Item 7: Draft Recommendation - Animal Welfare Policies and Marketing Priorities — original pdf

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BOARD/COMMISSION RECOMMENDATION Animal Advisory Commission Recommendation Number: (20250811-7): Animal Welfare Policies and Marketing Priorities WHEREAS, spay neuter surgeries are critical services provided to the community to stabilize and ultimately reduce shelter intake of unplanned litters of kittens and puppies; and WHEREAS, the City of Austin contracted with Greater Good Charities to provide high-quality, high-volume community spay/neuter services for up to seven (7) free clinics for the residents of Austin and Travis County with the goal of up to 1,200 animals spayed/neutered for each clinic; and WHEREAS, during each of the four (4) prior clinics the maximum goal of 1,200 animals spayed/neuterd per clinic was not met; and WHEREAS, when significant efforts by the public to assist with marketing the clinic resulted in an excellent turnout for the fifth clinic held in July 2025; and WHEREAS, when Austin Animal Center worked with all their partners and increased marketing efforts it also contributed to the success of the fifth clinic. NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT the Animal Advisory Commission encourages the Austin City Council to support the following marketing recommendations to ensure continued excellent turnout for future spay neuter clinics by: 1. Recommending Austin Animal Center’s marketing team find new and creative ways to encourage participation in the free spay neuter clinics by posting clinic information in the Austin Chronicle, requesting the site hosting the clinic to cross promote, requesting more media coverage both before and during the clinic, creating more variety in social media posts about the clinic, and reaching out to contracted nonprofits providing services for APH/HHS to promote the clinic. 2. Recommending Austin Animal Center’s Community Cats Program work with the Greater Good Charities/Good Fix team to determine how many community cats they can accept each clinic day and plan and work with volunteer trappers and community members to fill these slots. 3. Recommending Austin Animal Center’s customer service team promote the clinic by posting flyers outside the Pet Resource Center, distributing flyers to customers, including a link to clinic information in the auto-reply for all shelter emails, emailing clinic information to every pet owner who has reclaimed their pet intact, and harvesting emails from 311 requests for the past year and email flyers to those addresses. 4. Recommending Austin Animal Center’s outreach team reinstate their spay and neuter outreach efforts where they picked up and transported owned pets to be sterilized and vaccinated and returned to their owners. 5. Recommending Austin Animal Center’s rescue coordinator request more comprehensive marketing support from all rescue partners. 6. Recommending encouraging community members to help market the clinics by posting and distributing flyers to targeted mutual aid groups, local veterinarian clinics, apartment complexes, mobile home parks, neighborhood associations, and targeting areas close to the site of the clinic. Date of Approval: _____________________________ Record of the vote: (Include motion and second. Unanimous on a 7-0 vote, 4-3 vote with names of those voting no listed) Attest: _____________________________________________ (Staff or board member can sign)