Austin Pets Alive! Forced to Close Dog Adoption Sites Due to Extreme Heat Non-profit needs new vehicles, as air conditioning in existing transport vans cannot keep up with
recent record-setting temperatures
[caption id="attachment_15045" align="alignleft" width="1600" caption="Out-of-commission vans at our building"][/caption]
Update 8/6/11: Thanks to donations from the community, we were able to get the ACs on our existing vans repaired and are operating our offsite events again. However, the vans are all old and we don't expect the ACs to last long with this heat. We are still hoping to receive donations of gently used vans with well-working ACs.
AUSTIN, August 1, 2011 –Austin Pets Alive!, a nonprofit dedicated to making Austin a “no-kill” city, was forced to make the decision to close all dog adoption sites this week due to the extreme temperatures. The organization reports that their transport vans are old and the air conditioning is unreliable, so it's in the best interest of the dogs to keep them safe and cool at their Resource and Adoption Center.
Since the dogs get more exposure and the group gets more adoptions with the additional adoption sites, closing them could set the organization back in their life saving efforts and the City of Austin back in its no-kill goal.
“We’re worried about how many animals we’ll have to leave behind to be euthanized at the city shelter since we expect our adoptions will be down without our adoption sites, leaving us unable to pull additional animals from Town Lake Animal Center," said Ellen Jefferson, executive director of Austin Pets Alive! "We really need help getting our vans updated and reliable, as unfortunately, without these vans in prime condition we just can’t function at the level needed to keep adoption rates high."
APA! has also decided to lower adoption fees for all dogs over 6 months old to just $20 at their building until they are able to start sending the dogs to offsite adoption events again. They are calling on the community to come by the building and adopt this week so that they can continue to pull dogs from the euthanasia lists from Central Texas kill shelters this week.
Donations can be made here to help the organization with AC repair costs. To donate a van, please contact us at [email protected].
[/caption]
