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Janet Ott, President of the Humane Society of Williamson County

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By Kara Vaught Friday, 21 November 2008

Q. What’s new at the Humane Society of Williamson County?: A. We’re really excited to announce we have a new executive director starting Nov. 24. Her name is Juliana de Rosa. She’s a longtime volunteer who comes to the job with a good working knowledge of our organization and all of the challenges she’s going to face. She’s really excited to fulfill her lifelong dream of working with an animal welfare organization, and we’re excited for her to join our team. She has a background of working with nonprofits in the arts community. Most recently, she’s been in a position of fund raising and corporate development with the Long Center in Austin.
Q. What are the executive director’s duties?: A. The executive director is in charge of the operations of the shelter, from A to Z. She’s responsible for the management of the employees, our volunteer program, the care and well being of all the animals in our care, the development and execution of all of our programs and services. She works directly with the board of directors. Part of her responsibility is bringing in the community to support our programs and services through volunteers and fund raising.
Q. We hear you have an anniversary coming up.: A. We’re about to celebrate our 30th anniversary in 2009, so we have planned a year-long celebration that is going to include promotions around pet adoptions and several fun events for our volunteers and community supporters. We invite the public to periodically check our website to learn more as we enter 2009 and begin that celebration. Right now, we’re starting the celebration with a 30/30 promotion, that any dog or pet that has been with the shelter longer than 30 days or weighs over 30 pounds, it’s $30 off. Our normal adoption fee is $95 for adult dogs and cats, and $120 for puppies and kittens. That includes them being spayed and neutered with all vaccinations and a microchip.
Q. Are those animals harder to adopt?: A. Typically yes. In general, we have more large dogs entering shelters across the United States. There is probably a bit higher demand for smaller dogs, so larger dogs tend to be more in quantity and stay longer.
Q. How is the society governed?: A. Our organization consists of the executive director and a couple managers. One manager is a medical supervisor who works closely with our vet to run our spay-neuter clinic and our vaccination clinic. Then, we have a kennel manager who is responsible for the intake of animals into our adoption program and obviously the care and feeding of the animals and their mental well being while they’re in our care. We also have a volunteer coordinator who coordinates all of our volunteers with our leadership positions. We have a variety of employees who help with customer service, adoption and animal care. The board is our governing body that sets the strategy for the organization and fund raising. We currently have 10 board members, and we are actively recruiting additional members. We would like to grow that to about 20.
Q. What kinds of people are you looking for to be board members?: A. We are specifically looking for folks who have marketing talent, general business development, strategic planning, finance experience, accounting, that sort of thing — basically, the gamut of business skills we need to help set the strategy and direction for the organization.
On average, our board members give anywhere from 10 to 30 hours a month. That includes attending board meetings and functions in the community to represent the organization. If people go to our website, www.hswc.net, there is a page on what we’re looking for with board members and the process for applying.
Q. Has the society been affected by the national financial situation?: A. Like most nonprofits, raising funds to keep the community programs and services that we do is always a challenge. But over the last few months, we’ve really been seeing more people having to give up their pets because they’re losing their job or losing housing. We’ve also seen that our adoptions overall have slowed down. The combination of seeing more owner surrenders and slower adoptions has driven the fact that our homeless dogs and cats are waiting a little longer at our shelter for new homes.
Because we are a limited-admission shelter, we keep our intake at about 100 animals at any one time, so when it takes longer for an animal to get adopted, it just doesn’t free up the space to take in a new homeless pet. Any time we have about 100 dogs and cats available for adoption and the length of stay is about 30 days, that’s a little bit higher than normal.
Q. Is there anything specific to holiday operation at the shelter that you could use some help with?: A. Monetary donations, especially in this economic time, are very appreciated. We spend about $190 per animal to prepare a dog or cat for adoption. That includes spay and neuter, surgery, vaccination, flea and tick treatment, microchip and their care and feeding while they’re with us. We’re always in need of supplies too. Volunteers are literally the backbone of our organization. Whatever an individual’s skill set or desire is, we can find a place to use them, and we need their help. We also offer a program where you can give a gift to the Humane Society in honor of someone else as well as gift certificates, which are another popular item during the holidays. If you’re thinking about adding a new family member, it’s really important to involve the entire family in that decision.
They can present the gift certificate at the holiday time and then come back with the whole family and choose the right pet for them.
Q. What is the process that people go through to adopt an animal?: A. Basically, they come out to the shelter, and depending on if you’re looking for a dog or a cat, you would meet with one of our adoption counselors to talk about your family lifestyle and what type of pet you’re looking for. They go through a process to match the pet characteristics with your family lifestyle. We have plenty of places for potential adopters to spend time with a dog or cat so that they can get to know them. If you currently have a dog at home, we have meet-and-greet pens where you can bring your dog and meet the new potential family member to make sure everyone gets along. We have a pretty extensive adoption counseling process just to make sure that it’s a good fit and that there’s a lifetime commitment to the decision.
Q. Do you offer resources on training and care of animals?: A. Our website has lots of good training tips. And by calling the shelter [people] can get referrals to different trainers in the community.
We offer once-a-month, low-cost vaccination clinics, so that people who do have pets, if they have some financial constraints, they can visit our clinic once a month and get those vaccinations at a very reduced cost. The next vaccination is Nov. 22 from noon-3 p.m. It’s first-come, first-serve.
We also run a low-cost spay-neuter clinic every Tuesday and Thursday and we have some free spay-neuter appointments available for qualified low-income pet owners. Just call our shelter at 260-3602 for an appointment. Most of the time we can get individuals an appointment within about a week.