A North Vancouver man’s report of a dog crying through the night at a local animal shelter has ignited a push from pet advocates to write into law how long shelter animals can be left alone.
Those concerns came into focus in late September, when Daniel Weidner posted online about hearing a dog, named Luna, crying overnight at a local animal shelter for more than a week.
“It was midnight all the way through until 6 or 7 a.m.,” Weidner told CBC News, after posting about Luna on Facebook.
While B.C.’s Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act (PCA) requires people responsible for animals to protect them from distress, it doesn’t set a maximum length of time that shelter animals can be left without staff on site.
That leaves staffing decisions to local shelters.
But some advocates want clearer rules and more oversight from the province.
Weidner’s post drew 10 more residents to the District of North Vancouver’s animal shelter that weekend, some offering to foster or adopt Luna, and others demanding the dog’s release.
After Weidner, far left, posted about a dog crying at the District of North Vancouver’s animal shelter, a group of residents, including Bunting, third from left, expressed their concern by showing up to the shelter on Sept. 27. (Submitted by Daniel Weidner)
One was Kelly Bunting, a volunteer dog walker at the B.C. SPCA’s West Vancouver centre, who filed a complaint after learning the senior dog she walked there, Clyde, was left without staff on site from 5 p.m. until 8 a.m.
“It was just breaking my heart when I would take him for a walk, then I would put him back in his kennel … I knew he was going to be in there until the next day. I couldn’t sleep and I couldn’t stop thinking about him,” she said.
The standards
Several animal shelters in B.C. told CBC News they don’t have staff scheduled on site overnight, with those periods ranging from roughly 10 hours to more than 16 hours.
In separate emails to CBC News, the District of North Vancouver said staff at its animal shelter typically leave around 5 p.m. and return between 8 and 9:30 a.m., while the B.C. SPCA confirmed staff are scheduled at its West Vancouver centre from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The B.C. SPCA also said in an email, “generally speaking” all its centres — a total of 37, according to its website — have staff on site for between eight and nine hours a day.
The B.C. SPCA and the district told CBC News Clyde and Luna have since been adopted.
A senior dog named Clyde stayed at the B.C. SPCA’s West Vancouver centre for seven weeks, according to the society. (Submitted by Kelly Bunting)
Both Bunting and Weidner want to see change.
Bunting said she hopes the province will write into law that shelter animals can’t be left unattended for more than 12 hour.
Weidner, meanwhile, has called for a top-to-bottom review of the North Vancouver shelter’s operations and policies around how animals are cared for.
The district wrote in an email that dogs in its care meet accepted standards used by shelters in the region.
The B.C. SPCA says its care standards meet and often exceed recommendations in the Association of Shelter Veterinarians guidelines, generally considered the benchmark of care in North America.
In Canada, animal shelters adopt best practices rather than rely on legal requirements, according to Maneesha Deckha, an animal law professor at the University of Victoria.
Those best practices, she said, are not always enforceable and often rely on goodwill, which is why she believes requirements for on-site staffing should be regulated by “animal-centred” law, valuing animals as relational beings.
What can change?
Rebecca Ledger, an animal welfare and behaviour scientist, said 15 hours alone can be tolerable for some dogs, but may cause stress for others.
She reviewed recordings Weidner took of Luna and said it sounded like a dog trying to get attention.
Ledger said most shelters are aware of issues that come with prolonged confinement, particularly overnight, but “many simply don’t have the resources to provide more care than they already do.”
According to animal lawyer Victoria Shroff, the issue doesn’t start at the shelter level, but with the lack of robust laws and systems in place.
She said it is “incumbent on the provincial government” to better fund animal welfare, and hopes the next government will form a task force to address gaps in care.
Provincial parties respond
The province said it would not comment while the provincial election is underway.
CBC News reached out to all five major provincial political parties and asked how, if elected, their governments would address concerns around staff supervision at animal shelters.
A spokesperson for the B.C. Conservatives said its government would work with the B.C. SPCA and municipalities to set enforceable standards, “including how long [shelter animals] can go without supervision.”
CentreBC Leader Elenore Sturko wrote in an email that her party would conduct a review of the province’s current animal welfare legislation, to strengthen laws and properly protect shelter animals.
The B.C. NDP, the B.C. Greens and OneBC did not respond by deadline.