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Date:2/18/2025 12:22:49 PM
From:"Karen Vaughn"
To:"Public Comment" publiccomment@anaheim.net
Subject:[EXTERNAL] Public Comment to City Council (OC Register article on OC Animal Care )
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Did you happen to see the article in the OC Register? I've posted the link below, with excerpts, in case you didn't see it.
Why is the county not applying the Strategic Plan that we, the city taxpayers, have already paid for?
We don’t want any more of our money spent on a worthless “new” plan. And seriously, why sign another 10-year contract with the county on the
basis of a “new” plan, given that they didn’t respect the last one. What would that do?
If the county wants another contract from the cities, it should promise, in writing, to follow the existing Strategic Plan we already paid for.
Sincerely,
Karen Vaughn
OC Register: New plan for OC Animal Care: To boost survival, or dampen expectations?
https://www.ocregister.com/2025/02/16/new-plan-for-oc-animal-care-to-boost-survival-or-dampen-expectations/
Excerpts:
After all, JVR did the 2018 plan for a meaty $435,000; Mavrovouniotis and others don’t understand exactly why a new plan is needed at
all.
“We don’t need a revision of the strategic plan, we need implementation of the one we have,” he said.
The No. 1 goal was this: “Every animal in the shelter receives daily, varied enrichment.” Success meant that 100% of all healthy,
friendly dogs were in daily playgroups, and got in-kennel enrichment tailored for their needs; and that every adoptable cat was taken out
of its housing for enrichment at least three times a week, and that all cats got enrichment tailored for their daily needs.
That hasn’t exactly come to pass. Where are the regular public measures showing progress toward these goals? Where are the strategies
to meet them? Those have been hard to come by, and the shelter’s critics fear a new update will lead to a weaker, rather than stronger,
plan for saving animals.
Boyer suspects that the other organizations knew there’s nothing wrong with the original plan and didn’t bid because they didn’t think
they could do much better. “As a taxpayer, we have already wasted $500,000 on a strategic plan that was approv ed already. Why do we
have to waste yet more money on a weakened, less effective plan that is not as thorough and won’t achiev e very much at all and will
lessen standards at the shelter further?”
One potential bidder — who was initially excited about the contract — had heard rumors of dysfunction at OCAC and decided to bow
out.
“It seems like they need a lot more than strategic planning there,” said the non-bidder, who asked not to be named. “A strategic plan is
for when you have an idea of where you want to go and you need a road map of how to get there. This sounds lik e a business that needs
an overhaul. A root-cause analysis. We weren’t sure we’d be able to do a strategic plan update in good faith.”
“A ‘competitive’ bidding process?” Boyer said in a testy Facebook exchange with Foley. “You hav e ONE bid. How’s that competitive?
Obviously your ‘process’ was custom-made to block competition. None of the reputable shelter consultants were willing to lower the
standards, so you found one that will.”
Another commenter on that post said, “OK, the VERY FIRST metric in the Strategic Plan says: ‘One hundred percent of all dogs
qualified (retention met, healthy, friendly) are in daily playgroups….’ Have the standards changed? No. If anything, the consensus is
even stronger that this type of socialization is super important. Is OCAC doing this? No. Large dogs hav e near-zero playgroups.”
The county is using the “update” to delay accountability and lower the standards, that poster said.
Mavrovouniotis, for his part, can’t help but notice that the update comes as the county’s animal services contracts with 14 cities are set
to expire in 2026. Romina Yamashiro noted the same thing.
“Feels familiar.” she said. “My guess? They’re doing this now so they can use it as part of their pitch to the cities for contract renewal.
That’s essentially how they did it 10 years ago, and the timing lines up perfectly.”
Does the county really want a better shelter, critics wonder? We’ll be watching how this all unfolds. Clearly, others will be, too.