4 investigation: a former employee of an animal shelter speaks out about deplorable conditions

Throughout the summer, former and former staff and volunteers contacted 4 Investigates, asking the KOB 4 team to look into the situation, inside the town’s animal shelters, which is transforming dogs. normally non-aggressive in dangerous dogs.

“My level of worry is very high. I quit my job so I could speak up for the animals of Albuquerque, ”said Deana Case, a former employee of the Department of Animal Welfare.

Deana Case was once an Animal Behavior Specialist for the City of Albuquerque. After she resigned, she agreed to speak to KOB 4 on behalf of the many other people who contacted her, but felt that they could not get on camera for fear of losing their jobs. She worked with increasingly stressed dogs at the shelter.

“They didn’t have a lot of human contact during their stay at the shelter. And often their body chemistry is so high that it causes permanent changes in the brain. Physiological changes occur from stress and trauma to people and animals, ”said Case.

Case believes the dog mistreated this shelter worker because he had lived in an untenable situation for too long.

“She came in to pick up her kennel and this very young herding dog that had been there for months without enough exercise, no enrichment level human contact, he manhandled her.”

Case said the employee suffered nearly three dozen bites, the dog slashed a vein and the employee was taken by ambulance. The fate of this dog: euthanasia.

Deana Case, along with several others, said that the dogs in KOB 4 are increasingly stressed due to two major issues: there simply aren’t enough people to look after all the animals and there are just too many animals.

“So that’s how full the shelter is right now. These dogs live outside because there is no room inside the physical shelter, ”said Case.

Cell phone video and photos provided to 4 Investigates show that the animals are in areas intended for short-term use, such as the admission area, where the animals are supposed to stay for a few minutes, but the dogs are said to live there. For days.

“Overcrowding issues make all animals worry about digestive problems. They develop hyperkinesia where they do stereotypies such as finger painting rotating with their poo. Cats tend to hide behind their backs under their beds, they don’t go out or socialize. The noise level is simply overwhelming and increases aggressive and anxious behaviors in animals, ”said Case.

At present, the Animal Welfare Department has a vacancy rate of 30%. The people who should be working with the dogs are just not there, and this has led to the dogs staying in their cages 23-24 hours a day for weeks or months.

“They don’t have human contact, they don’t walk around. And again, this worsens the aggressive behavior, and also the depression. Some of them just give up, ”Case said.

KOB 4 conveyed Case’s concerns to the city’s Animal Welfare Department Director Carolyn Ortega, and she admits she got creative about where to house the animals.

“We are a public refuge and we do not close our doors when we reach our full capacity. We created temporary accommodation for them because we knew we were going to be overcapacity, ”said Ortega.

Ortega said that at the start of the pandemic, she was ordered to stop sterilization and sterilization surgeries.

“To preserve PPE for hospitals,” she said.

And she believes this directive has had a devastating effect on the city’s pet overpopulation problem, and combined with a nationwide worker shortage – she recognizes the problems.

“Some of these positions are really hard to fill,” Ortega said.

But she said she had interviewed and offered jobs for positions with direct contact with animals.

Other videos and photos show the shelters violating the city’s animal laws.

The HEART ordinance requires shelters to keep animals at temperatures between 60 and 80 degrees.

But a photo of the thermostat last winter shows that the temperature inside the kennel is significantly lower than this.

“So it’s 7:30 am. It came down to 16 degrees with the wind chill. The dogs are still outside and water enters the guillotines and freezes. So it’s snowing now and there are dogs outside.

Last summer, the swamp coolers were smashed, forcing staff to bring in these powerful industrial fans.

“We brought in development people to review our air conditioning and find the best approach to make sure we are in the 60-80s according to the HEART ordinance,” Ortega said.

And the shelter has a rodent problem, staff have expressed concern that the animals are eating poisoned mice.

An email obtained by 4 Investigates reads as follows:

“Cash got sick and I suspect he ingested a poisoned mouse. He eats the mice a lot and I’m afraid this will become a problem. Gerty in B01 had dying mice in his kennel tonight.”

With all of these issues, staff wondered if Mayor Tim Keller had chosen the right person to pull the department out of this chaos. Ortega has no previous experience working in animal shelters. KOB 4 asked Mayor Tim Keller about this.

4 investigator Chris Ramirez : You have been accused of hiring a manager who is not qualified to be a director of animal welfare and has no shelter experience. Is it true?

Keller: “Well, we did it on purpose. Often in city departments where they have long-standing problems, you need a stranger. All I want from our animal welfare director is to let the experts run the service, and I want them to handle that all of this high level stuff that was happening, didn’t happen before. “

“You can’t just stack them in cages like rope wood. They are living social beings, ”said Case.

And the others she speaks for, they said it’s time to put animal welfare first.