CAMDEN COUNTY, Ga. — The future of stray pets in Camden County is up in the air after the humane society cancelled its partnership with the county.
The county is not taking in any strays until it can find an organization to partner with and the humane society is only taking some, but not as many as before as it becomes a no-kill shelter.
On June 30, just days before its contract renewal with the county took effect, the Humane Society pulled out of renewing its contract with the county.
"We were required to take anything in whether it was in bad health and injured. Dangerous dogs, feral cats, anything that came in the door," Board of Directors President Dave Brown said.
Brown says the contract was signed in May, but the county requested modifications for more control.
"They wanted to they wanted the authority to appoint two thirds or 66.7% which consisted of a County Administrator and private citizens that we apparently had no say in who they were going to appoint to our board. So we were not interested in that," Brown said.
County Administrator Shawn Boatright said the county simply wanted some representation on the Humane Societies board.
"It's a two-way street. It gives the board the opportunity to learn a little more about what's going on and that could be brought back to the board of commissioners to learn about further needs that maybe we're not understanding or maybe we are doing enough or shifting funds," Boatright said.
Brown says the episode showed it was best for the shelter to separate from the county altogether. Even though it will cost them about $13k a month in county money.
"For many, many years, we have tried to see how we could survive without the the income from the county. Now given the fact that we have some good, great donors and fundraising efforts, we are able to do that now, as we determined recently," Brown said.
Now, the county is tasked with finding an alternate place to bring strays.
"The county has also been in communication and negotiation with bestfriends.org which is a national organization for a TNR program to identify ways to reduce the stray cat population, and on the dog side, it will be with our local communities," Boatright said.
The county says animal control says while it will continue to euthanize problem dogs it will not accept other animals. The Humane Society is still open and accepting strays from the public, just not the county.