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| - Please, consider supporting THE ANIMALS in this shelter because due to a very poor management and very low adoption rates most of them grow old and die there. I volunteered there and didn't like it since the moment I saw a volunteer application on their official web site and a $35 what they call "donation" requirement for donating my time and energy (it's $75 for a family). It's not about money, even if it was $1 I still think it's wrong and it's not a suggestion - nothing on the application indicates that you may or may not pay it. They explain that this is how they are trying to make sure that more people stick around, since only 10% of those who attend the volunteer orientation does. This was the very first red flag for me, but because they are so close to where I live I was still considering them,very reluctantly. So I paid them a visit. I was only interested in the cat room, I saw a lot of potential and after I'd been told that very-very few people come to help with kitties I decided to keep my mind open and give it a try. So I paid $35, attended the volunteer orientation, chose my days and started working in their cat room. I helped with cleaning a little bit but my main focus was socializing and playing with the kitties. That's not the point. I volunteered for probably 2 months, a couple of days a week and I was getting more and more depressed. I've never met the director of the shelter, her name is Andra Jeffress but I've heard enough about her and they were not bad things, just simple statements. First of, after seeing that kitties were not only not getting adopted hardly anyone ever comes to look at them. So my suggestions was why don't we start sharing them on FB so people know they are here. It turned out she had had a bad experience on FB and now absolutely loathed it, so no - she didn't want to promote ABC's cats on FB. Eventually she allowed me to do it on my own FB page only. All this was communicated through other volunteers who had been there for a year or so. They are supportive of her and respect her decision, whether they agree or not. They had to FeLV+ cats, who were kept separately from other cats but they also hardly had any interaction with humans, due to isolation.Those cats were never even given a chance of finding a home: they never advertised them because they were afraid that people were going to start dropping off their FeLV+ cats by their shelter.One died when I was still there, and for another one I found a sanctuary that I hand-wrote a letter to and they agreed to take her in.Well, Andra didn't let that happen,she promised she would see to it that that cat would go to another shelter where they had a room and a catio full of FeLV+cats. It never happened as I found out later. Instead of living in a sanctuary with other felines,that cat continued by herself,isolated, and died within a few months. I also contacted their volunteer coordinator via e-mail and asked her if there was a possibility for ABC cats to be at Petsmart, in one of their adoption centers. Next time I heard from her she never mentioned anything about it, if she had talked to Andra about it or not, she simply asked me if I could come and help with cleaning on a certain day. It was enough. By then, I had visited another rescue group, fell in love with their cat room and decided to switch. That's what I told her -- that I had decided to volunteer at a different shelter, with which I've been for almost a year now and I am loving it (the management is amazing, volunteers and staff -- such a huge difference from ABC). Since I left ABC I have met quite a few other people who have very negative experiences with them, either as volunteers or potential adopters. One of my friends also told me how a few years back she had tried to help them out with some marketing, hooking them up with the right people, but they didn't want to move forward or make any changes even if they were for the good of their animals. She had never told me that before I started volunteering, because she was hoping it had got better and she wanted me to have my own opinion of this place. So, here it is: this is an awful place that fortunately does care about animals and does save lives, that's why they deserve one star. On the other hand they do nothing to promote their animals or shelter, cats are treated like second-class citizens in my opinion, and I see a lot of potential adopters have had problems with them. I hope, if you are looking for an animal, you check this place out, and if you find a cat or dog you like, just bear in mind that they may give you a hard time during their adoption process. They do care about adopting their animals into the right homes but apparently they are not aware of the new guidelines provided by the HSUS on how to conduct a conversation with adopters and what to do to adopt out more animals. This place is like a stick in the mud, which is not animals' fault.Don't donate any money to them, this place is shady!
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