If cats and dogs ruled the world … Oh, wait, they do. We structure our lives around them. We buy whatever food they prefer. We give them Facebook pages and Instagram profiles. And if you’re Taylor Swift, you put them in your music video.
Of the 2,077 creatures for whom Palm Springs Animal Shelter found homes last year, 986 were cats and 1,012 were dogs. The shelter also reunited more than 350 lost felines and canines with their families.
A sunny outlook foresees this month’s Clear the Shelter event, Aug. 17–18, rivaling last year’s success, when 293 cats and dogs checked out of kennel cages. This year’s sponsor is Silvercrest.
But if you think that people-pet matchmaking covers shelter operations, you’re missing the big picture.
“We provide a safe place for homeless animals and help people with issues they may have to keep animals they love,” says Dan Rossi, the shelter’s executive director.
Staff and volunteers provide an array of services, such as dog licensing, vaccinations, microchipping, euthanasia and cremation, pet-bereavement meetings, and feeding feral “colony” cats. The shelter also underwrites mobile spay/neuter clinics.
Palm Springs Animal Shelter veterinarian examing a pup.
Critical community programs include trap-neuter-return, or TNR, of feral cats (1,527 in 2023) and a pet-food bank (serving 4,482 cats and dogs in 2023). Under the TNR program, the shelter vaccinates, microchips, and treats any health issues before releasing cats to where they were found. As for the food bank, Rossi says, “The shelter purchased more than $26,000 worth of food and used thousands of dollars of donated food to help people feed their pets.”
On shelter grounds, volunteers spend time with cats and dogs awaiting adoption and, after training, may help in medical and “behavior” wards. Or they might be a human presence in the catio that houses adult felines whose outdoor-only history makes them unsuitable house pets but appropriate for properties needing rodent control.
Volunteers also perform housekeeping functions to meet the high-volume demand of laundry and dishwashing. They greet and guide visitors, assist with landscaping around the shelter, and fill a range of roles at on- and off-site educational and fundraising events.
Foster volunteers nurture kittens and puppies to the weight that they can be spayed or neutered and work with animals in need of socialization. They provide a comfortable home for animals giving birth and nursing and for those near the end of their lives.
Stray, surrendered, and animal control–seized pets often require medical attention. In 2023, the shelter’s medical team performed 3,074 surgeries. While most of those were spaying/neutering to make animals available for adoption, hundreds were to improve and, indeed, save the lives of animals. Operations included removing foreign materials that had been ingested, tumors, eye occlusions, amputations, and dental surgeries.
To help animals find homes, the shelter also participates in transfer programs with other shelters and rescue organizations.
“Last year, we transferred in six dogs [left homeless] after the Maui fires,” Rossi says. In 2023, the shelter transferred in 241 dogs and 21 cats and transferred out 105 dogs, 76 cats, and 41 wildlife.
To augment its capacity, the shelter will launch a capital campaign before year’s end.
“We have expanded into services that our facility cannot house, which stymies us from further development,” Rossi explains. “A community resources center could house the pet-food bank [now off-site in a warehouse] and provide wellness and emergency care.”
After Coachella Valley Wild Bird Center in Indio closed its doors last summer, the shelter won a request-for-proposals bid to reopen it.
“We used it over the years to bring injured birds for rehab,” Rossi says, noting that the Palm Springs building lacks the housing and experts needed to treat birds. “Our goal for the Desert Wildlife Center is to expand to reptiles and mammals.” It is poised to open this fall.
Given that statement, it bears noting that 2023’s intake at the shelter included 107 other critters: rodents, ducks, skunks, opossum, racoons, coyotes, snakes, tortoises and turtles, bats, geese, roosters, and one badger.
Though some of the 186 animals brought to the shelter by Palm Springs Animal Control were seized, others lost loving homes when guardians became incapacitated or died.
“If you have an animal, have a plan for them,” Rossi says with heartfelt sentiment.
The city of Palm Springs’ $1.2 million in funding covers only 20 percent of the shelter’s $6.1 million annual budget. The balance comes from direct donations, fundraising events (including the shelter’s annual Faux Fur Ball), and retail sales of pet products and shelter-logoed apparel for people.
Palm Springs Animal Shelter will waive adoption fees during its annual Clear the Shelter event, Aug. 17–18, thanks to a partnership with Silvercrest.
Help Is on the Way
Palm Springs Animal Shelter relies on community contributions of time and money.
“Shelters are a mystery to most people,” Tamara Hedges asserts. “A lot of people won’t go into them, thinking it will be too sad, and other people think the opposite — that every animal is going to be fine because they are in good hands with all the resources. Neither is true. It depends on the leadership of the shelter. It depends on how many community members are involved.”
Hedges has devoted time to animal causes since she was a teen and joined Palm Springs Animal Shelter’s board of directors in 2008, when the shelter was run by the city’s animal control department and its building was what she calls “horrific.”
“There was no air conditioning, only a swamp cooler,” Hedges recalls. “Now we are concerned when we have two or three dogs in a kennel; then, there would be 10 dogs in a kennel. Because there was no ventilation, respiratory infections spread among cats. Animals developed medical and behavioral issues because of the confinement. It was a small building lacking an outdoor play area for dogs. With no city funds, Friends of Palm Springs Animal Shelter built a play yard and brought in a mobile unit to house animals.”
The 501(c)(3) Friends also began raising money when the city’s allocation of funds for a new building fell $2 million short of what was needed.
The current shelter location adjacent to Demuth Park opened in October 2011. And in November 2012, the city and nonprofit entered into an agreement by which the latter took over shelter operations.
“A public-private partnership like we have is the best model to handle animal sheltering,” Hedges says. “It is hard for cities and counties to raise money for the kinds of programs the community needs for pets and their people.”
Hedges’ reference to programs includes mobile low-cost spay and neuter clinics, low-cost vaccinations and free microchipping, a pet-food bank, and low-cost euthanasia.
But the community need is greater than the shelter’s current capacity, which explains why it is developing a capital campaign, expected to launch later this year. Among plans is a resources center that, in addition to current programs, could offer low-cost veterinary care, on-site spay and neuter surgeries, pet training, and perhaps even low-cost boarding.
“We are very fortunate that we live in a community that is supportive [of causes] and generous,” Hedges says. “They just need to know that we need their help.”
For more information, or to donate, visit psanimalshelter.org.
