El Paso Animal Services

El Paso Animal Services launched a new program called Resource Rover, a team composed of veterinary technicians and an animal protection officer who will be out in the community to offer education, supplies, and resources to those in need. El Paso Animal Services also opened their satellite adoption center as a temporary transport hub, which was currently empty, to assist transporters taking pets from other Texas shelters to new partners up north. In March, they hired Community and Pet Support supervisors who will lead community support services and help reunite lost/found pets. The EPAS team visited other HASS pilot shelters including Dallas Animal Services and Pima Animal Care Center to learn about operations and programs, which they hope to implement in El Paso.

El Paso Animal Services (Interim Director, Ramon Herrera) celebrated the highest-ever live-release rate of 92.54% (December.) EPAS also won the 2020 Diane & Bob Hoover Innovation Award for the Pet Finder Map, an interactive tool available to the community that offers a centralized location to view lost and found pets as pinpoints on the city’s map as well as free microchip scanning locations.

COVID hit the El Paso community and EPAS staff very hard in November, and in response, El Paso Animal Services expanded the Pet Pantry program even more to provide families that tested positive or are awaiting test results to have two weeks of pet food delivered to their homes. This allows families to safely quarantine without worrying about having to leave their homes to get food for their pets. This service is an expansion of the Pet Pantry program where we also provide weekly curbside pickup of pet food for families, and monthly pet food distribution in partnership with other local food banks. The EPAS Field Department has also been working with local rescues directly to coordinate the transfer of pets straight from the location to the rescue, rather than that animal coming to the shelter first. Animal Care Officers coordinate with rescue partners on potential pets for transfer, pick them up, vaccinate them, and deliver them to the rescue or foster. As a department, we are continuing to check ourselves to ensure we are offering compassion to not only our pets and the community, but also to our lifesaving team during this difficult time.

In October, El Paso Animal Services continued to expand its ‘Stronger Together’ services to the community by offering pet pantry and pet wellness services to targeted areas of the community. The Pet Pantry program added a second location to distribute pet food monthly along with other pantry services, and we partnered with organizations like the Texas National Guard that are assisting with pantry preparation and bagging for our events. The Animal Protection team also continued to provide assistance to families in need, including a family that were overwhelmed with the number of pets they were caring for, and needed rehoming and pet wellness support. Our team also partnered with another city department, Environmental Services, to assist the family with cleaning up their home. Through the Community and Pet Support program, 135 pets were returned to their owner or went directly into foster homes without having to come to the shelter in October.

In September, El Paso Animal Services expanded the new ‘Stronger Together’ program which provides services and support to our community. For the first time ever, El Paso Animal Services teamed up with El Pasoans Fighting Hunger Food Bank (the largest food bank in the region that serves 24 million meals a year) to offer pet food at their food bank distribution site. We also hosted numerous events that targeted areas of town that have been underserved and haven’t had the access to many of our programs and services. In September, EPAS assisted 1,060 community pets with 10,459 pounds of pet pantry food, 874 microchips and 338 vaccinations. El Paso Animal Services also presented the 2020 Fiscal Year report to City Council, which showed the success of the new Community & Pet Support program (created on some of the foundations of HASS), how much our community has supported our lifesaving efforts, and how EPAS is transforming from the traditional brick and mortar shelter system to a community wide resource aiming at supporting the human-animal bond.