Drama Dominates Spay/Neuter Discussion at San Angelo City Council Meeting

During the Public Comment session of the City Council meeting Tuesday morning at the McNease Convention Center, 501 Rio Concho Drive, Ladene Hardin of San Angelo made her way up to the podium. She introduced herself and brought up the topic that has been on a lot of minds over the past few months since James Flores, assistant director of Neighborhood Services and who oversees the Animal Shelter in San Angelo, introduced the inclusion of a low-cost spay/neuter and microchipping program. That ordinance passed two weeks ago, and Hardin said although she supports it, she does not agree with the microchipping aspect, especially after conducting her own research.

“I just want the people to know that doesn’t guarantee you’re going to get your pet back,” Hardin told city council members.

Hardin explained that the microchipping reader machine has to be in good condition, the microchip is on three different frequencies, and worse, there are some medical ramifications with the procedure.

“I found out that in some cases, and in some pets, it does cause cancer,” Hardin said. The woman then paused for a moment as she fought against her tears, took a deep breath and continued. “I live by myself, and my cats are my children. If you’re forcing me to implant a microchip that causes cancer, which one of you on the council is going to hold my hand when I have to put that pet down? Mr. Fleming, you’re my representative, are you going to come hold my hand?”

Hardin also mentioned how today is voter day, and she voted early because she plans on letting her voice be heard. That’s not all she plans to do.

“I’m letting you know right here, right now; I’m making my voice heard. This week I’ll be filing a petition to have the microchipping part repealed,” Hardin claimed. “I’ll have that filed with the City Clerk because I want my voice to be heard; and I want the voices of the people in San Angelo, who I’ve spoken to, and who want that repealed heard also.”

Hardin isn’t the only one who plans on doing something about the ordinance. Mayor Dwain Morrison said he "stood ready" to give the council 72-hours notice to rescind the ordinance if three other council members joined him. Prior to that statement, he gave his reasons why.

During the council members’ comments and announcements, Morrison read from a press release used for the Make a Difference at the Animal Shelter Day, and that’s when things got a bit testy.

“All pets will be available for adoption at the Shelter for $10 from 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. Saturday,” read the Mayor from the press release. “I applaud you on that. I think that’s wonderful. I’d rather give an animal away than kill it; but what bothers me about this is that we create an ordinance for 100,000 people in the City of San Angelo that makes it illegal for anyone of us to sell an animal in the city limits without facing a $500 per event, and that the City exempts herself from the very ordinance. That’s a double standard, and it’s wrong.”

The Mayor went on and read how this event was meant to help with the number of intakes this past week, but COSA is witnessing a bigger issue.

“We have been in this ordinance for two weeks,” stated Morrison. “And we’re already seeing animals being dumped at the shelter. We’re seeing them being dumped in the areas outside of town. People are unloading their pets because they’re facing such a tremendous high penalty for the pets, and they’re going underground. They’re dumping animals two weeks into this.”

The Mayor noted that these situations are not helping, and the ordinance is not working in the way it was promised. As he continued, James Flores attempted to come up to the podium, but the Mayor cut him off.

“No sir, this is not the comment time,” he told Flores, who wanted to respond. At that point, there was some argument about Morrison addressing the topic, which should have been addressed during the Regular Agenda session; however, Morrison noted what he had to say didn’t relate to the fees aspect of the ordinance, which would be discussed.

“This is doing a press release,” Mayor Morrison added before Councilwoman Elizabeth Grindstaff, SMD5, cut him off.

“It’s the same subject matter, isn’t it?” she asked.

“I’ll hold off then, but I think it’s a different subject matter,” the Mayor quipped.

When the low or no-cost spay/neuter program discussion began, the Mayor immediately asked if he could repeat himself. When he got the go ahead, he resumed his rant.

“I could not have written a better script than this to make the point that I’m going to make,” he said addressing Flores. “Two weeks into this and we are already seeing a high number of intakes that are at our Animal Shelter. This is not going to get better. This is going to continue.”

As he finished his sentence, Grindstaff cut in and asked, “Can they start with their presentation first before we comment?”

“I asked if I could finish my statement, and she said, ‘Yes,’” the Mayor responded looking toward City Attorney Theresa James.

“I don’t think that’s how it goes,” Grindstaff responded in kind.

“It’s not improper,” James chimed in.

With that okay, the Mayor continued, “This is a terrible terrible ordinance that is going to kill more animals than anything we’ve ever envisioned. This is part of the unintended consequences of an ordinance that is going to cause people to dump their animals. There will be more animals at the shelter. There will be more animals euthanized; and that is the exact opposite of what you told us when we voted on this. I’m going on record and will say that this ordinance is bad. This ordinance needs to be rescinded, and I don’t know how many unnecessary animal deaths it’s going to take before we realize we made a mistake.”

The Mayor finalized by saying he stood ready to give a 72-hour notice to rescind the spay/neuter/microchip ordinance if three other council members would join him.

In response, Flores said he didn’t know if he should expand on the Mayor’s comments, but he stated it has only been two weeks. The animals given away during the Make a Difference event have been at the shelter for more than 70 days, and that was the reason for the sale. That timeframe also surpassed the beginning of the ordinance.

“I don’t want to assume that because of this ordinance we got to the population we got to because of an ordinance we enacted two weeks ago. I don’t agree with that,” Flores responded. “These animals are 80 to 90 days old, and therefore, we decided our task was to try to get animals out the door. We should have done this a year and a half ago. We should have done this two years ago. We should have done this when I first started. We didn’t. We waited until we got ordinances in place and cleaned up the shelter. We’re going to continue doing $10 sales because that is the sad fact of the day. We have lowered the euthanasia rate, and no one island is going to fix this. It’s a cumulative effort of so many practices that we’ve got to be better at, and that’s what I’m trying to do at that place.”

With that, Flores thanked the mayor and moved on to fees.

The low cost spay/neuter has adopted rates that follow successful shelters, and per the council’s request, Flores provided the costs people, who may struggle with the fees, will face. Since the city hired a new veterinarian from California on Nov. 2, Flores’ staff could finally put something specific in place. Flores added that the amount for spay and neuter will be based on the Federal Poverty Guidelines.

“We need to use specific guidelines that we use for WIC and other state funded programs,” he said.

Overall, people within the 0-50 percent range of FPG will not pay, and the rest of the residents up to 125 percent can expect to pay anywhere from $20 - $40 after that. Here is the breakdown:

• 0 – 50%: No Cost
• 51 – 75% of poverty: $20
• 76 – 100% of poverty: $30
• 101 – 125% of poverty: $40

“This is going to be a new venture for us, but the goal is to stick to the guidelines,” Flores added.

After his presentation, and after council members who supported the ordinance commended the assistant director for what he’s doing at the shelter (that includes helping save the Animal Shelter $100,000 during the last year since March), and noted that it will take about two years before the city sees any major changes with the new ordinance, Flores gave one last request.

He said, “I concur with the two-year standard, and I would like an opportunity to get more than two weeks to fix the problem.”

Clarification: Mayor Dwain Morrison said if three council members were ready to stand with him, he stood ready to give 72-hour notice to rescind the ordinance. In order to rescind an ordinance, that is the necessary requirement to do so. San Angelo LIVE! apologizes to the Mayor for that clarification issue, and the correction has been made in the story.