Shelters and Rescues

Municipal shelters are typically open admissions and have a higher pet intake rate than most rescues. They are run by a city or by a nonprofit with a municipal contract. Most run on a mixture of donations and a budgeted amount from the city served.

Unlike municipal shelters, rescues do not take in all owner-surrendered and stray pets and thus they have more control over their intake rates. They typically pull specific pets out of shelters. Depending on the rescue, these pets may be a specific breed, have special needs, be a certain age, or be a good fit for the mission of the rescue in other ways. These rescues do not have funds from the city they indirectly assist, and they rely almost entirely on donations and sometimes grants.

Through their differences in function, both shelters and rescues serve a community. Both are needed for a no kill community to evolve. The nonprofit rescues help extend the number of homeless pets that can be helped at any given time; they increase the life-saving capacity of a city. The shelters are on the front lines of intake and provide immediate care for pets given up by the public, pets found as strays and waiting for their families to claim them, and pets from cases of abuse and neglect. Both shelters and rescues help animals in need to find their forever homes.

When a shelter has a no kill objective, it absolutely needs to work with rescues to reach its goal. The shelter may get some public attention because it provides a direct service to a city and because it has a higher and more noteworthy intake and transfer/adoption rate than a single rescue might. However, when a shelter has more publicity and subsequently more adoptions and public support, there is less pressure on the rescues to take in more pets more frequently from the shelter. Conversely, when a rescue is well-known, has a large amount of public support, and an impressive adoption rate, the rescue is in a better position to help the shelter by taking in more of the homeless pets from the shelter and finding them homes. Municipal shelters can benefit from rescues doing well, and rescues can benefit from a municipal shelter’s success.

It is typical for no kill and adoption supporters to pick one nonprofit to which they dedicate their time, efforts, and donations. That model of passionate volunteers and donors has helped many organizations become very successful in their missions. It is great to support and help one shelter or one rescue, but it doesn’t help its cause to bash the other. In a community where a shelter is committed to saving every healthy or treatable homeless pet, it would be inappropriate to say that a shelter is inherently better than a rescue, or a rescue is better than a shelter. The truth is that they have different functions towards reaching the same community-wide goal.

Shelters and rescues can mutually succeed. They can help each other too when the competitive aspect is set aside. These organizations and their volunteers can pool their resources occasionally and collaborate on adoption campaigns and fundraisers. As rescue and shelter supporters, we should celebrate each other’s successes and seek ways to collaborate. The field of helping homeless pets does not have to be a zero-sum game. New adopters and donors can be attracted through creative campaigns and through generating awareness and a positive atmosphere around pet adoption. General progress and increasing adoptions throughout the community helps us all, rescues, shelters, animals, and supporters alike, in our ultimate goal of no kill.