FEBRUARY 25, 2022 UPDATE

Effective Saturday, March 5, 2022, the Front Street Animal Shelter will be open for adoptions and stray intake from 12 pm to 5 pm, 7 days a week, with or without an appointment.

In addition, we will continue to partner with our community members and ask them to assist us in finding pet owners before surrendering pets to the shelter. Partnering with our community to help reunite pets with their owners saves shelter space for the animals that must enter the shelter because they are a danger to public safety, victims of animal cruelty, abandoned, sick, or injured and allows us to stay within our capacity to provide humane care to shelter animals.

JANUARY 20, 2022 UPDATE

Due to a COVID-related shortage of staff, we are highly encouraging appointments for stray animal drop off. Without an appointment, wait times will be at least 2-3 hours. An appointment can be made by calling 311 or 916-808-7387. However, if you find a stray (especially a lost dog) the best thing you can do for that animal is to hold onto it and make proactive efforts to find the owner, which our shelter doesn't have the ability to do for each animal coming through our doors.

Although studies show that 92% of stray dogs have a home, and that the majority are found less than a mile from home, most animals brought to shelters are never found. Bringing a lost animal to a shelter not only decreases their chance of being found, but also creates crowding in kennels and introduces the animal into a stressful environment where they often get sick and wait weeks or months for a new home.

By using our tips at CityofSacramento.org/found to house the animal and find the owner, you are drastically increasing the chances of reuniting the animal with their family, and saving lives at the same time. Owners are often located within 24-72 hours using these tips. We have begun using automated lost and found reports to make the process of finding the family even faster.

To prevent COVID transmission, we are also temporarily implementing appointment-only adoptions 7 days a week. We will be resuming walk-in adoptions on weekends once the surge in cases subsides.

We appreciate your understanding as we work through these difficulties.

JANUARY 7, 2022 UPDATE

After testing all symptomatic dogs in the shelter and dogs housed in close proximity to the dog that tested positive, all tests have come back negative. Based on this and an in-depth review with the UC Davis Shelter Medicine Program, we are updating our initial response:

• Because risk of transmission to healthy dogs in a home environment is minimal, UC Davis has advised continuing to allow dogs to be adopted and fostered to homes with other dogs. This will allow us to get the shelter as empty as possible – the most important step we can take to prevent disease. Out of an abundance of caution we will also be giving every dog an antibiotic shot that will further reduce the possibility of transmission.

• We will still be suspending intake of new dogs into the shelter through January 19th – an over-capacity shelter environment raises stress which lowers immune response and increases the transmission of many types of illness, which presents an opportunity for strep zoo to become established in vulnerable animals who were previously healthy.

Front Street Animal Shelter temporarily closes intake of stray dogs after one animal tests positive with dangerous infection

SACRAMENTO, CALIF. (JANUARY. 6, 2022) –- A dog at the Front Street Animal Shelter has tested positive with a highly contagious and dangerous bacterial infection, Streptococcus zooepidemicus, known more commonly as strep zoo. The bacteria cause hemorrhagic pneumonia, meaning infected dogs can start bleeding into their lungs and airways. Often, dogs in shelter environments are found deceased in their kennels before symptoms of strep zoo appear.

To prevent this deadly infection from spreading to other dogs, the shelter will not be accepting any healthy stray dogs for at least two weeks. This will help save lives as well as allow the shelter to get back to normal operations as soon as possible.

In December, Spokane County Regional Animal Protection Service (SCRAPS) went through a similar outbreak. SCRAPS closed to the public for two weeks and began treating dogs in its care, following shelter medicine protocols and best practices informed by veterinary infectious disease experts specialized in shelter medicine at the University of Florida’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

Front Street Shelter manager Phillip Zimmerman said he has seen this deadly infection in shelters before. "While managing the City of Stockton Animal Shelter, we also experienced a dog that tested positive for strep zoo,” he said. “Limiting the number of animals in the shelter is the most important step we can take to reduce a widespread outbreak of this disease," said Zimmerman.

The shelter is asking anyone who finds a healthy stray dog to attempt to locate the owners by posting to Facebook lost and found pets pages, Craigslist, Nextdoor and other lost pet sites, talking to neighbors, and hanging large found-pet posters in the area. These tips, and a link to create a found pet report, are available at cityofsacramento.org/found.

“Studies suggest that 92% of stray dogs have a home – right now we need the public to help those animals get back to those homes,” Zimmerman said. “Allowing the dog to enter the shelter could be dangerous for that dog.”

The Front Street Shelter will continue to respond to reports of sick, injured, and dangerous dogs, partnering with other local veterinary clinics and shelters to house and treat those animals.

The shelter is seeking emergency foster homes to temporarily house dogs to prevent the spread of the infection to dogs currently at the shelter, which is at capacity. “Reducing the number of dogs in the shelter helps stop the disease from spreading," Zimmerman said.

Because the disease is infectious to other dogs, fosters must not have any other dogs in the home. Community members can sign up to be emergency foster homes by visiting HelpFrontStreet.org.

Front Street will continue holding dog adoptions by appointment, but those dogs can only be adopted to homes that do not own other dogs and can be kept away from other dogs for at least 14 days.