Uptick in Owner Surrenders Leaves DAS With Thousands More Animals Than Past Years

Dallas Animal Services is bursting at the seams, and city officials worry that one hoarding cruelty case could push the shelter over the limits.

According to shelter data available Friday afternoon, 436 dogs occupy 307 kennels, for a 142% capacity rate. The capacity for cats is topping 152%, with 144 felines taking up the 95 kennels. That overcapacity comes even though animals stay in the shelter for shorter periods than in years past, Paul Ramon, director of Dallas Animal Services, told the City Council’s Public Safety Committee last week.

A growing number of owners surrendering their pets has left animal caretakers scrambling. Last fiscal year, 28,000 animals moved through the DAS system, 4,000 more than the year prior.

Data through the end of April shows that 1,473 dogs and 590 cats have been surrendered to the shelter this year. Last year, those numbers were 1,605 dogs and 661 cats, but the pace accelerated in May, and Ramon warned that this fiscal year is on track to outpace the last.

“Our adoptions are up, our foster rescues are up, our transports are up. All of our outcomes are up,” Ramon told the committee. “It’s just that the number of animals that are coming in from the community has increased. So year over year, that’s been an impact.”

To buy the shelter some time, DAS has suspended the owner surrender program for the next few weeks. A statement from the department said the pause will help the shelter set up a triage-based appointment system that better prioritizes intake cases. Ramon said the. economy, conflicts with landlords, and health issues are leading drivers of why people choose to surrender their.

Across the United States, other municipalities are grappling with a similar problem.

Last month, Denver Westword found that the pet popularity boom of COVID-19 is now conflicting with rising veterinary costs and a growing number of renters. The Denver animal shelter has seen a significant increase in owner surrenders year over year since the pandemic. Dog surrenders alone have increased between 26% and 42% annually for the last few years, a trend expected to continue in 2025.

Shelters in Minnesota have reported the same phenomenon, pointing out that households making less than $75,000 are especially vulnerable to the compounding costs of pet ownership.

“[We try to offer] tools or resources that [owners] need to remove barriers,” Ramon said. “We try to divert as much as we can, but there’s a lot based on the economy, landlord issues.”

Still, owner surrenders don’t account for all of Dallas Animal Services’ problems. In certain areas of town, “an influx of puppies and kittens” is being reported, Ramon said. Those ZIP codes, which the director did not specify, will likely need additional resources from DAS and partner organizations to help slow reproduction numbers.

While owner surrender appointments made before this month will be respected, Ramon also urged Dallasites to seek other possible alternatives to bringing a pet to the shelter. DAS is also looking to move its animal cruelty resources to an off-site location, as the shelter does not have the “space or bandwidth” to handle the animals brought in as part of an investigation.

“Anything that we could do to encourage folks who are owners surrendering to rehome these animals through other means would be great,” Ramon said. “[The fear is] at any moment we could get a hoarding case with a large number of animals, and it’s going to significantly impact the shelter as it relates to those animals that are currently there that are lost, stray or owner-surrendered.”