Pima Animal Care Center will be offering a variety of free services and a potential temporary incentive for fostering dogs as fireworks season approaches.
A variety of free services and a potential temporary incentive for fostering dogs is in the works as an overcrowded Pima Animal Care Center prepares for an influx of animals due to Fourth of July fireworks.
The week of and after the Fourth of July is often one of the busiest weeks of the year for animal shelters across the country, as pets “become spooked by fireworks and flee in panic,” Pima County says on its website. Last year, PACC took in 271 dogs in the week following July 4, according to a news release.
“We are completely overcrowded. We have two to three dogs in every kennel, dogs living in offices and lobbies and pretty much anywhere we can find room for them,” said PACC Public Information Officer Kayleigh Murdock. “We’re taking in 40 to 50 new dogs every single day, and fosters and adoptions are just not keeping up at the same rate.”
The shelter, which was built to house at max about 400 dogs, currently has over 540 dogs.
PACC is still trying to figure out strategies on how to take in lost pets the week following Independence Day while still caring for the animals they have now, but Murdock said there are a few different tactics currently being finalized.
“We’ll offer a special foster incentive a couple weeks before and after Fourth of July so that folks can actually get paid to foster one of our dogs for a while,” she said. “We’re also going to host a big adoption event about a week after the Fourth of July.”
She said it’s yet to be finalized, but there’s a possibility of an additional $5 per day incentive for fostering large dogs. PACC currently offers free food and medical attention for fosters.
Free microchips for cats and dogs are also making their annual return to the shelter as part of a campaign encouraging owners to prepare their pets for the holiday.
PACC offers free ID tags for pets year-round as well. Murdock said it’s important to have both so that if a lost dog’s collar is still on when it gets found, it can be taken straight home.
“Microchips are incredible. You hear about people finding pets that have been lost for three, six months because of them,” she said. “But if you find a dog with an ID tag on it, you know what to do with it. You don’t have to know anything special like (you would) with microchips.”
PACC will hold a public event on Independence Day where volunteers will read to pets and shelter animals to encourage more people to get familiar with the organization, said PACC Interim Director Steve Kozachik. He said the shelter’s main concern in trying to keep as many dogs as possible safe and away from fireworks.
“If our numbers continue to trend upward by Fourth of July, we could be hitting 575 or close to 600,” Kozachik said. “That is a safety issue for the animals in this shelter (and) it’s a safety issue for our staff and for volunteers.”
He said PACC has distributed microchip scanners to the administrative buildings at Reid Park, 900 S. Randolph Way, and the Quincie Douglas Center, 1575 E 36th St., for those who find animals closer to those locations.
