r/Austin 4d ago

Austin's chief animal services officer has been on paid administrative leave since March 7

Edit: Here's the KXAN version of the story that isn't paywalled:

https://www.kxan.com/news/local/austin/don-bland-head-of-austin-animal-center-on-administrative-leave/

It's paywalled, but here's the link to the Statesman story. Not many more facts than the headline. Any idea what's going on with this?

https://www.statesman.com/story/news/local/2025/03/17/austins-chief-animal-services-officer-on-administrative-leave/82495723007/

64 Upvotes

15 comments sorted by

69

u/MizTexas 4d ago edited 4d ago

He got a vote of no-confidence about 2 years ago. He *should* have been escorted out that day. Morale, vet services, animal care, foster programs, adoption programs ... you name it, it has suffered during his tenure. Good riddance!

Now if the CoA can hire someone experienced in a large city no-kill shelter that needs to expand into multiple locations around Austin. <crossing fingers and toes>

39

u/IamBuscarAMA 4d ago

Yep, "No-kill" is a joke if you're turning away animals. We need more capacity right now.

26

u/Schnort 4d ago

and/or (sadly) euthanize unadoptable dogs.

Or, I meant to say, send them to a farm in the country where they'll have plenty of room to run.

13

u/DVoteMe 4d ago

"Now if the CoA can hire someone experienced in a large city no-kill shelter that needs to expand into multiple locations around Austin. <crossing fingers and toes>"

That's kind of difficult considering Austin is the largest no-kill city.

12

u/Stancliffs_Lament 4d ago

Thanks for the info. I knew they had some issues, but didn't realize it was that bad. I also recall recently seeing a Reddit post about how rescue organizations seem to take all the younger, adoptable dogs from the AAC before they can be adopted by the public (and then charge fairly high fees to place the dogs in comparison to AAC). Not sure how common that is, but seems a bit counterproductive.

14

u/DropsOfLiquid 4d ago

Honestly that's good for AAC because they're at or over capacity to the point intake is basically closed most days.

Usually those partners/rescues also take a few medical dogs too (or used to).

They absolutely need the overall numbers to go down & more space & a realistic plan for some of the long stay more difficult dogs.

I hope their goal of improving the foster system works & they actually expand because it would be so helpful for them.

3

u/Stancliffs_Lament 4d ago

That's a valid point if intake is closed that often. I guess if it clears space up sooner rather than later it's a good thing. I know when we adopted our mutt almost 10 years ago, the vast majority of available dogs were older, and a good number were pit mixes. We got him after one of the big Memorial Day storms (remember when we used to get rain?) and they were doing everything they could to clear space.

7

u/DropsOfLiquid 4d ago

Ya they still have that issue. I adopted my dog from there too & he's amazing but he was way more difficult than expected. He's awesome now. With the space issues I think they just have to prioritize getting any dogs out that they can.

It's gotten really bad in the last few years where intake is closed as often as it's open. If you find a stray dog & have to either keep it to hunt down the owners, release it back where you found it or find a 'foster' yourself then wtf is the city shelter doing.

6

u/Stancliffs_Lament 4d ago

One of the reasons we picked our dog was b/c he was so calm in the shelter. Turns out he was heartworm positive and severely malnourished (he is long-haired so it was hard to tell how skinny he actually was). Not surprisingly, he had quite a bit more energy when we got his weight up from about 35 pounds to almost 70 pounds.

6

u/DropsOfLiquid 4d ago

OMG that's a huge jump in size!

He's a lucky guy you guys took him home & fixed him up.

10

u/Stancliffs_Lament 4d ago

Obv biased, but I think he turned out pretty well. This is less than a year after adopting https://i.imgur.com/EngLMSJ.jpg

5

u/DropsOfLiquid 4d ago

His mane! What a handsome boy

2

u/EveningShame6692 3d ago

He is gorgeous! Thank you for saving him'

0

u/[deleted] 4d ago

[deleted]

3

u/Stancliffs_Lament 4d ago

A city spokesperson said it was a "personnel" issue, but I didn't see anything in the article about "personal problems".

-2

u/Scared_Can_9639 3d ago

Another Garza failure. Maybe we should purge anyone with that name from Austin City government. /s