’s no different in the shelter environment. And while it may feel inappropriate to second-guess these owner requests, it becomes a necessity as the data shows that OREs can be a significant portion of a shelters deaths. Healthy or treatable animals that are killed may be accounted for in the “ORE column" even though they are saveable. If OREs are excluded from the data, then the “save rate” (a calculation for the percentage of pets who leave the shelter alive) will be higher than it should be if the ORE’s were accounted for differently.

The latest lifesaving data shows that more than 50,000 dogs and cats may be in this category. The number of animals killed nationally is 625,000 so this is not a trivial issue. It’s delicate and may be uncomfortable, but this conversation has to happen if our goal is to treat each animal as an individual with a chance at life.

It wasn’t that long ago that the majority of dogs rescued from dogfighting operations were killed without any kind of behavior evaluation. It was widely accepted that they were too dangerous for a second chance. That changed with the rescue of the dogs from Michael Vick’s Bad Newz Kennels. The plea to evaluate the dogs was heard, and since that time, they have served as an example of how every animal should be treated as an individual.

We have made great strides when it comes to treating every animal as an individual, but we are still lagging when it comes to applying that same objectivity to people. Our inherent biases can sometimes play out in ways we may not even realize - from racism to classism, ageism, sexism, and ableism. These subconscious isms restrict our effectiveness in saving animals.

So it begs the question. If we treat all animals as individuals, shouldn’t we do the same for people?

Every animal is an individual and their journeys are as unique as they are. Each of them has a story waiting to be told and these stories are how we connect our community to the work we do.

Writing effective adoption bios leads to higher adoption rates. Cutting through the increasing noise on social media requires captivating stories. Donors and volunteers need to feel invested in your mission before they will devote their time and money which will help you continue your work. 

This week we look at ways you can inspire action and build awareness through the art of storytelling.

Housing issues are the second most common reason people surrender pets to shelters. If not priced out by exorbitant pet deposits or monthly pet-ownership fees, arbitrary restrictions around species, breed, and size can often force a pet owner to make the worst choice imaginable.

And while it may be easy to think, "I could never do that. I would just find another apartment," consider that there may not be another apartment. Experts say we are millions of housing units short of what we need to meet demand. The critically short supply creates greater demand, often making a landlord's policies more restrictive and monthly rents more expensive.

Federal, state, and local governments are considering solutions such as tax credits and rent control, but these measures often lack pet-inclusive language. Since two-thirds of Americans own pets, any reforms that don't consider equal access for pet owners will potentially put millions of people and pets in peril.

This week we catch up with the national manager of housing initiatives for Best Friends, Elizabeth Oreck, as she shares good news out of California about a new bill aiming to keep low-income renters - and their pets - safe and housed.

For the housing and advocacy related resources mentioned this week, check out the website for this episode : https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-135

Each year, a dedicated group of Best Friends staff and volunteers compile a colossal spreadsheet with 611,000 individual cells of data. This comprehensive dataset tracks lifesaving across the country and the latest numbers are in.

It wasn’t that long ago that our field worked in the dark, not knowing where and how animals were being killed. It’s impossible to develop effective, targeted programs to save lives without this information. This changed when a collaborative group of stakeholders launched Shelter Animals Count, and shelters and rescues across the country embraced a new framework for tracking and reporting. Today more than 3,600 shelters submit their data which represents 92% of intake nationwide.

The dataset tracks the national number of dogs and cats that enter and leave shelters, and drills down geographically to the individual shelter level. This week we give you the scoop on the 2019 progress and explore the ways that this dataset informs the work of Best Friends.

America loves cats. There are conventions entirely devoted to felines and the people who love them. The internet helped spur the mania with worldwide sensations like Grumpy Cat, who have forever changed popular culture. Despite our collective obsession with felines, they continue to be the animal most often killed in shelters. More than two-thirds of cats who enter shelters lose their lives.

Some programs have proven to be effective, but widespread increases in the lifesaving of cats continue to be elusive. Why?

From the ancient mythology around cats to the cutting edge programs that are saving lives more effectively than ever before, this week we explore the question, "what's the deal with cats?"

Caring for and protecting companion animals involves strong emotions. Understanding how we feel and harnessing our feelings for productive solutions, recognizing and respecting how others feel so that we can bring them along is equally as important as we navigate lifesaving change across the nation.

Emotions impact every facet of the human experience. Decades of research shows that as we improve our emotional intelligence (EI), we can boost our decision-making, attention, memory, creativity, and relationships.

One of the producers of the Best Friends podcast, Aimee Charlton, chatted with Dr. Marc Brackett, the founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, and explored his work in emotion skills and his new book, Permission to Feel.

Just like the Best Friends goal of ending the killing of dogs and cats in our nation’s animal shelters by the year 2025, Dr. Brackett has the audacious goal of starting an emotional revolution. He is leading an initiative to shift the mindset of the nation around the value and importance of emotions.

The nation is gripped by racial tensions and division exacerbated by the killing of George Floyd, an unarmed African American man in Minneapolis. Days of protests and demonstrations in all fifty states are demanding an end to police brutality, and have underscored conversations about institutionalized racism and the treatment of people of color in American society.

Animal welfare and animal services lack diversity and inclusion, both in our staffing and how we relate to the communities we serve. The number of pet-loving people of color is into the tens of millions and addressing this is not only crucial to ending the killing of pets in our nation's shelters it is a moral imperative for all of us.

This episode we take the time to listen and try to understand how we can do better and be better moving forward in our lifesaving work.

Think about the last time you were upset in your professional life. Maybe you were angry, or sad (or both). What did you do with that emotion? Did you allow it to affect you in a way that it threw you off your game?

Our skill at managing emotions - of all kinds - can be measured by something called emotional intelligence. It’s not about removing the emotions, quite the opposite. How do you manage them so you can continue working toward your goals?

In this episode, we look at a real-life example of managing emotions during an emotionally charged campaign for change at the local level. And we introduce you to Marc Brackett, the founding director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence.

Thanks to the most accurate and detailed dataset in animal welfare history, it is possible to see the number of animals killed nationally and all the way down to your community.

Effectively using the data drives the lifesaving efforts of Best Friends. For communities that have a lot of lives to save, the embed program, as it's known, brings Best Friends staff to the community. Be it short term to help with a particular area, or, as is the case with Santa Rosa County, Florida, a full-time staff member standing shoulder to shoulder helping transform the lifesaving efforts. 

Santa Rosa County Animal Services has been progressing toward the no-kill benchmark but needed some guidance to help push through that 90% barrier. They opened their doors to the Best Friends embed programs team and their success will be the anchor to lead the entire panhandle to no-kill.

Our work has evolved rapidly the past several years as we all work to change an institutionalized sheltering system that was not designed to save lives. The operational changes during COVID-19 have served to accelerate even more change and a determined group of leaders believes now is the time for us to create a new paradigm.

Historically our focus has been on helping pets but people have not been given the same priority. Times have changed and while we’re better at the people part, this new model of sheltering seeks to turn everything on its head and serve the community in new ways.

American Pets Alive! is leading the charge with a pilot project in 13 cities* where they hope to determine if an “Animal Social Services Model” is the wave of the future.

*since the publication of this episode, New York City has moved down to a tier two community

The progress towards a no-kill nation has been remarkable. From approximately 17-million animals killed in 1984 to 733,000 in 2019. Of course, one healthy or treatable pet killed is one too many.

Saying we need to end the killing of pets is great, but it takes a strategy to help the 5,000 shelters across the country get there. And a strategy is great, but it’s even better when you get specific with your goal and add the urgency that the animals deserve. 

That’s No-Kill 2025. Working collaboratively, aligned around this common goal, together, we are ending the killing of pets in our nation’s shelters.

As governments scrambled to react to the COVID-19 pandemic, one word dominated conversations related to stay at home orders. Essential. Is the service or business, critical to the health and welfare of the community? Where do animal services fit into that picture?

While there’s little debate that animal control is necessary as a component of public safety, other elements of what we do were being judged on their merits. Spay and neuter surgeries were handled differently across the country both by government officials and people in our field. How essential are they?

We talked with leaders in three states about how they managed their clinic work during this time. And we talked with Aimee St. Arnaud, Director of National Veterinary Outreach for Best Friends Animal Society, about the larger picture of veterinary services during the pandemic, and what challenges lie ahead.

Neonatal kittens are one of the most vulnerable populations in animal shelters. The resources necessary to save them haven’t always been available but that has changed over the last few years. An ever-growing, committed group of volunteers has offered a lifeline to newborn kittens.

Our guest, Hannah Shaw, has helped in a big way. She has amassed a huge audience which she uses to educate the world on the plight of orphaned kittens. Her beautifully produced educational content is teaching countless people how to save them.

Better known to many as the “Kitten Lady,” Hannah is a New York Times best-selling author. Millions of online followers follow the progress of her rescued kittens and on top of it all, she runs a growing nonprofit that is funding projects to save kittens across the country.

It’s been a challenging year for animal shelters and rescue organizations across the country. Lifesaving gains made during the COVID pandemic seemed to disappear for many as a new set of external factors played havoc with the animal welfare industry.

Those lifesaving gains certainly seemed to disappear, but did they? Anecdotal stories from scores of individual organizations say some version of the same thing; that intake is up, and positive outcomes are down. Many say that adopters are simply not coming into their facilities as they have in the past, and there are more requests for help with pet relinquishment than ever. But what does the data show?

This week we hear from the Senior Director of Lifesaving Programs at Best Friends, Brent Toellner. He analyzed the numbers from hundreds of organizations to put our current reality in perspective.

For more resources related to this topic and others discussed this week, check out the website: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/best-friends-podcast/best-friends-podcast-ep-135

Check out Brent's editorial that has the numbers and more details talked about in today's episode: https://network.bestfriends.org/proven-strategies/editorials/reality-todays-shelter-struggles

The next Best Friends National Adoption weekend is happening December 9th through the 11th, and the registration period is closing soon. Get your organization registered right now: https://network.bestfriends.org/join-us/events/best-friends-national-adoption-event

Share your experience with us! Is your intake up or down? What about your adoptions, are folks still coming in to find their next pet? Send us an email: podcast@bestfriends.org

Stress and adversity are part of life. How we deal with it is what matters most. How do we stay gritty, persevere, and show up as our best selves even amid a pandemic? 

By building our personal resilience, we increase our ability to cope, and that allows us to face adversity head-on and stay in the driver's seat. An important goal when the animals are depending on us. 

Another in a series of episodes that focus on wellness, we spoke with Lyn Christian of Soul Salt, an expert who is helping people develop resiliency during difficult times. We also dropped in on Minneapolis, where the shelter director talked with us about her resiliency skills from 25 years in the field.

The economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is becoming clearer for municipal governments, and the projected revenue shortfalls are causing across the board budget cuts. Animal services in communities large and small are facing decisions on how to do more with less. How do you keep up lifesaving while also providing necessary services to the public when your budget is cut by 15%?

It will take community-wide collaboration, innovation, and a commitment to the animals and each other like never before.

We spoke with Ed Jamison of Dallas Animal Services as he leads his team, and community through this time of economic uncertainty.

Guests this week:

• Ed Jamison, Dallas Animal Services

The work in animal welfare, municipal sheltering, and field services can be emotionally, mentally, and physically taxing. The emotional peaks and valleys affect us all differently but over time, the impact of them must be acknowledged. The evolution of our profession has spurred a heightened recognition of the need to care for ourselves and each other so that we can continue our lifesaving work.

This is the first in a series of episodes that will focus on wellness.

The conversations and discussions can be triggering or difficult, but we must care for ourselves and each other in the most authentic and compassionate way.

This week we hear from Amanda Paris, a shelter manager who is realizing the impact ten years in the field has left on her, and Jessica Dolce shares her expertise on how you can practice "compassionate badassery."