Animal People News, July/August 2006, Annual Report: FIRST REGIONS WITH LOW-COST DOG & CAT STERILIZATION ARE STILL MAKING FASTEST PROGRESS ...The U.S. regions where the first low-cost and free dog and cat sterilization programs started, between 30 and 50 years ago, still are making the fastest progress in reducing the numbers of dogs and cats killed in animal shelters... Animal People News, July/August 2005, Annual Report: SHELTER KILLING DROPS AFTER UPWARD SPIKE The numbers of dogs and cats killed in U.S. animal shelters appears to have resumed a 35-year decline after a brief spike upward, according to the 12th annual ANIMAL PEOPLE review of shelter exit data. The overall rate of shelter killing per 1,000 Americans now stands at 15.5. Shelter killing is coming down in all parts of the U.S., but progress remains most apparent where low-cost and early-age dog and cat sterilization programs started first, decades ago, followed by aggressive neuter/return feral cat sterilization, introduced on a large scale during the early 1990s Regions with harsh winters that inhibit the survival of stray and feral kittens were usually killing more than 100 dogs and cats per 1,000 humans circa 1970. The U.S. average was 115, and the Southern toll (where known) soared above 250... ...The most remarkable new finding in the ANIMAL PEOPLE data analysis is that the percentage of unsterilized dogs and cats who have homes is now almost equal, in many locales, to the number killed in shelters per 1,000 humans. This quick-and-crude approach to estimating dog-and-cat reproductive potential may be more a recurring coincidence than a rule, and does not appear to hold up where the rate of dog and cat sterilization is known to be less than 70%, but it did hold up in every U.S. city where ANIMAL PEOPLE had both sterilization and shelter killing data. Seventy percent is the tipping point at which the remaining unsterilized animals cannot reproduce in excess of attrition, if the 70% sterilization ratio is maintained... Animal People News, July/August 2003, Editorial: SHELTER KILLING AND REGIONAL VALUES On page 17 of this edition ANIMAL PEOPLE presents our tenth annual casualty count in the 131-year-old battle by humane societies against dog and cat overpopulation. For the first 100 years after the Women's Humane Society of Philadelphia became the first U.S. humane organization to take an animal control contract, there was no visible progress. Even after the numbers of dogs and cats killed in U.S. shelters and pounds began to fall in the early 1970s, there was little recognition of improvement. The numbers everywhere were still higher than almost anyone could bear to study in any kind of depth... ...Fresno, California, is a university town. Located just a two-hour drive from San Francisco, whose shelters killed just 2.5 dogs and cats per 1,000 residents in 2002, Fresno in 2002 killed 80 dogs and cats per 1,000 humans, for a total of more animals killed than New York City, and only 500 fewer killed than every shelter in Oregon combined. Obviously not enough people in Fresno know or care what becomes of homeless animals. Thus there is inadequate funding for low-cost and free dog and cat sterilization, rehoming, and humane education. One might also speculate that the people running the Fresno shelters have inhaled too much carbon monoxide while killing animals in such appalling numbers, thereby sleeping through the lessons of the past 30 years. A regime change appears to be decades overdue. A deeper answer, also applicable to most other laggard communities, is that Fresno is a rural hub rather than part of a megopolis, separated from San Francisco less by miles than by a deep cultural divide... ...The low Northeastern and D.C. area figures appear to result from... a relatively strong humane infrastructure to encourage neutering... Animal People News, May 2003, Chronology of the Humane Progress ...1970 - Dog and cat killing in U.S. pounds and shelters peaked in frequency at 115 per 1,000 human citizens. By 2002 it was down to 15.7 per 1,000. Steep drops followed public acceptance of sterilization of pet dogs during the 1970s, sterilization of pet cats during the 1980s, and sterilization of feral cats during the 1990s. How rapidly the numbers can fall onse high-volume dog and cat sterilization begins is especially evident in North Carolina, whose shelters in the mid-1980s were killing 238 dogs and cats per 1,000 humans, but by 2000 were killing 35 per 1,000 - still, however, more than twise the U.S. average. Gross numbers of animals killed in U.S. shelters are less indicative than rates per 1,000 humans because of human population growth, but also show a steep decline, from circa 23.4 million in 1970 to 17.8 million in 1985 to 4.4 million in 2001. Animal People News, regional data of shelter killing published in 2003, 2005 and 2006: Region/Year/Residents/Animals killed/Animals per 1,000 of people New York City 2005 8,086,000 21,171 2.6 New York City 2001 8,009,000 36,500 4.6 Los Angeles 2005 9,638,000 38,000 3.9 Los Angeles 2003 9,638,000 83,780 8.7 San Diego 2004 2,931,000 17,421 5.9 San Diego 2002 2,863,000 14,019 4.9 NEW JERSEY 2003 8,638,000 50,637 5.9 NEW JERSEY 2000 8,414,000 48,551 5.8 Chicago 2005 2,869,000 19,706 6.9 Chicago 2002 2,896,000 30,000 10.4 Pittsburgh 2003 1,261,000 10,907 8.6 Pittsburgh 2001 1,270,000 12,000 9.5 OREGON 2002 3,560,000 33,132 9.3 OREGON 2001 3,421,000 40,505 11.5 UTAH 2005 2,352,000 33,854 14.4 UTAH 2004 2,352,000 36,121 15.4 UTAH 2003 2,233,000 31,072 13.9 UTAH 2002 2,233,000 39,772 17.8 VIRGINIA 2003 7,386,000 133,800 18.1 VIRGINIA 2001 7,079,000 32,978 18.8 Houston 2004 3,596,000 80,000 22.2 Houston 2000 3,400,000 74,825 22 Bakersfield, CA 2005 676,000 16,700 24.7 Bakersfield, CA 2003 676,000 22,500 33.3 NORTH CAROLINA 2004 8,407,000 236,327 28.1 NORTH CAROLINA 2002 8,407,000 265,289 31.2 NORTH CAROLINA 1999 7,547,000 264,150 35 San Antonio 2003 1,418,000 50,000 35.3 San Antonio 2001 1,393,000 46,000 33