JONESBORO — Amid recent complaints from animal advocates about Clayton County Animal Control euthanizing animals, Animal Control staff updated the Clayton County Board of Commissioners during its June 13 work session.
According to statistics provided by Animal Control, the total number of animals euthanized in 2020 was 125 (2.845% of all animals), 173 (2.4%) in 2021, and 382 (3.93%) in 2022.
The 2022 national average was 8.2%.
“We do listen to the advocates,” Animal Control veterinarian Dr. Margaret Chastine said. “We would like to lower our euthanasia rates even more.”
Mandatory spay and neutering will help in the long run but “it’s going to be a long-term process,” Chastine said.
As far as adopting animals out, Chastine said Animal Control has to be careful because if not, the county could get sued if an animal attacks and bites somebody.
“It pains us, but we do have to think about the liability,” she said.
Intake at Animal Control went down in 2020 because of COVID — with 2,470 animals being taken in.
The numbers went up to 3,104 in 2021 and to 3,206 in 2022.
Animal Control Capt. Jodi Turnipseed said many people adopted pets during the COVID pandemic but then gave them up once they went back to work and couldn’t take care of them. Another problem was the isolation as many animals were not socialized, which created problems later.
While there have been more animals taken in at the shelters, Animal Control has limited space and limited staff.
There is space at the Jonesboro shelter for 71 animals while Ellenwood has a capacity for 59.
As of the June 13 meeting, there were 15 Animal Control officer positions, but only seven were of those positions were filled.
“(We) lost at least one Animal Control officer who said she couldn’t raise her family on her wage — so she left,” said Clayton County Police Chief Kevin Roberts. Animal Control is under the Clayton County Police Department.
With the lack of officers, there are only two Animal Control officers working at a time in the entire county.
Animal Control at one time had an “Urgent List” of 20 animals that had been there the longest but has since discontinued that because of misinformation that had been spread on social media about the list — which had been mistakenly called a “Kill List.”
“We had a great partnership but with that also real problems,” Turnipseed said of animal advocates. “We were bombarded with emails and staff where they are getting numerous calls and were actually cussed out on the phone over the euthanasia or the ‘kill list’ as some of the rescue advocates branded the urgent list as.”
Turnipseed added that calls got so bad that staff couldn’t answer calls of service.
Animal advocates have also been voicing their concerns recently at County Commission meetings during the public comments portion of the meetings.
“I thank God for rescue groups because they do a tremendous job and have been doing so for years,” Clayton County Commission Chair Jeffrey Turner said. “We’ve got to continue working with them.”
As far as letting people know what animals are available for adoption, Turnipseed said Animal Control does several things — including an inventory that is printed out and is available at both facilities, pictures are posted at headquarters, there is a viewing room at the Anvil Block facility, videos and pictures of adoptable animals are posted on social media, and animals are posted on 24PetConnect.com.
The physical addresses and phone numbers of the two Clayton County Animal Control facilities:
Animal Control Headquarters
Animal Control Adoption Center