Adoptions temporarily close at Wisconsin Humane Society Racine, Ozaukee, and Door County campuses
MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) -- In response to COVID-related staff and volunteer shortages, the Wisconsin Humane Society (WHS) announced effective immediately, Jan. 3, pet adoptions will solely be offered from their Milwaukee and Green Bay Campuses until further notice. Adoption services will not be available at their Racine, Ozaukee, or Door County Campuses for the time being.
“Early on in the pandemic, we tried this strategy and it allowed us to keep our doors open for animals in need despite unpredictable, limited staffing,” said Angela Speed, vice president of communications. “Unfortunately, COVID is heavily impacting our work once again, but this temporary shift will allow us to continue to care for animals and families in need of our support.”
Available animals from those campuses will be transported to Milwaukee, Green Bay, or foster homes for adoption placement.
Speed said this move is so they can concentrate their staff in more centralized places to help care for the more than 600 animals in their system.
She said most non-adoption related services will still be available everywhere.
"Of course we're still intaking surrendered and stray animals at our locations as well," said Speed.
She said while volunteering to do things like fundraising, adoptions and cleaning would be huge for them, choosing to foster an animal for short, or long-term, makes things easier for them too.
"If it doesn't work out, that's okay, we understand that not every animal is going to be a good fit for your home even for a short-term foster, but it certainly opens up space at a shelter for another animal in need," said Speed.
She said of the more than 600 animals in the system, around 250 are in foster care.
"So as you can see, foster makes a huge impact on our ability to serve hundreds of animals," said Speed." You get first dibs on an animal should you fall in love, we love foster failure stories and celebrate those as well."
They say as animals are moved, their location is updated live on their website, so it's easy to know if the animal is there or not.
They say they hope to get things back to normal in a few weeks.
To help keep shelter population low, if you're interested in opening up your hearts and homes to dogs, cats, rabbits and other small animals, there's more information here. Some of those animals may need time to recover from an illness or injury, or simply go to foster to make more room at the shelter for new arrivals.
WHS also has a Foster Facilitated Adoption Program in which foster parents can be trained to offer adoptions services themselves, thus freeing up staff members to focus their efforts on other animals in the shelter. Signing up to be part of the Rachael Ray™ Nutrish® Foster Program at the Wisconsin Humane Society is easy. Simply CLICK HERE to watch the online orientation, fill out the foster parent form, and WHS will be in touch to get you started.
WHS remains open at all locations for surrender intake by appointment, as well as stray intake in the counties in which they are the contracted agency to care for stray animals (which includes the majority of municipalities in Racine, Ozaukee, Door, and Brown Counties). For information on adoption hours or other services, CLICK HERE.