PROPOSED WAYSIDE (GRAGG PARK) FACILITY
On December 18, 2009, then mayor, Bill White, announced a planned $11 million animal campus, including a pet adoption center at Gragg Park (2999 Wayside). This facility will be paid for by:
1) funds won in the city's lawsuit against the Ann Young estate (1.7 million);
2) CIP Funds - Houstonians' tax dollars (1.2 million); and
3) donations that the city plans to receive from citizens (7-9 million).
Although it is welcome news that the city is planning to increase adoption sites for BARC animals, the choice of location is an imprudent choice for a pet adoption center if the goal is to increase adoptions. We have asked Mayor Parker and city council to re-evaluate the wisdom of choosing this location. So far, all but Councilmember Bradford have refused.
As discussed in Nathan Winograd's recent assessment report, part of the reason for BARC’s high kill rate is its physical location. Winograd states that BARC "… is in a warehouse/industrial district far removed from retail, residential, recreation, and other prime sectors of the city. It was built in an area of the city with no foot traffic, no retail traffic, far away from where people live, work, and play, ensuring it would be 'out of sight, out of mind'.... BARC appears to have been built for the purpose of warehousing and killing animals at the lowest possible cost". The proposed Gragg Park location is very much like BARC's current Carr St. location. Neither location is suitable for an adoption facility if the city’s goal is to increase the number of adopters going to BARC. Locating BARC’s new adoption center at the Gragg Park location will be a death sentence for dogs and cats who would otherwise find loving homes if they were housed and shown in high traffic locations.
High volume adoptions can only be maintained by having adoption venues in high traffic, highly visible locations all over the city.
Winograd has said “One of the primary inhibitors to maximizing adoptions for most shelters is the physical location of the shelter. Shelters tend to be placed in outlying parts of the city, far away from centers of commerce, retail and prime residential neighborhoods… far away from where the vast majority of adopters, volunteers and other members of the community work, live and play.” This precisely describes both the Carr St. and Gragg Park locations.
The city should emulate successful No Kill shelters such as the San Francisco SPCA which stopped killing by increasing their adoptions astronomically. They did this by making the animals available for adoption where people live, work and play, not by relocating them to other remote parts of the city. They had an intense focus on maximizing adoptions, and eliminating the hurdles that reduce them.
Instead of spending millions of dollars on a pet adoption center in a location that is hidden away from the vast majority of thousands of potential adopters, the city should secure venues in high traffic, highly visible areas. This wouldn’t necessarily require building new facilities. There are empty retail spaces all over the city that would be excellent locations for adoption facilities.
The city of Houston must invest in many more offsite adoption venues in high traffic, highly visible areas of Houston. The highly successful adoption event that No Kill Houston and Frisky Paws organized in the Westchase area is proof that these types of venues would greatly increase the number of animals adopted from BARC. BARC needs many of these venues all over Houston’s 600 square miles to reach as many potential adopters as possible.
In addition to the above described problem, the Gragg Park site is in a zip code in which BARC picks up the most cats in the city (77023). In fact, BARC picks up more cats from this area than from BARC's Carr St. location (77026). BARC also picks up a very large number of dogs in the Gragg Park zip code. See maps below showing intake numbers by zip code.
People living in this area are not likely to adopt a pet from BARC when they are asking BARC to pick up the largest number of cats and dogs in the city. In fact, by placing a BARC facility at Gragg Park, the city will make it more convenient for people in this area to abandon more animals, while making it more difficult for other people to adopt them. Making it easy to surrender and hard to adopt will not result in lowering of the kill rate and will certainly not lead Houston to becoming a No Kill city.
We want BARC to stop the killing. However, to do this, the city needs to make choices that have been proven to be successful in other communities. We do not want more of the same that we've had in years past (i.e. an adoption facility hidden away from the adopting public)which only leads to more deaths.
Please send a letter to the mayor and city council asking them to reconsider the location for the planned adoption facility on Wayside.
We have created a letter to make it really easy. Just click on the Take Action link below.
Ltr-Wayside.pdf
Adobe Acrobat document [144.2 KB]
Click to hear Bett Sundermeyer's radio interview regarding why the planned Wayside location is a horrible idea for a pet adoption facility. (The interview starts right after the traffic report).
WaysideIV2010-02-23.mp3
MP3 audio file [5.1 MB]
NathanWinogradShelter-RelocationReport[1[...]
Adobe Acrobat document [232.1 KB]
A letter from March Parker stating that she will do everything in her power to ensure that Houston transitions to a no-kill community.
MayorParkerFeb2010.pdf
Adobe Acrobat document [424.0 KB]
UPDATE JANUARY 27, 2010
Councilmember C.O. Bradford called me to tell me that he read my letter regarding the proposed Wayside location and that he agreed with me. He said he was
opposed to building a pet adoption facility at this location. He also said he would talk to other councilmembers to find out their thoughts as well.
I sincerely appreciate that councilmember Bradford took the time to read what I prepared and that he is lending some thoughtful consideration into how we can drop the kill rate at BARC.
We need more Councilmembers like this. Let's hope they all step up to the plate and do what is necessary to save more BARC animals.
UPDATE FEBRUARY 2010
We have discovered that the proposed site for the animal campus at Gragg Park is also completely within a designated flood plain. This is yet another reason that we oppose this site for an animal campus. It would be foolish to put many animal and human lives at risk by building housing for the animals in a location that could easily flood during the next heavy storm or hurricane in Houston.
Many of us still remember the fiasco surrounding Hurricane Gustav in which we received emails informing us that all animals left at BARC after 7:00 pm that day would be killed since BARC did not know if employees would be able to get into BARC the next day. This caused much panic among volunteers, fosters and rescues. It was only after many angry citizens bombarded BARC and the Mayor's office with calls that this edict was changed. We do not want to risk another repeat of this nightmare.
Councilmember Rodriguez has met with the community around the proposed location in order sell them on a children's park and additional park trails. It should be noted that we have no objection to building a children's park, dog park or hiking trails at this location.
Our opposition is solely to the building of a pet adoption facility there.
Flood plain maps are shown below.
The proposed location for the pet adoption center is across the street from Gragg Park (the area in the green box). As you can see this location is ENTIRELY IN BLUE i.e flood plains.
Gragg Park
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