LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Louisville’s oldest no-kill shelter, Animal Care Society, has enough kennel space to hold 30 dogs. However, most of the time, each of those spaces are occupied.
“We are always operating at capacity. You know our philosophy is if there’s an open kennel, that’s a life that we can save, so our kennels are full every single day,” Megan Gonterman, executive director of Animal Care Society said.
It’s why Gonterman, and leaders from other area shelters, are constantly looking for more people to become a foster.
“If we have foster homes, we are able to pull animals out of our shelter environment and then be able to intake those other animals, and so, you know, fostering I can’t say it enough, literally saves two lives,” Gonterman said.
Animal Care Society has around 15 consistent fosters. Gonterman hopes to double that number.
Sherry McKinney is one of the people Gonterman can rely on whenever there are cats needing a temporary home. McKinney has fostered for around 24 years and says she’s not sure exactly how many animals she’s cared for in that time. “Counted one time, and I had about, I could count about 300, but I’m sure there’s many more than that,” McKinney said.
Normally, McKinney says, she takes care of pregnant cats, but when currently she’s fostering three felines who are all under a year old. This selfless act keeps shelters from having to euthanize for lack of space, something Louisville Metro Animal Services was forced to do with one of their dogs in early January.
“It’s a lot, I mean we are literally at capacity like every day,” Destiny Mbachu, an adoption coordinator at Louisville Metro Animal Services, said. Since the beginning of the year, the city has taken in over 100 dogs. At one point Mbachu says, they had to line one of their building’s hallways with extra kennels.
Some good news though — that overflow space is no longer needed, but they are still asking for more people to sign up to take an animal in.
“We do want people to sign up. Please don’t be discouraged, but do understand that we are severely not staffed for the influx that we have,” Mbachu said.
Put simply, when more people are able to foster, it takes some of the pressure off places like animal services and Animal Care Society to help when the inevitable next call to help comes in.
You can sign up to foster with Animal Care Society here or with Louisville Metro Animal Services here.