Buggles, a pit bull mix with a tongue-forward smile, had skin infections across his face and body. Lilo faced death without immediate medical care. Markie’s new family received free dog food and preventive medicine after adopting the easygoing mutt.
All three stories reflect the work of Friends of Front Street Animal Shelter, a nonprofit established in 2001 to help animals at the city shelter. Last year, Friends brought in $750,000, mostly from individual donors.
The call came into the Wildlife Care Association in early September. A great horned owl was caught in a metal art structure at the Franklin Light Rail Station near Consumnes River College. The large bird of prey had been trapped for at least 24 hours.
Chris Lay, a Wildlife Care volunteer with eight years of experience, was first to respond. “He was alive, but there was no way to get him out,” she says.
It was a sweltering summer day in 2022 when county Animal Control Officer Jessica Solano responded to a call about a dog named Bowbii.
Bowbii, a 170-pound Caucasian shepherd living outside, was severely malnourished, immobile and covered with maggot-filled skin infections.
“It was the most challenging call I have ever done,” Solano says. “The dog needed urgent medical care and the owner had failed to provide that care.”
It’s illegal in California to deprive an animal of food, water or shelter.
It’s a crime to tether or chain a dog to a stationary object for longer than three hours in a 24-hour period. It’s against the law to allow that rope or chain to become entangled.
Are unhoused people exempt from these laws? Their dogs are denied food, water, shelter and the ability to move freely on a daily basis.
The questions were straightforward. Does Front Street Animal Shelter provide policies and protocols to 311 on how to respond to animal-related requests?
How do 311 call agents determine if a situation is serious enough to dispatch an animal control officer?
How does 311 address urgent situations when animal control is days behind responding to requests?
There is a hidden world in Sacramento, off the grid and unknown to most. Dogs in small cages or padlocked to trees and poles. Chains tangled with little room to move. Many without food, water or shelter.
These are the dogs of homeless camps.
“You know those commercials on TV?” Debbie Tillotson says. She’s talking about the heart-wrenching public service ads that expose the underworld of animal abuse. “You can easily insert Sacramento. This is your backyard, it’s the same thing.”